Entrepreneur as Information Gatherer
This article is a part of the book “How to Build Thriving Start-up Ecosystems: Five Information Patterns for Success.”
Humanity has long been a forager of information, for more information can lead to more food. Food — a mix of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins — supplies the body with calories that are vital for the body’s every function, from physical activity to maintaining internal processes like breathing and digestion (Westerterp). Millenia ago the information that was transferred between people was information on what game was plentiful nearby, or which mushrooms were edible versus poisonous.
As farming techniques advanced and more people could move away from subsistence farming, specialization of labor began. Now individuals might become glass blowers, leather workers, weavers, or smiths (Smith). This specialization of work demanded a way to transfer value between specializations, as people still needed to ultimately transfer their work for food. These tokens of symbolic value became known as currency (Mankiw).
As European craftsmen shifted from local to global activities, the products they made became more specialized than any one person could create and sell alone (Parker). When no one person could create the entirety of a product themselves, complex internal structures were created to organize work on specific components of a product or service. This structure of internal organized work to obtain and store value within a larger economic structure became known as a company (Smith).
Even though today’s automative, AI, SaaS, consumer goods, and health tech companies seem far removed from hunting and gathering or subsistence farming, companies still need to take in more stored value (money) than they expend. To do this a company’s founder must find a unique structure of marketing, revenue model, value production and retention that enables them to repeat the process again. This is the metabolic cycle of a company.
Entrepreneur as Forager
Animals adopt strategies that provide the maximum energy return for the least energy expenditure in their search for food (Stephens). Some animals alter their behaviors with the surrounding world to meet their energy needs, known as utilizing external behavioral patterns (Pyke). Many large cats and frogs adopted a sit-and-wait or ambush strategy that enables them to conserve energy by remaining motionless and waiting for prey to come within striking distance (Schoener). Hummingbirds take a different migratory approach, moving themselves south in the winter where food continues to be plentiful (Bairlein).
Other animals through the long process of evolution developed mechanisms to grapple with indeterminate food access known as internal behavioral patterns (Pyke). Bears build up fat reserves during times of abundance in the late summer to grapple with times of scarcity in the winter. Camels similarly store fat in their humps that can be metabolized into water when food and water resources are scarce (Schmidt-Nielsen).
Whether it is to change their behavior to the external world or slowly evolve energy storage within their internal structures, the efficiency of an animal’s energy usage is a critical factor in its survival and reproductive success (Schmidt-Nielsen).
Internal and external information structures in the entrepreneurial world might look a bit different. An external information structure for founders might include a marketing strategy that gains the attention of a new demographic, a sales strategy that converts more customers, or a new email outreach process that helps the company retain more previous customers. Developing efficient internal company structures might include a new development process that helps designers collaborate faster, or a new software program that helps developers build more with fewer people. A key role of a founder is to search for an efficient combination of internal structures and external behavioral patterns that pull in more energy than the company utilizes to enable their operations for another cycle.
Entrepreneurial Ecosystems
With the help of information patterns, the evolution of companies are not bound by the time scales of physical evolution. Founders can change their companies’ structures in weeks, even days to adapt to changing conditions within the organization or the wider market. A small tadpole can become a whale.
An important role for Community Information Designers is to create productive environments which help founders find sustainable company structures before they run out of resources to continue their search that can in turn create diverse economies with companies across a range of sizes and fields.
Productive ecosystems in the natural world include rainforests that can host a wide range of life due to their ample rainfall and warm temperatures, while coral reefs offer protection and nutrient-rich waters (Whitmore). In entrepreneurship, the breeding ground of successful companies are not crafted through dirt and water. Rather, they are spaces that have three core facets: the resources for founders to run initial tests, the ability to gain rapid feedback, and the ability to adapt their internal structures and external behaviors efficiently based on this feedback.
The Role of the Community Information Designer
Looking at entrepreneurship through this lens creates a deeper understanding of the role of the Community Information Designer (CID). What a CID might be doing is running workshops, accelerators, design labs, networking events, alumni panels, etc. But the underlying reason why is to develop an ecosystem where founders can achieve this goal of creation, feedback, and adaptation. Good CIDs create an environment where more companies can evolve faster.
Building thriving start-up ecosystems is an ever-evolving process, as CIDs must contend with larger geographic and technological structures and systems outside of their control and must adapt, just like the founders they work with.
