How Many Pies Do We Need?

Photo by FitNish Media on Unsplash

Having our “fingers in multiple pies” seems like a good idea when we’re starting out. 

Business environments are competitive, clients are demanding and surviving means doing whatever’s needed to make money. 

Practically, this translates to spreading our reach into as many domains as possible: serving multiple client segments, providing alternative services or delivering numerous iterations of our product or service to cater to varying demands. The rationale to do so is always the same: it’s necessary to reduce our risk and survive.

But all of this comes with tradeoffs. 

Going broad means spreading resources versus investing heavily in one. It means maintaining a wider range of capabilities instead of developing a specific focus area. 

But, by definition, it means you cannot really build a speciality that you’re known for i.e. known to be really good at.

Being really good at something requires material investment - of people, time, money, effort, resources, etc. The wider you spread these investments, the more you run the risk of spreading yourself thin. Actually, it’s more than simply a risk, it’s a real issue. 

And the consequent effect is that you don’t develop the depth you need to become the best in a specific area. Which means your customers don’t see you as such. Which is a problem.

Of course, there’s risk in this approach, too. Going ‘all-in’ on one specific area means if it doesn’t work, we’re in trouble. There’s no ‘fall back’.

But I’m not sure we have a choice. Markets are competitive. Customers are demanding. And there’s always someone ready to take your place. What we need the most are companies that do really good work at the things they’re really good at.

In my mind, that’s actually the best path for survival.