Steve Blank (The Four Steps to the Epiphany) discusses killing innovation with corner cases and consensus:
I was visiting a friend whose company teaches executives how to communicate effectively. He had just filmed the second of a series of videos called, Speaking to the Big Dogs: How mid-level managers can communicate effectively with C-level executives (CEO, VP’s, General Managers, etc.) As we were plotting marketing strategy, I mentioned that the phrase “Speaking to the Big Dogs” might end up as his corporate brand. And that he might want to think about aligning all his video and Internet products under that name.
We were happily brainstorming when one of his managers spoke up and said, “Well, the phrase ‘Big Dogs’ might not work because it might not translate well in our Mexican and Spanish markets.” Hmm, that’s a fair comment, I thought, surprised they even had international locations. “How big are your Mexican and Spanish markets,” I asked? “Well, we’re not in those markets today… but we might be some day.” I took a deep breath and asked, “Ok, if you were, what percentage of your sales do you think these markets would be in 5 years?” “I guess less than 5%,” was the answer.
Now I mention this conversation not because the objection was dumb, but because objections like these happen all the time when you’re brainstorming. And when you are brainstorming you really do want to hear all ideas and all possible pitfalls. But entrepreneurial leaders sometimes forget that in startups, you can’t allow a “corner case” to derail fearless decision making.
A corner case, Blank explains, is technically reasonable and has some probability of occurring, but its probability of occurring is less than your probability of running out of money.