Build a VAST business model

Entrepreneurship is 1)the pursuit of opportunity, 2) under VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) conditions 3) with the goal of creating multiples of user defined value, 4) through the deployment of innovation, 5) using a VAST profitable business model 6) to achieve the sextuple aims.

A business model is the plan implemented by a company to generate revenue and make a profit from operations. The model includes the components and functions of the business, as well as the revenues it generates and the expenses it incurs. A key step for startups and scaleups is to create a business model and validate the underlying assumptions as quickly and as cheaply as possible.

A startup is a temporary organization designed to create a repeatable, scaleable business model.

However, there are many options when it comes to creating a model and a startup entrepreneur must decide which to deploy and test. By applying certain screens or criteria to your model, you can make it VAST:

1. Validity Regardless of which elements of your model you choose, they have to be valid. In other words, the dogs must eat the food. When the dog won't eat the food, you'll have to change your approach and try again. Be sure that based on evidence, interviews, and tests that your underlying business model hypotheses are not just technically and commercially valid, but clinically valid too.

2. Automaticity/Adaptability At the very start of planning your venture, you should think about how you are going to work on your business, not in it. Reducing hands on time to manage operations will give you more time to lead the company, create strategies for growth, and give you more personal time to enjoy the fruits of your success. Outsourcing, automating, adapting or using technologies to ramp up operations, sourcing and distribution is a key part of scaling, and something that investors want to see...which brings us to the next piece. Given the rapid pace of change and unexpected events, your team will also need to explore and exploit your the model.

3. Scalability Your business model is primarily a way to create a business machine that can produce an infinite number of products. Think of it as a device that takes in customers and creates profits on the other end and can do so at quicker and quicker speeds.

4. Time and Traction Finally, your model needs to create as much profit as quickly as possible with a growing customer base that is loyal to your brand. You also need to create speed to value before you run out of funding.

The building blocks of any business have to do with problem seeking, problem solving, a team that can create and deploy a VAST business model and exit. The main reasons why businesses fail are that they don't make products customers are willing to buy, the business model is not viable, or the team is not effective. In addition, due to the nature and culture of sick care, you need to overcome significant regulatory, adoption and evidence-based hurdles.

If you want to accelerate, build a machine that will respond to the accelerator. It's that long pedal on the right.

Arlen Meyers, MD, MBA is the President and CEO of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs on Substack