Resources

* 5 Whys video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmrAkHafwHI)
* Jason Fox TEDx Talk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69yQVlAD39c)

Sponsors
This episode is sponsored by Bluehost (http://www.raidspawn.com/bluehost).
Transcript
What is Raidspawn?

I'll be completely honest, at the moment, I wholly and honestly do not know. The path leading up to this point has been long, winding and most definitely tough. The original image was of an online hub where gamers could come together as a brand new community and find everything they needed about their latest video game. Evidently, that is not what Raidspawn has become yet and large corporations with huge budgets are already setting their targets on that.

As an example, just a couple of months ago I reported on the Raidspawn Video Game News Podcast that Microsoft, yes Microsoft, the owner of Xbox and Windows, were launching Game Hubs on their Xbox Platform as a place containing everything a gamer would need relating to the each title.

Of course, I could foolishly look at that as proof of concept and continue plodding on, yet with all of this new knowledge, that doesn't seem like the right thing to do.

I have read Sun Tzu's The Art of War and I still haven't scratched the surface of it's teachings, yet one that often pops into my head is the lesson to fight the enemy where they aren't. This one sticks out to me right now and is bouncing around in my head telling me that I should pivot away from this goal and search deeper.

During his time at the Toyota Motor Corporation, Sakichi Toyoda created a process known as the Five Whys. This process was later presented to the entrepreneurial community most famously by Eric Ries, author of The Lean Startup, which is where I first heard about this approach a few years ago.

This technique is extremely powerful and many believe it was one of the primary factors in Toyota's success in the automobile industry, allowing them to progress and innovate at an unmatched level of efficiency and excellence.

Here is a clip from the Harvard Business Review YouTube channel, which features Eric Ries explaining the technique and providing an example. If you would like to watch the entire video, there will be a link included in the show notes at Raidspawn.com/J2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmrAkHafwHI

While I have known about this powerful technique for quite a while and is something I have explored from time to time, I hadn't yet applied it to this business and I think now is definitely the time. It is time for me to answer a few tough questions so that this business can move forward and become successful.

If I don't know why or even what I am building, then how can I hope to succeed? If I drove a car without a destination and with a blindfold on for no reason, where would I end up? Honestly, I have absolutely no idea but chances are, it wouldn't be somewhere successful.

First, I need to understand why I am spending so much of my life, working so hard.

Why did I start a business?

I started a business to become successful.

Why do I need a business to be successful?

I needed a business because while I can become extremely good at my job, I will never be able to transcend beyond it and will always be limited by the limitations of the company.

Why do I feel limited?

I feel limited because I have little power to make decisions or to be creative and innovative.

Why do I want to be creative and innovative?

I want to be recognized for creating something truly great that people will really enjoy.

Why do I care if other people enjoy it?

Because seeing other people happy is what makes me happy.

I will be honest with you, this is scary stuff. As I ask myself these questions, I am uncovering truths about myself I didn't, in a way, know myself. We all seem to live in the upper two why's and use those reasons to defend our actions and beliefs, yet once you dig deeper, much deeper,