Identify, Solve, Scale
Deconstruct entrepreneurship into three moves and start with a notepad
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~months to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- 90%
Bloom's claim is that the single greatest obstacle people face is over-complicating what entrepreneurship means. All it means is that you solve problems for people, create value, and receive value in return. Deconstructed, it's three moves: identify a problem, create a solution, scale that solution — and the more scalable the solution, the more money you make. Distilled to that, it feels simple, because at any moment you're only working on one of three things. The starting move is deliberately mundane: take a notepad, walk around for a week, and write down every problem you perceive in the people around you. What you don't do is write a business plan — Bloom calls that a joke. You don't need a plan, you need evidence you can do it, and evidence comes only from action. You have to go do the thing; you can't talk about it or brainstorm it. And the motivation sequencing inverts: you act, then you become motivated.
Origin
Bloom had, by his account, no entrepreneurial bone in his body — his father is a professor, he played baseball as a kid, and he's very risk-averse. He started a newsletter in May 2021 with no monetization plan and no strategy, and reverse-engineered the model from what actually worked.
Core principles
- 01Entrepreneurship is just solving problems for people and receiving value in return.
- 02You can't plan entrepreneurship — a business plan is a substitute for action.
- 03You need evidence, not a plan: proof you can do the thing.
- 04The more scalable the solution, the more money you make.
- 05Motivation is a byproduct of movement, not a prerequisite for it.
- 06Over-complication is what makes most people do nothing.
How to run it
- 1
Strip the definition back
Entrepreneurship means solving problems for people and receiving value in return. Structure, business plans, and social-media big questions are noise that lose sight of that.
Pro tip Bloom's reassurance: 'if I can do it, anyone can do it because I was not wired for this.'
Watch out Over-complication is not diligence. It's the mechanism by which people do nothing.
- 2
Walk around with a notepad for a week
Write down every problem you perceive in the people around you that you interact with. This is literally where Bloom says he'd start if he had to create a new business today.
Pro tip Don't filter for good ideas during collection. Collect first, judge later.
- 3
Design a solution
For a problem worth serving, ask how you might solve it for that person — with a service, a product, or something you can put out.
- 4
Create evidence, not a plan
You need evidence that you can do it, created by taking a little bit of action. Go do the thing — you can't talk about the thing or brainstorm the thing.
Pro tip Ship whatever bad version of it looks like. The answers become clear once you start moving.
Watch out A business plan for your first thing is, in Bloom's words, sort of a joke.
- 5
Do the arithmetic on your first evidence
When the first small proof lands, extrapolate it. That's the moment a path becomes visible — and the path is what makes the effort sustainable.
Pro tip Bloom's $500 sponsorship became: two a week is $1,000 a week, $4,000 a month — and suddenly there was a business.
- 6
Ask how the solution scales
How would you reach more people? Through the internet, through social, through whatever means. The more scalable the solution, the more money you make.
In the wild
Bloom launched his newsletter in May 2021 with no monetization plan and no strategy — he just started writing it, sending out what he'd been posting on Twitter since May 2020. By the end of that first month he had around 15,000 subscribers. He texted a startup founder he knew and asked if he'd want to sponsor one. The founder said sure and paid $500. That was the evidence. Bloom's arithmetic: one a week makes $500; two a week is $1,000 a week, $4,000 a month — and if I scale it, this could be something.
→ The newsletter now reaches a little over 800,000 people twice a week and anchors a media business, a holding company, and a venture fund.
Bloom quotes the ancient poet Rumi: as you start to walk on the way, the way appears. His reading is that as an entrepreneur you cannot figure it out standing still. You start to walk and then the path becomes clear. That has been the story of everything he's done — he starts moving, does whatever bad version of the thing looks like, and only then do the answers start to become clear. He pairs it with an inversion: motivation is a byproduct of movement. You don't need to be motivated to act; you need to act, and then you become motivated.
→ A general operating rule that dissolves the planning paralysis at the front of every venture.
Common mistakes
Writing a business plan first
You don't need a plan to launch your first thing, you need evidence — and evidence comes only from action. The plan is a way of feeling productive while doing nothing.
Waiting to feel motivated
The causality runs the other way. Motivation is a byproduct of movement — your energy put out into the world literally creates it.
Brainstorming the thing instead of doing the thing
You have to go do it. Talking about it and brainstorming it produce no evidence, and evidence is the only currency at this stage.
Is it for you?
Best for
People with no entrepreneurial background who want to start but don't know where to begin.
Not ideal for
Capital-intensive or heavily regulated ventures where a real plan genuinely must precede action.
From the transcript
“it is identify a problem, create a solution, and then scale that solution. The more scalable the solution, the more money you will make.”
“You need to create evidence. You need to create evidence that you can do it, which is just done by taking a little bit of…”
“Motivation is a byproduct of movement.”
From the episode
Sahil Bloom: How Entrepreneurs Build Real Wealth Beyond Money
Sahil Bloom