As a physician-technologist, I've faced countless hurdles over the years—whether financial, operational, or resource-related—while developing new healthcare innovations. One that echoes loudest was when our company lost our CTO (and only engineer at the time) due to a devastating family emergency immediately after an investment round. Instead of celebrating the victory of closing the funding round, I was forced to think outside the box and come up with a solution to keep our small group of paying pilot customers happy and move the business forwards despite this huge setback. This is what forced me to learn about how you can drive traction without actually having a product and focus on the one thing that really matters before investing time, energy and money on building the solution: Validating your business model.
Rather than being hindered by the challenges that invariably arise during the innovation process, I’ve found that they often push you to think more creatively, focus on priorities, and devise efficient solutions. Learning to work within limitations has been one of the most valuable lessons in my career, often turning obstacles into opportunities for groundbreaking innovation.
Peter Drucker, the father of modern management, put it best when he said, “Innovation is the specific instrument of entrepreneurship. The act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth” (Drucker, P., Innovation and Entrepreneurship, 1985).
Constraints don’t have to hold you back; they can, in fact, ignite the spark for innovation.
Using Limitations as Fuel for Innovation
A famous example comes from Apple during the late 1990s. On the verge of bankruptcy, the company brought back Steve Jobs, who made bold decisions by drastically cutting the product line and focusing on core innovations such as the iMac and iPod. Instead of dwelling on the lack of resources, Jobs concentrated on how to maximize impact with what they had, leading to Apple's resurgence as one of the world’s most valuable companies.
In healthcare innovation, I’ve experienced similar situations where constraints can drive creativity. Whether it's finding ways to implement new health technology on a tight budget or navigating complex regulations, working within limits often leads to more effective, long-lasting solutions. Clayton Christensen, author of The Innovator’s Dilemma, emphasised that “Challenges drive creative problem-solving, leading to breakthrough innovations. A lack of resources pushes companies to think differently” (Christensen, C. M., The Innovator’s Dilemma, 1997).
Research by Zhu and Furr (2016) further supports this idea, showing that companies operating under tight resource constraints tend to develop more innovative and focused solutions. Their findings highlight that constraints force companies to address core problems, leading to greater impact.
Avoid the Innovator Bias: Don’t Rush to Build
Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of rushing to build a product or service as soon as they have an idea. I’ve seen it firsthand—entrepreneurs who hastily pour resources into a project without understanding the true needs of their target audience. I was guilty of this too before being forced to push my business ahead without an engineer in the team as described above.
This tendency, known as the Innovator Bias, often results in building products that don’t match what customers actually want. As Steve Blank, a pioneer of the Lean Startup movement, wisely said: “No plan survives first contact with customers.” The real challenge is validating customer needs before diving into product development.
Supporting this view, Cohen and Hochberg (2014) found in their research that startups which focus on lean experimentation and early customer feedback have a much higher likelihood of success. Rather than building first, it’s crucial to validate ideas early, which is where limitations can actually help narrow your focus and prioritise what’s most important.
Turning Challenges into Opportunities
The solution to overcoming challenges lies in shifting your mindset. Instead of viewing limitations as barriers, consider them an opportunity to refine your approach and focus on what truly matters. Whether you’re facing tight budgets, limited personnel, or time constraints, ask yourself:
As both Clayton Christensen and Peter Drucker have stressed, limitations don’t hinder innovation—they fuel it. By concentrating on solving core problems first, these challenges become the stepping stones for breakthrough solutions.
How to Build What People Want Without the Final Product
Facing a lack of resources—whether it’s time, money, or personnel—doesn’t mean you can’t move forward. In fact, such constraints can encourage more strategic thinking. Instead of asking how to get more resources, the real question is: How can I build what people want without the full product?
Peter Drucker once highlighted that innovation is about making the most out of what you have. Start with the offer, not the finished solution. The key is to test your assumptions with potential customers early and often, using simple prototypes or mockups.
By starting with an offer, you can prioritise the riskiest market and customer assumptions first, allowing you to define the right solution—whether it's a minimum viable product (MVP) or another version. This approach saves time and money by ensuring you're solving the right problem before developing the entire solution.
Leverage Constraints for Problem-Solution Fit
Building a product before fully understanding the problem is a surefire way to miss the mark. Constraints help focus efforts on finding a true problem-solution fit. Research by George and Bock (2011) shows that businesses operating under constraints are more likely to rethink their models and processes, leading to a competitive edge.
In my experience, this process has been vital. Constraints force you to be lean and intentional with every decision. On one recent project, we achieved early traction not by building a complicated product, but by testing a simple offer with a small group of users. That feedback helped us refine the product and avoid costly mistakes down the road.
Conclusion: The Key to Success Is Focus
By working within your limitations, you can achieve more with less. Whether in healthcare, technology, or any other industry, the key to breakthrough innovation lies in leveraging challenges to your advantage. My own experiences have shown that focusing on early validation and customer feedback before developing the full solution ensures that time and resources are used wisely.
Constraints, when viewed in the right light, are not roadblocks—they are opportunities to create something that truly meets the needs of your audience. The next time you face a challenge, remember: it’s not a limitation, but an opportunity to build something that people genuinely need.
References:
Christensen, C. M. (1997). The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail. Harvard Business Review Press.
Drucker, P. (1985). Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Harper & Row. George, G., & Bock, A. J. (2011). The business model in practice and its implications for entrepreneurship research. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 35(1), 83-111.
Zhu, F., & Furr, N. R. (2016). Innovation under resource constraints: A behavioral theory of innovation. Strategic Management Journal, 37(8), 1765-1781.
Cohen, S., & Hochberg, Y. V. (2014). Accelerating startups: The seed accelerator phenomenon. SSRN Electronic Journal.
Blank, S. (2012). The Startup Owner’s Manual. K & S Ranch.
