So last night with my laptop on the kitchen table I finished my spreadsheet. The one where I outline carefully all the expenses and all the income that would be associated with my latest entrepreneurial venture. Precise numbers only, based on solid and sound research, no rounding, everything just right and true.

Then I did that fancy "click and drag the column values down" thing for all the columns and set up my projections. How much would I need to sell in order to reach my income goals? How much to break even? How much to make it worth the effort? Tweak the sales price, tweak the quantities, tweak but don't dream.

So I did all that, and something quite interesting happened. I learned that my model is broken. Or rather that reality is askew of my expectations.

So I sent off some emails last night. Stop what you're doing, don't do anything else. Stop right there, something's wrong.

A few hours toiling with my spreadsheet, a little time wasted getting the column colors just right, but mostly productive work, researching, plugging in values, including absolutely everything, making it all complete. And when I was done, I was disappointed.

But not near as disappointed to learn it now before I've invested a great deal. Or as disappointed as i would have been to learn it "live" as things actually happened (or, didn't).

Then something very cool happened. And this is the part that makes being an entrepreneur so much fun. I started thinking. I added up all the expenses, one-by-one. What was eating into my profits? Is there a way to eliminate any of these expenses without compromising on the value I'd provide to my customers? Would it be possible to change my model and still do what I want, just as well as I want?

These were actually hard questions. The easy thing to do would be increase the price, but that would suppress sales, and wouldn't be fair, so that was out.

And then the light bulbs started coming on. Looking at all those expenses, looking at the ones that were hurting me the most, I started having ideas I could not have had without this data in front of me. As I looked at things it became clear that there might actually be a way to change my model, improve my profits, pass half of those gains onto my customers which would only increase sales, and do even better than my old expectations.

This is the moment I hadn't expected. This was the sweet side effect of doing due diligence. I'd had a stroke of genius looking at those rows and columns. And so it began. I started tweaking, get rid of these expenses, add this new one, take that one out. Run it again.

And there it was.

So last night was a fitful night. Another case of entrepreneurial insomnia. And this morning I'm looking at the spreadsheet again. Is there anything wrong with this picture? Will this really work? Am I leaving anything out?

It all still looks good. Solid. I'm going to do a bit more research today, but it looks like I'm on my way.

Last night, in the quiet hours before bed, I did my my due diligence, and the light bulbs came on. Innovation took a seat with me at the kitchen table and I remembered all over again why I love being an entrepreneur.