Stone Soup
How the childhood fable is the key to KingFit’s recent success.
Stone Soup…chances are you heard this fable in grade school but at the time, like most people, you may have not understood the significance. To make a short story shorter, here is a quick outline.
Some soldiers come across a village while looking for food. The soldiers began knocking on doors telling the householders that they were planning a magnificent feast! Tonight, they would be making stone soup.
Having never heard of stone soup before, the villagers were very interested. Stone soup? This I HAVE to see!
As the soldiers made their way from door to door, more and more villagers followed them on the path to the town center. Finally, the preparation was about to begin. But first! In order to create the stone soup, the soldiers would need a pot, some firewood and some water to boil.
Interested in seeing the stone soup, some villagers volunteered.
I have a pot! I have some firewood! I’ll fetch the water!
As the water began to boil, the soldiers placed a few large stones into the pot. One soldier said, “You know what would make this stone soup really good? Some potatoes and carrots.”
Two villagers volunteered their potatoes and carrots. After-all, they had never witnessed stone soup in their lives.
Next, the villagers began sharing ideas on how to make the stone soup better. The villagers offered bread, broth and bowls so that everyone could enjoy the stone soup together.
In the end, the only thing that the soldiers did was create the idea of stone soup and the villagers supplied everything else that was necessary for a grand feast!
In their book BOLD, Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler state that stone soup is one of the major secrets to “Going Big, Creating Wealth and Impacting the World.”
This is a philosophy that we can testify as truth at KingFit. When we began down this path there were a few principles that I used to lead my decisions as CEO. Two of the major principles:
#1: Become again like a child. Understand that I know NOTHING.
#2: Leverage the fable of Stone Soup to mold the vision into a feasible business strategy.
Too often I witness entrepreneurs who are stuck in their ways. Obsessed with their own ideas. These entrepreneurs are quick to dismiss ideas from the outside world and are not flexible in how they will reach their destination. I believe this is a mistake.
In order to leverage stone soup you must be humble, open to new ideas and willing to take constructive criticism from many different people. This is the hardest part of stone soup BUT when you can do it, your idea will benefit greatly!
We started out with a vision to create an application for people with diabetes. We knew we wanted to have X, Y and Z features. We knew we wanted to somehow connect the greatest coaches to the people in underserved communities. We knew we wanted to have spectacular design…but we didn’t know the important details. We didn’t have the pots, the bread or the potatoes.
Luckily, the book BOLD “coincidentally” landed in our book shelf and we began leveraging the power of stone soup.
We spoke with healthcare professionals, game experts, lawyers, accountants, designers, motivational coaches, janitors, teachers, family members and anyone else willing to hear our tale of stone soup.
We supplied the passion and the villagers supplied everything else.
Today, we are blessed with a beautifully designed application, four industry-leading expert diabetes educators, a team of sophisticated investors, our first potential major customer and beautiful office space.
Oh! Don’t let me forget about our amazing full-time team!
- Dillon Noller, CCO
- William Markus, Community Manager
- Jonathan Bonczyk, Engineer
- Tyler Rambo, Creative Director
- Collins McDonald, Lead Producer
- Daniela Diaz, Motion Graphics Designer
- Tristan Noller, Content Creative
What got us to this point? Stone soup! Our ability to share our vision and listen. Have you ever experienced stone soup in your life? Let us know in the comments!
Thank you for reading!
