The overstory, the not-not, and the monkey

This is the third article in a series applying lessons from startups to other domains. If you are new to the newsletter, start with the first in the series, Focus on the monkey.

In the first article in this series, I argue the hardest problem, the “monkey,” isn’t building a product, but driving adoption. In the second issue, I refine this idea, suggesting product-market fit (PMF) and go-to-market (GTM) are inseparable, and success depends on rapid iteration across both.

Yet finding a winning PMF GTM combination is rarely straightforward. Two books have sharpened my thinking on this challenge: Malcolm Gladwell’s Revenge of the Tipping Point and Merrick Furst’s Heart of Innovation. In this sequel, Gladwell introduces “overstories” (narratives that shape behavior) and “superspreaders“ (individuals with outsized impact), concepts that expand on ideas in the original bestseller. Without a change in the overstory and the activation of superspreaders, dramatic change is rare.

For example, Gladwell argues that the rapid rise in prescriptions of OxyContin would not have been possible without a shift in the overstory of pain medications from exercise extreme caution with narcotics to you have a duty to manage pain effectively with these new, safe opiods. Once the narrative was altered, superspreaders created an epidemic. At the height of the opioid crisis, 1% of American doctors wrote nearly half of all OxyContin prescriptions. This diabolical strategy to target doctors with loose ethical standards was developed by McKinsey and executed by Purdue Pharma with ruthless precision.

Furst takes a novel approach to PMF by distinguishing invention, the creation of a new product, from innovation, which requires adoption and a change in behavior. He introduces the concept of authentic demand, a powerful twist on the standard notion of PMF. The goal is not to build a product that people will use, but one they can not not use.

Furst recounts the history of GMR versus RAID hard drives. While IBM’s GMR drives offered capacity, RAID offered speed. Both were valuable, but when RAID was first demonstrated, an unexpected feature emerged. At the end of the demo, when the hard drive was removed, the computer kept running because RAID automatically backed up data across multiple drives. This unintended feature revealed the authentic demand for reliability. RAID succeeded not because of speed or capacity, but because it solved a problem the market had overlooked. Automatic backup was a feature users could not not have. 

The success of Listerine (discussed in the first issue) is a great example of both Furst’s and Gladwell’s work. Framing bad breath as a medical condition changed the overstory from a minor nuisance to an affliction that had to be dealt with. In doing so, they also discovered a not not. If bad breath is a medical condition that carries the threat of social and romantic failure, then it's a product you could not not buy. They effectively uncovered (and created) authentic demand for a product to cure bad breath.  

In previous issues I have discussed Think Together’s work in California’s schools. Some of the biggest challenges we face are the overstories that it's impossible to teach poor kids to learn and that the US education system is so broken that it must be torn down and rebuilt from scratch. These narratives have resulted in a normalization of failure in our schools. In many districts, it’s quietly accepted as “normal” for two-thirds or more of low-income students to perform at significantly lower levels than children from families with more means. 

Empirically, this narrative is inaccurate. There are numerous school districts across the country with kids from all backgrounds dramatically outperforming districts with similar demographics (see Karin Chenoweth’s work on Extraordinary Districts and Chad Aldeman’s analysis for The 74). In these districts, leaders and educators maintain an uncompromising belief that all kids can and should perform at high levels and that the adults in the district are responsible for ensuring that happens. In such districts, everyone in the system acts deliberately and with urgency. However, the normalization of failure in our schools is so pervasive that few are aware that a different path exists. 

To make dramatic improvements in student outcomes, organizations like Think Together must uncover the “not-nots” that create true urgency for districts to act. There is a saying I often hear in education circles: no superintendent has ever been fired because kids can’t read. In practice, superintendents are rarely removed for poor academic outcomes; they are far more likely to lose their jobs over politics, budgets, or misconduct. I am hopeful the new projects we are launching will surface the critical “not-nots” in education. Once we do, our aim is to partner with the most connected and influential superintendents as superspreaders to drive system-wide change.

Gladwell and Furst remind us that real breakthroughs emerge when the story around a product shifts and the product taps into a need so fundamental that it can no longer be ignored. PMF and GTM aren’t separate puzzles; they are two sides of the same search for authentic demand. Change the overstory and uncover the “not-not,” and the path to adoption becomes clear.

Sangeeth Peruri - Jack of Many Trades, Master of None
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