Source: Simon Wardley
Published: March 2015

Pioneers, Settlers, Town Planners

Circulated: July 16, 2020

This framework describes a way of understanding the unique combination of characteristics and aptitude needed to bring products and services to life.

Pioneers

• bold thinkers who come up with new, exciting ideas

• fail often; you wouldn’t trust what they build

• innovative ideas uncovered are passed onto the Settlers

• example: Jack Kilby who invented the integrated circuit (aka microchip)

Settlers

• they build trust and understanding by listening to customers

• generate revenue while finding product-market fit

• turn ideas from Pioneers into a product

• example: Henry Edwards Roberts who invented the first PC (Altair 8800)

Town Planners

• take the Settlers’ product and scale it to reach more customers

• you can trust the quality of their product

• utilize economies of scale to make things faster and more efficient

• they operate the services that pioneers build upon

• example: Apple Computer inventing the Macintosh