This summer I supervised a project in a course introducing the entrepreneurial spirit. The task was clear: guide students to build a functioning business website from scratch.
Four days passed. Most students’ websites had only one page — and it was nearly empty.
Not because they were slacking off — they really were working — but because they didn’t know what to put in. They opened the website editor, and then got stuck. Like a writer sitting in front of a blank Word document, cursor blinking, unable to write a single word.
The Comfort Zone of System 1
Before the project began, I introduced the students to the “dual-system theory” of cognitive scientist Daniel Kahneman.
System 1: intuitive thinking. Fast, automatic, effortless. You see 1+1 and instinctively respond with 2, no calculation needed. You see a face and instinctively judge whether the person is friendly or threatening, no analysis needed.
System 2: rational thinking. Slow, deliberate, extremely draining of cognitive energy. You use System 2 when calculating 37×24. You also use System 2 when planning a business model.
Most people spend more than 95% of their daily lives using System 1. Because System 2 is too exhausting. Firing up System 2 is like switching the brain’s CPU from power-saving mode to full throttle — it works, but you quickly feel tired, irritable, and eager to escape.
I told the students: for the next four days of this project, you must turn System 2 on, and you can’t turn it off.
The results after four days told me: most people still turned it off.
The Truth Behind the Blank Page
Why were the students’ websites empty? Because they skipped the most critical step: thinking through what the purpose of the website was.
I asked them: “What does your website do?”
“Sell stuff.”
“Sell what?”
“Um… sell some… products.”
“What products?”
“Still thinking about it.”
This is the trap of System 1. System 1 makes you feel like “I roughly know what I need to do” — but that “roughly” is fatal. When you actually have to translate your idea into concrete pages, copy, product categories, and a purchase flow, you discover that the “roughly” is full of hollowness.
I’ve repeatedly experienced this in running my own company. Every time I feel “this direction should work,” then actually sit down to write the plan and force myself to think every link through clearly, I discover a pile of problems I’d previously skipped over with “roughly.”
The quality of a business plan will never exceed the clarity of your thinking.
Working Backward from Purpose
I used a framework to help the students fire up System 2.
Every website has a core mission. Educational websites provide knowledge; news websites push out reports. We were building a business website — its core mission is to let potential customers understand your product, trust you, and then buy.
Working backward from this purpose, the front end must clearly answer four questions: Who are we? What products or services do we provide? What does the product look like, and what makes it appealing? How should consumers buy?
These four questions seem simple, but answering each one clearly requires the deep operation of System 2.
“Who are we” isn’t just the company name — it’s brand positioning, value proposition, and differentiation from competitors. “What do we provide” isn’t just a product list — it’s what problem you solve and why the customer should choose you. “What does the product look like” isn’t just posting photos — it’s the integrated presentation of visual design, usage context, and social proof. “How to buy” isn’t just placing a shopping cart button — it’s the design of the entire user journey.
In Pain Points Aren’t the Whole of Transformation, I discussed how the most common failure in digital transformation isn’t a technical problem, but a failure to think through what problem actually needs solving. The same is true for business websites — most failed websites aren’t ugly in design or poor in function, but rather the business logic behind them was never thought through at all.
System 2 Is a Team Sport
Another observation: operating System 2 is even harder in a team than alone.
Firing up System 2 as an individual is painful enough. But in a team, you need everyone to fire up System 2 simultaneously, and in the same direction. Any single person secretly switching back to System 1 — “I think this is good enough,” “this is close enough” — drags down the whole team’s quality of thinking.
In The End of the Lone Runner: The Real Battlefield of Group Education Seen Through Triathlon, I discussed how the core of team collaboration is “holding others in your heart.” It’s the same in business planning — you’re not just thinking about the piece you’re responsible for; you must understand the logic of the whole system and ensure your part connects with everyone else’s.
This requires everyone to fire up System 2. And not only during meetings — after you leave the meeting, every small decision you make must remain consistent with the overall logic.
Systematizing the Fragmented
At the end of the four-day project, I said this to the students:
The birth of a business website isn’t a stacking of pages. It’s taking the fragmented ideas in your head and, through the power of System 2, organizing them into a logical, structured, self-operating system.
Technical tools are merely the vehicle that helps you present this system. If the system itself is empty, even the most beautiful vehicle is just a good-looking shell.
This isn’t just the principle of building a website; it’s the principle of making any business decision. Your plan will never be clearer than your thinking. The only way to make the plan better is to make the thinking deeper.
And that means you must endure the discomfort System 2 brings — the brain-burning, the irritation, the feeling that you’re stupid. That isn’t the feeling of incompetence; it’s the feeling of growth.
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