You often hear about “The Idea” and “The Execution,” as if they were two different things.

However, executing your idea is, in itself, a progression of ideas.

You base your actual execution on many ideas, including what and how to execute. Some you know as best practices, others you need to innovate, and a few you need to create yourself.

First, you come up with ideas on what (e.g., a feature to develop in the app) and how (e.g., a new algorithm) you are going to make your idea a reality.

This, itself, is a chain of ideas, starting with...

The Idea: a solution to a problem or a way to take advantage of an opportunity.

For each area of execution, like people, hardware, software, marketing, sales, management and partnerships, you need ideas on how to do it.

These are executable ideas - each one is a particular idea in a specific area of execution.

Repeat this process. Each idea leads to a new one (by exposing new problems, discovering new opportunities and paths), until you get to the actual execution.

There is no real difference between The Idea and Executable Ideas. Each is an idea, in itself, leading to other ideas. Each one of these executable ideas can be a new instance of The Idea in itself.

Execution IS ideas, mostly with only the last step of each idea in the chain as an actual "doing of something by someone."