Adapt or Die: What Evolution Can Teach Entrepreneurs About Surviving the Startup Jungle

What do Darwin’s theory of evolution and entrepreneurial strategy have in common? Nearly everything. Both rely on a consistent pattern of adaptation, selection, and survival under pressure. This article explores how the same principles that drive biological evolution—internal efficiency (“cheap to produce”), external fit (“simple to deploy in context”), and outcome effectiveness (“improves survival”)—also define successful startups and product development.

By comparing the natural world to the economic landscape, you will discover a practical decision-making framework rooted in evolutionary logic and behavioral insight. These principles apply to founders, innovators, and decision-makers navigating the volatility of today’s markets.

And this is not just theory. At the end of the article, we bring the framework to life through a real-world case study of Personal Finance Reimagined—a business built to help consumers survive and thrive in the data-saturated economy. It is an example of evolutionary thinking applied to entrepreneurship, decision-making, and long-term financial success. Whether you are building a business or navigating personal uncertainty, the lesson remains the same: improvise, adapt, and overcome—or risk extinction.

About the Author:  Jeff Hulett leads Personal Finance Reimagined, a decision-making and financial education platform. He teaches personal finance at James Madison University and provides personal finance seminars. Check out his book -- Making Choices, Making Money: Your Guide to Making Confident Financial Decisions.

Jeff is a career banker, data scientist, behavioral economist, and choice architect. Jeff has held banking and consulting leadership roles at Wells Fargo, Citibank, KPMG, and IBM.

Evolution and Entrepreneurship—A Shared Survival Code

Natural selection, first formalized by Charles Darwin, describes how species evolve through a consistent, repeatable process: variation, heritability, and differential survival. When certain traits improve an organism’s ability to survive and reproduce, those traits become more common over time. Evolution is not about perfection. It is about fitness relative to a specific environment.

Evolutionarily successful traits tend to share three defining characteristics:

• They are cheap to produce,

• They are simple to deploy in context, and

• They effectively improve survival.

These traits dominate not because they are flawless, but because they offer a practical and timely advantage—good enough, soon enough.

These traits or adaptations are constantly tested through the process of reproduction. During reproduction, the process of meiosis shuffles a mother’s and father’s DNA, introducing variation through recombination and occasionally small mutations. Each offspring becomes a natural experiment—an incremental change tested against the demands of survival. Those who survive long enough to reproduce effectively “pass” the test, passing along their traits—and their mutations—to the next generation. Through this mechanism, natural selection drives the long-term evolution of living species.

Entrepreneurs serve as agents of adaptation, introducing novel combinations of features or entirely new solutions. These “market mutations” are tested immediately—by users, competition, and market dynamics—mirroring how biological traits face evolutionary pressure in the wild. Unlike natural selection, which takes generations to unfold, entrepreneurial adaptation can occur in real time. When a new solution resonates with consumers and improves their lives, it spreads quickly, creating a cycle of innovation and refinement.

Entrepreneurs serve as a crucial bridge between the immediate demands of society and the long-term evolutionary adaptations required for a changing environment. Their innovative approaches address current needs while also paving the way for future developments.

Internal Fit: Cheap to Produce

In biological terms, “cheap to produce” refers to traits that require minimal internal energy or structural disruption. These traits often build on existing biological systems—genetic, neural, or metabolic—and preserve systemic stability while delivering incremental improvements. Nature rewards low-cost adaptations that maintain functionality without overburdening the organism.

In entrepreneurship, this concept translates to products that are “cheap to adopt” from the consumer’s perspective. It does not imply poor quality. Rather, it reflects how easily a product integrates into the consumer’s current routines, habits, and cognitive patterns. Products that are cheap to adopt do not force major behavior changes. They solve problems with minimal disruption, leveraging what the consumer already knows and uses.

This is where entrepreneurs must subordinate their personal beliefs to the internal reality of the market. While a founder may believe a new habit or approach would benefit consumers, success depends on understanding what people are actually willing to accept—and how they are willing to accept it. Innovation must meet the consumer where they are, not where the entrepreneur wishes them to be. The most successful products work with existing mental models and behaviors, not against them. In this way, true market fit is discovered through humility, observation, and structured adaptation.

From the author’s experience, entrepreneurs rarely misjudge the need they are solving. They more often miscalculate the timing of when consumers are ready to adopt the solution. Even the smallest behavioral change—no matter how logical—is typically met with suspicion, friction, or delay. Bridging this adoption gap is often a greater challenge than identifying the problem itself. This is why making a product or service “cheap to adopt” is not optional—it is essential. Reducing the cognitive and behavioral burden on the user is what turns intention into action and potential into traction.

A clear example of this internal alignment is found in the world of short-form content creators on platforms like TikTok and Instagram. Scrolling has become a default behavior for people seeking micro-breaks from daily routines—like watching an evolving, personalized movie in 10- to 30-second increments. Creators no longer produce stand-alone content; they must design videos that fit seamlessly into the rhythm and expectation of the scroll. These videos succeed when they align with a viewer’s momentary need for novelty, entertainment, or emotional resonance—delivered exactly when and how the algorithm anticipates it. In this ecosystem, evolutionary success is measured not by production value alone but by the content’s ability to integrate with user behavior and other content creators in real time.

External Fit: Simple to Deploy in Context

Internal fit alone does not ensure success. A trait must also function well in the external environment. In biology, “simple to deploy in context” means that a trait is not only functional, but practical within the ecological conditions where the organism lives. Traits requiring rare circumstances or complex coordination are unlikely to survive selection pressure.

Entrepreneurial products face similar constraints. A solution must align with the customer’s social, technological, cultural, and economic context. Even a technically superior product will fail if it introduces friction in the user’s real-world environment. Solutions that are simple to deploy remove barriers, accelerate adoption, and align with existing systems of use.

Consider how long-standing religious institutions are adapting to this reality. For centuries, churches have built community through centralized, in-person worship services. In the information age, however, smartphones and digital platforms have decentralized access to faith-based content. While the transmission of information has become more distributed, the human need for community connection remains strong. The decentralizing impact of the smartphone makes community connection more important than ever.

In response, some progressive churches are adopting entrepreneurial models—creating community-focused “third spaces” like cafés, co-working hubs, or wellness centers. These serve dual purposes: fostering in-person connection and generating revenue to sustain ministry in a changing cultural landscape. Instead of dropping a donation into a collection basket at a church service, church communities increasingly are providing those resources for community-generating third spaces.

Survival Through the Interplay of Both

Evolutionary and entrepreneurial success depends on the interplay between internal and external fit. When a solution is both cheap to adopt and simple to deploy in context, it creates a direct path to the ultimate outcome: it effectively improves survival.

In biology, that means increased reproductive success or long-term adaptability. In business, it means improved quality of life for the consumer—through time savings, convenience, lower cognitive load, or emotional value. In both domains, success emerges from solving meaningful problems with minimal resistance and maximum relevance.

This evolutionary framework provides a powerful lens for entrepreneurship. The economic environment mimics nature: scarce resources, unpredictable change, and constant pressure to adapt. Entrepreneurs who succeed understand not only what to build, but how to ensure that their solutions fit the customer’s internal state and external reality.

Founders must treat planning not as a constraint but as a platform for adaptation. They must test, listen, learn, and evolve continuously. As I often share with entrepreneurs:

The only thing for sure about your business plan is this: (1) It is a necessary platform for success, and (2) It will need to change.

The Marine Corps motto—“Improvise, Adapt, and Overcome”—beautifully captures the mindset of successful entrepreneurs. These individuals embrace risk as a necessary part of innovation but maintain clear boundaries to avoid existential failure. As Nassim Nicholas Taleb wisely notes:

“One may be risk-loving yet completely averse to ruin.”—Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Antifragile (2012)

Understanding this difference between risk and ruin is central to both natural and entrepreneurial selection. In both systems, experimentation is essential—but long-term survival depends on knowing when to adapt and when to walk away.

The following two-part comparison lays out:

• Part 1: How the three pragmatic drivers of evolution (cheap, effective, simple) map to traditional natural selection.

• Part 2: How these same drivers offer a powerful framework for product-market evolution in startups and entrepreneurship.

Together, they offer a decision-first lens for making better choices in both biology and business.

Part 1: Evolutionary Drivers vs. Natural Selection

Evolutionary Driver	Natural Selection Equivalent	Explanation
1. Cheap to produce	Variation + Heritability	Traits that arise with minimal genetic or developmental cost are more likely to appear and persist. Nature tends toward low-friction adaptations.
2. Simple in context	Environmental Fit	Traits that align with the current environment—without requiring complex coordination—are more likely to be selected. Simplicity scales.
3. Improves survival odds	Differential Reproduction	Core Darwinian logic: traits that help the organism survive and reproduce more successfully get passed on more frequently.

Part 2: Evolutionary Logic in Entrepreneurship

Evolutionary Principle	Entrepreneurial Analogue	Explanation
1. Cheap to adapt	Low resource burn (MVP mindset) - leads to understanding what is cheap to adapt	Entrepreneurs succeed by testing ideas quickly and inexpensively. MVPs (Minimum Viable Products) mirror nature’s "minimum viable mutations."
2. Simple in context	Frictionless adoption	Products or services that match existing user behavior and market conditions succeed. Complexity without fit leads to extinction.
3. Improves survival odds	Clear value proposition	Products must directly improve customer experience or solve a meaningful problem. No survival = no repeat customers.

Key Takeaways

• Evolution and entrepreneurship follow the same survival logic: low-friction adaptations that solve real problems and fit the environment are most likely to endure.

• Internal efficiency matters: nature rewards energy conservation, and the market rewards capital efficiency. Founders must minimize cognitive and financial costs for both themselves and their customers.

• Fit matters more than differentiation: even the most innovative solution will fail if it clashes with consumer behavior, cultural context, or environmental readiness.

• Simplicity enables scale: products that are intuitive and easy to adopt—like traits that align with existing biological systems—are more likely to spread and succeed.

• Entrepreneurs are evolutionary catalysts: the best founders listen to the environment, subordinate personal bias, and adapt in real time through structured feedback.

Entropy, Evolution, and the Entrepreneur

In physics, entropy is a measure of disorder or randomness within a system. The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us that systems tend toward higher entropy—greater chaos—unless energy is applied to organize or structure them. In this sense, natural selection is nature’s way of fighting entropy. It selectively preserves traits that increase order, functionality, and fitness within a chaotic environment.

Entrepreneurship serves a parallel purpose. Every viable product or service emerges to reduce entropy in the life of a consumer—whether by saving time, simplifying choices, organizing tasks, or solving complex problems. Just as evolution favors traits that reduce uncertainty and improve survival, the market favors offerings that create clarity, ease, and order for the end user. In this case, the market is a group of people sharing the reducing entropy benefits af an entrepreneur's product or service. Think of the market as voters. "Making money" is akin to yes votes for a group of consumers reducing entropy.

Both in nature and business, progress is made by reducing entropy through purposeful adaptation. Survival, whether biological or economic, is earned by those who improvise, adapt, and overcome.

Case Study: Personal Finance Reimagined—Closing the Evolutionary Decision Gap

Next is a case study to show the evolutionary-based entrepreneurship framework in action.

Background - why PFR is needed

The modern world delivers an unprecedented flood of information. Data streams continuously from smartphones, laptops, smart appliances, social media, and more. Consumers are no longer starved for information—they are drowning in it. Yet much of this data is irrelevant, misleading, or even intentionally manipulative. It is designed not to inform, but to influence—shaping decisions about products, services, political choices, and financial behaviors.

In this environment, the modern consumer is the battleground, and their attention is the currency. Marketing systems exploit evolved instincts that were once beneficial in a world of data scarcity. It is our nature to accumulate information. Our brains remain largely wired for that pre-information era—an era when gathering data was difficult, but decisions were relatively easy. Today, that wiring fails us, leaving most people overwhelmed by the very data that could support success. In the information-abundant world, data is plentiful, and our decision-making focus is crucial for achieving long-term success.

This is the naturally occurring decision-making gap—a mismatch between our cognitive architecture and our data-saturated environment. Personal Finance Reimagined (PFR) exists to help individuals and organizations bridge that gap. We do not add more information. We provide a decision structure—an evolutionary scaffold that empowers modern humans to navigate complexity with confidence. We help people subtract data for the purpose of improving decisions and well-being.

Using the same evolutionary principles explored earlier—cheap to produce, simple to deploy in context, and effectively improving survival—PFR’s approach delivers sustainable financial empowerment:

1. Cheap to Produce: Internally Aligned Decision Clarity

PFR begins by helping people recognize that they are not alone in feeling overwhelmed. Rather than beginning with the market, we start inward, by identifying what matters most to the individual. Our tools—such as the Definitive Choice app—prompt consumers to clarify their values, rank decision criteria, and reduce the data drowning noise. This inward focus makes good financial decision-making “cheap to produce”. It does not require a massive cognitive overhaul or extensive research. PFR does not seek to alter people's decision-making nature. Quite the opposite, we aim to leverage how we naturally make good decisions and handle our natural challenges in the background. It leverages existing desires, instincts, and priorities, guiding users toward confidence with minimal effort.

Our digital tools are intentionally designed to be lightweight, intuitive, and mobile-first. They are always available, always personal, and always focused on structured choice. In this way, decision clarity becomes a low-friction internal evolution—not a burden.

2. Simple to Deploy in Context: Outward-Facing Market Confidence

Once internal clarity is established, PFR helps users look outward—toward real-world financial choices. Whether evaluating the housing market, buying a car, choosing retirement accounts, or even deciding whether to adopt a pet, PFR provides just-in-time context and decision frameworks. These are not generic how-to guides. They are decision blueprints, built for real market environments and updated as conditions change.

This context alignment makes PFR’s tools simple to deploy. Consumers enter financial negotiations with confidence. They know what matters to them. They understand trade-offs. They recognize when to say yes, and when to walk away. This reduces regret, minimizes risk, and enhances decision outcomes. Also, our tools encourage consumers to engage their trusted decision community. Big decisions often benefit from input from their trusted community.

3. Effectively Improves Survival: From Financial Stability to Thriving

PFR’s mission extends beyond basic financial literacy. We aim to transform a series of good decisions into a lifetime of wealth-building. Survival is only the baseline. Through structured decision-making, PFR empowers people to thrive—to become future versions of themselves who are not just financially stable, but financially free.

We emphasize behavioral clarity over data overload, confidence over guesswork, and long-term prosperity over short-term gratification. This is the pathway from cognitive overload to sustainable wealth.

Ongoing Challenges and Strategic Focus

Like any entrepreneur, we face challenges. It has taken many iterations to align our solution toward the consumer's needs in our evolutionary framework. Our MVP approach allows us to iterate as we learn. Honestly, we are not there yet, but we have made great progress in fine-tuning our message and solutions.

First, we must clearly articulate the information era problem in a way that resonates. Many consumers remain focused on the immediate—unaware that their decision-making struggles are part of a broader evolutionary disconnect. We must make the invisible problem visible.

Second, we must continue to make our tools “cheap to produce”—intuitive, frictionless, and embedded in everyday life. This includes seamless interfaces, personalized pathways, and content that is both timely and evergreen. We appreciate that our decision-first approach is a subtle behavior change. We continuously fine-tune the message and messenger (our apps) to make our product "cheap enough" from a behavioral change standpoint. It is a fine line we walk.

Finally, we must ensure our solutions are simple to deploy in real contexts—that users become confident financial decision-makers in actual negotiations, not just in theory.

PFR exists to close the decision gap of the information era. By applying evolutionary principles to the realities of modern finance, we help people make smarter choices today—and become wealthier versions of themselves tomorrow.

One of the reasons I teach personal finance is to help students but also to learn from them. I help the students create a consistent, repeatable decision process to achieve a lifetime of wealth. In return, they share with me what works and what needs to be refined. It is a mutually beneficial relationship for which I am grateful.

Evolution favors those who adapt with purpose. So does the market.

Resources for the Curious

• Darwin, Charles. On the Origin of Species. John Murray, 1859.Introduces the foundational theory of natural selection and variation.

• Futuyma, Douglas J. Evolution. Sinauer Associates, 2013. Provides a comprehensive explanation of evolutionary processes, including meiosis, genetic variation, and natural selection.

• Taleb, Nassim Nicholas. Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder. Random House, 2012. Explores how systems and people thrive by embracing volatility while avoiding irreversible failure.

• Boyd, John. Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War. Back Bay Books, 2004. Introduces the OODA loop—Observe, Orient, Decide, Act—as a strategic adaptation model.

• Dennett, Daniel C. Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life. Simon & Schuster, 1995. Explains how evolutionary principles extend into intelligence, culture, and innovation.

• Blank, Steve. The Startup Owner's Manual. K&S Ranch, 2012. Provides a detailed guide to customer discovery and iterative product development through adaptive experimentation.

• Bennett, Max Solomon. A Brief History of Intelligence: Evolution, AI, and the Five Breakthroughs That Made Our Brains. Dutton, 2023. Offers a compelling exploration of how the human brain evolved through key adaptive shifts—and what this teaches us about intelligence and artificial systems.

• Klotz, Leidy. Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less. Flatiron Books, 2021. Explores how people often overlook subtraction as a powerful strategy for solving problems and improving systems, favoring addition instead.