Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 6, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, November 6, 2008 Steveys Blog Rants: Good Agile, Bad Agile I thought Id share an interesting post from someone with a decidedly anti-agile point of view. Steveys Blog Rants: Good Agile, Bad Agile : "Google is an exceptionally disciplined company, from a software-engineering perspective.

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Agile San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment 76

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

But by taking advantage of open source, agile software, and iterative development, lean startups can operate with much less waste. So far, I have found "lean startup" works better with the entrepreneurs Ive talked to than "agile startup" or even "extreme startup.") Of course, many startups are capital efficient and generally frugal.

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Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, November 13, 2008 Five Whys Taiichi Ohno was one of the inventors of the Toyota Production System. His book Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-Scale Production is a fascinating read, even though its decidedly non-practical. Each five whys email is a teaching document. and so forth.

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Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Its had tremendous impact in many areas: continuous deployment , just-in-time scalability , and even search engine marketing , to name a few. I owe it originally to lean manufacturing books like Lean Thinking and Toyota Production System. Similar results apply in product management, design, testing, and even operations.

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San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment Development Team Review 161

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

Thats the conclusion Ive come to after watching tons of online products fail for a complete lack of customers. Our goal is to find out whether customers are interested in your product by offering to give (or even sell) it to them, and then failing to deliver on that promise. Nothing made any difference.

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 7, 2008

In addition to presenting the IMVU case, we tried for the first time to do an overview of a software engineering methodology that integrates practices from agile software development with Steves method of Customer Development. Unfortunately, positioning our product as an "IM add-on" was a complete mistake.

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Customer Development Engineer San Francisco Developer 131

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

I am convinced one of Joel Spolskys lasting contributions to the field of managing software teams will turn out to be the Joel Test , a checklist of 12 essential practices that you could use to rate the effectiveness of a software product development team. For more on continuous deployment, see Just-in-time Scalability.

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Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Feld Thoughts

MARCH 11, 2010

I’ve become a big advocate of true Agile development (partly because of my experience with Rally Software – the leader in Agile software development environments) and – more recently – the notion of trying to get to continuous deployment which has been popularized by Eric Ries. Some release weekly, or even daily.

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Software Review Wiki Continuous Deployment Agile 138

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 7, 2009

I spent some time with his company before the conference and discussed ways to get started with continuous deployment , including my experience introducing it at IMVU. They were deploying to production with every commit before they had an automated build server or extensive automated test coverage in place.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review Lean 131

Steve Blank

JANUARY 6, 2014

For the last 75 years products (both durable goods and software) were built via Waterfall development. This process forced companies to release and launch products by model years, and market new and “improved” versions. The Old Days – Waterfall Product Development. Then validation ensures the product was built to spec.

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Continuous Deployment Customer Agile Cloud 332

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 16, 2009

For those whove heard it, it contains a length discourse on the subject of agile software development and extreme programming, including its weaknesses when applied to startups. As Im pontificating about agile, I see the name Kent Beck in my peripheral vision. Now, this webcast was packed, hundreds of people were logged in.

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Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Startup 140

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

When we build products, we use a methodology. We know some products succeed and others fail, but the reasons are complex and the unpredictable. a roadmap for how to get to Product/Market Fit." The theory of Product/Market Fit is one key component of customer development, and I highly recommend Marcs essay on that topic.

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Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

Although Catalyst folded with the dot-com crash, Ries continued his entrepreneurial career as a Senior Software Engineer at There.com, leading efforts in agile software development and user-generated content. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. November 25, 2009 9:54 AM Danny Wong said. Expo SF (May.

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San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

I hope to show why lean and agile techniques actually reduce the negative impacts of technical debt and increase our ability to take advantage of its positive effects. Startups especially can benefit by using technical debt to experiment, invest in process, and increase their product development leverage.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

We wanted an agile approach that would allow us to build our software architecture as we needed it, without downtime, but also without large amounts of up-front cost. You can also download our presentation, " Just-In-Time Scalability: Agile Methods to Support Massive Growth." Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Agile Lean 94

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

If youre trying to design an architecture to maximize agility, how can that work if some people are working in TDD and others not? And what about if deployment takes forever? Labels: product development 15comments: mukund said. But along the way, something strange happened. Have you worked with or for a great CTO? Expo SF (May.

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CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 25, 2011

It may be hard to remember that there was a time when people in the agile software development community thought Lean Startup was incompatible with agile practices. A few other highlights from this year’s lineup: How Groupon is using Lean Startup ideas to scale their product development team, by VP of Product Development Suneel Gupta.

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San Francisco Silicon Valley Lean Agile 146

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 28, 2010

If you havent seen it, Pascals recent presentation on continuous deployment is a must-see; slides are here. It’s common, perhaps the norm, for startups to pivot like that—to discover that a product is catching on in unintended ways worth pursuing. kaChing has been very active in the Lean Startup movement.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment SEC 158

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 16, 2013

One good example is the way in which we''ve adjusted the length of different phases of our agile sprints. We don''t follow a set agile methodology, but rather follow a more home-grown, minimal version of various approaches. Continuous deployment: A key component of speed is to keep pushing out work. So what was going on?

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Lean Startup Software Engineering Agile 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

In my experience, the majority of changes we made to products have no effect at all on customer behavior. This kind of result is typical when you ship a redesign of some part of your product. Without split-testing, your product tends to get prettier over time. First of all, why split-test? One last note on reporting.

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San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, March 25, 2009 The Lean Startup at Agile Vancouver April 21st A surprising number of respondents in the latest Lessons Learned survey hail from one of the flourishing startup hubs in Canada. This workshop brings together leading thinkers from Lean Production and Lean software. Thank you so much!)

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, September 13, 2008 SEM on five dollars a day How do you build a new product with constant customer feedback while simultaneously staying under the radar? In a mature company with a mature product, the goal is to pay for lots of people to come to your website. SEM is a simple idea. chatted once?

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SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 2, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, June 2, 2010 The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business Review) I continue my series for Harvard Business Review with the Lean Startup technique called Five Whys. Five Whys has its origins in the Toyota Production System. Five Whys has its origins in the Toyota Production System.

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Technical Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 132

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

Boyd emphasized the importance of agility in combat: "the key to victory is to be able to create situations wherein one can make appropriate decisions more quickly than ones opponent." Agile software development. Agile allows companies to build higher quality software faster. This speeds up the Ideas-Code-Data feedback loop.

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Lean San Francisco Agile Continuous Deployment 102

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 9, 2009

Thats the essence of so many of the lean startup techniques Ive evangelized: customer development , the Ideas/Code/Data feedback loop , and the adaptation of agile development to the startup experience. Creating a company-wide feedback loop that incorporates both customer development and agile development is a challenge.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean Agile 132

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 28, 2009

This builds on a lot of great thinking that has come before, like the agile movements insistence that only the creation of working code counts as progress for a software development team. Customers dont care if you have good metrics, only if you have a good product. I used to think that investments in metrics were a form of waste.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 98

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Its inspired by the classic OODA Loop and is really just a simplified version of that concept, applied specifically to creating a software product development team. There are three stages: We start with ideas about what our product could be. Labels: agile , listening to customers 3comments: hauteroute said. Great points Eric.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 142

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 14, 2013

The site visits include stops at Square (the payments startup founded by Twitter co-creator Jack Dorsey), WeWork Soma (an amazing co-working space) and Pivotal Labs (leaders in Lean and Agile consulting), along with one more super-interesting location we’ll announce shortly. Thus we reduce the risk of deployments.

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Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2010

This is the first post that moves into making specific process recommendations for product development. Everyone was in the flow; the team was hyper-productive. In many cases, they did the impossible, building a new product faster, cheaper, and better than anyone could have predicted. Expo SF (May.

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

Inspiring ideas: real-time biz metrics; safe continuous deployment; A/B split testing. Thank you @ericries for drastically altering my perception of agile startup Thank you all so much for your kind words. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Articulate, inspirational. Expo SF (May.

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San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Lean 113

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 8, 2008

Maybe operations has changed the OS configuration in production in a way that is incompatible with some developers change. Thats counter-productive: the whole point of CI is to give each developer rapid feedback about the quality of their own work. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Expo SF (May.

Software Review 136

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 136

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2010

Kent Beck keynote, "To Agility, and Beyond" Six streaming locations Interviews ► March (7) New conference website, speakers, agenda Two new scholarship programs for lean startups Speed up or slow down? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Expo SF (May. Take a look and let me know what you think.

San Francisco 133

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 133

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

This may sound crazy, coming as it does from an advocate of c harging customers for your product from day one. Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. In fact, this company hasn’t shipped any new products in months. What’s going on?

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Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 3, 2009

Take a failed product launch. I continue to believe youre reading more claims into my post then I have made. I do not believe the purpose of this policy is to increase productivity, deprive employees of having a life (I encourage side projects), or even to have them "love the culture." Clement, not to worry. Expo SF (May.

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Employee San Francisco Lean Software Review 146

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2009

Kent Beck keynote, "To Agility, and Beyond" Six streaming locations Interviews ► March (7) New conference website, speakers, agenda Two new scholarship programs for lean startups Speed up or slow down? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Expo SF (May. Expo (and a call for he.

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Programming San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 143

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 5, 2010

The results of the Customer Development process may indicate that the assumptions about your product, your customers and your market are all wrong. They tell them to persist in their dream of building a great product and/or company, no matter what the odds are or what the market might be telling them – success is just around the corner.

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Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 166

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

If you dont have customers, a product, investors, or a board of directors, you can pretty much stay focused on just one thing at a time. Strategy - startups first encounter this when they have the beginnings of a product, and theyve achieved some amount of product/market fit. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88