Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2014

While he correctly understood how to frame his hypotheses with a business model canvas, and he was doing a good job in customer development – the third component of Lean is using Agile Development to rapidly and iteratively build incrementally better versions of the product – in the form of minimal viable products (MVP’s).

Cofounder 336

Cofounder Founder Technical Cofounder Coder 336

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014

Who can I hire later? Filed under: Customer Development. Customer Development' But what about for us, a consumer hardware hardware company? Trying to figure out what the right set of co-founders isn’t so clear. How do I decide who I need to have on board on day one? And what can I outsource?”

Cofounder 335

Cofounder Founder Intellectual Property Business Model 335

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

He just hired Meg Whitman. Given the stock market was buying “the story and vision” of anything internet, inflated expectations were more important than traditional metrics like customers, growth, revenue, or heaven forbid, profits. the ex-CEO of HP and eBay, as CEO of NewTV.

Lean 335

Lean Burn Rate Startup IPO 335

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. Freemium models have their own scorekeeping.)

Customer Development 229

Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer 229

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 19, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, January 19, 2009 Lean hiring tips In preparing for the strategy series panel this week, I have been doing some thinking about costs. And all of that cost was caused by one activity: hiring. Hiring is no different from any other company process. Sounds a little abstract, though, doesnt it?

Lean 140

Lean Hiring San Francisco Continuous Deployment 140

Steve Blank

AUGUST 22, 2011

Over the last few weeks I’ve gotten involved in hiring for two startups, a public agency and a non profit. In the last week I had four separate groups through the ranch all wanting to talk either about hiring a senior exec or a senior exec looking for a new job. Are you hiring for search or execution skills? Draw a pie chart.

Hiring 299

Hiring Non-Compete Search Customer Development 299

Hunter Walker

AUGUST 11, 2022

Seed Stage Startups Don’t Hire Fulltime For These Roles, And Certainly Not Senior Hires. You’re trying to build a software product, do customer development and find PMF. Hiring Marketing or Comms Consultants/Agencies At Seed Is Often a Terrible Idea. It’s just not worth their time.

Seed Stage 104

Seed Stage Cap Table Founder Marketing 104

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, February 11, 2009 The free software hiring advantage This is one of those startup tips Im a little reluctant to share, because its been such a powerful source of competitive advantage in the companies Ive worked with. This approach gives you an edge in hiring. Instead, engage with the project.

Software Review 68

Software Review Software Hiring San Francisco 68

Up and Running

MARCH 21, 2018

These don’t require coding skills—they’re usually visual templates that are easy to use but don’t allow for great customization (that would require technical skills). Custom development. This means hiring/contracting a freelance web developer or an agency to design and develop your site from start to finish.

Entrepreneur 107

Entrepreneur Technical Review Hosting SEO 107

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 11, 2010

The Customer Development process is the way startups quickly iterate and test each element of their business model , reducing customer and market risk. The first step of Customer Development is called Customer Discovery. outside the building and test them in front of customers.

Burn Rate 252

Burn Rate Silicon Valley Marketing Boston 252

Steve Blank

APRIL 5, 2017

Founders ask me all the time whether they should hire a PR agency. Hiring a PR agency too early is a sign that the CEO is treating this as someone else’s problem. Filed under: Customer Development , Marketing. They may be individuals who organize and hold conferences where the key industry thought leaders gather.

Marketing 318

Marketing Technical Review Audience PR 318

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. Is there some defining factor that easily distinguishes the difference? Sounds like handspring.

Customer Development 221

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 221

Steve Blank

APRIL 11, 2013

They provide consulting, promotion, product testing, hiring, training and incubation services to startups. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. China Customer Development Technology Venture Capital' Technology Business Incubators (TBIs).

Programming 287

Programming Technical Review SBIR China 287

Steve Blank

MARCH 31, 2011

Over the last decade we assumed that once we found repeatable methodologies (Agile and Customer Development , Business Model Design) to build early stage ventures, entrepreneurship would become a “science,” and anyone could do it. it is an art) and again hired professionals. Some men see things as they are and ask why.

Agile 334

Agile Customer Development Early Stage Business Model 334

VC Cafe

JULY 26, 2020

Ditch the business plan and when assumptions are proven wrong, pivot Customer Development: Build a product your customers want (vs. what you think they might need) by talking to customers and testing every aspect of the product features, pricing, etc.

Lean 214

Lean Seed Capital Startup Burn Rate 214

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 19, 2009

While the last post was titled “ You Know You’re Getting Close to Your Customers When They Offer You a Job “, this post should probably be titled, “You Know You’re Getting Close to Your Customers When You Offer Them a Job.&# These hires were definitely not your standard marketing types.

Engineer 223

Engineer Silicon Valley Part-Time VPE Advisory Board 223

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

Oh, and we had no installed customer base. I had hired the VP of marketing from a potential software partner who was responsible to get all this 3 rd party software on our computer. In reality we hadn’t gotten any closer to our goal than the day we hired him. We had accomplished nothing – zero, zilch, nada.

Silicon Valley 332

Silicon Valley Software Review RSS Technical Review 332

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. The Customer Development process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that.

Lean 263

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 263

The Startup Magazine

OCTOBER 29, 2018

If you want app development that is both affordable and efficient, you need to know how to hire programmers to do the job. Let’s take a closer look at and how to fill the job position for your next development project in a way that brings your business the most value. The Rise of App Development in the Business World.

Developer 93

Developer Offshore Software Developers Software Development 93

The Startup Toolkit

NOVEMBER 10, 2012

Spoiler: You can’t hire out sales because in the early days it’s about learning, not selling, and hired guns can’t bring back bad news. As a tech founder doing sales, you’ll find yourself constantly fantasising about hiring in a sales guy to take all your pain away.

Hiring 51

Hiring Founder Viral Early Stage 51

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 10, 2014

We didn’t know it at the time, but with that investment we had paid for front-row VIP seats to witness the origins of Customer Development and the Lean Startup. Twenty years and 100,000’s of copies of those books later, my life has fortuitously intersected with Steve Blank once again now that we’ve both become educators.

Maryland 280

Maryland Lean DC Virginia 280

Steve Blank

MARCH 2, 2011

Working with him, I’ve been impressed to watch his small team embrace Customer Development (and Business Model Generation ) and search the world for the right product/market fit. They’ve tested their hypotheses with literally hundreds of customer interviews on every continent in the world. Corporate elephants can dance.

Silicon Valley 238

Silicon Valley Agile Customer Development Early Stage 238

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 10, 2011

They’ve stopped hiring the best talent, and startups are not looking so risky compared to large companies. Filed under: Business Model versus Business Plan , Customer Development , Teaching , Venture Capital. Nokia was blind-sided in a classic disruptive innovation. Nanny-Culture, Lack of Risk Taking, Not Sharing.

Finland 332

Finland Naming Russia Government 332

Steve Blank

JUNE 29, 2009

You’re Hired, You’re Fired. My first job in Silicon Valley: I was hired as a lab technician at ESL to support the training department. The manager of the training department who hired you wasn’t authorized to do so – and he’s been fired. Could I work here if he wanted to hire me?&#

Agile 268

Agile Silicon Valley RSS California 268

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 1, 2014

Here are just a few things you might look for: Reducing risk in young companies Bringing innovation to the enterprise Designing and running experiments Customer development strategies All conference passes are on sale right now, and you can compare them here.

Lean 165

Lean Fractional CTO Part-Time VPE Fractional VPE 165

Steve Blank

JANUARY 25, 2011

He hired an operating exec as the CEO a few years ago. With a few more questions I learned that the code base, which had now grown large, still had vestiges of the original exploratory code written back in the early days when the company was in the discovery phase of Customer Development.

Part-Time VPE 325

Part-Time VPE Agile Engineer Startup 325

Steve Blank

APRIL 11, 2013

They provide consulting, promotion, product testing, hiring, training and incubation services to startups. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. China Customer Development Technology Venture Capital' Technology Business Incubators (TBIs).

Programming 179

Programming Technical Review SBIR China 179

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 7, 2011

At Tekes, government employees (and their hired consultants) – with no equity, no risk or reward, no startup or venture capital experience – try to pick startup winners and losers. Filed under: Business Model versus Business Plan , Customer Development , Teaching , Technology , Venture Capital.

Finland 329

Finland Venture Capital Government Russia 329

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 28, 2014

What you really need is a VP of Marketing and Customer Development, who can help with lead generation and honing the message, rather than an executive to manage a sales team and existing customers. Evangelism marketing is an advanced form of word of mouth marketing (WOMM), now largely replaced by Facebook and Twitter.

CTO Hire 252

CTO Hire Fractional CTO Angel Investor Public Relations 252

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

So what’s wrong the product development model? The first hint lies in its name; this is a product development model, not a marketing model, not a sales hiring model, not a customer acquisition model, not even a financing model (and we’ll also find that in most cases it’s even a poor model to use to develop a product.)

Customer Development 245

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 245

Steve Blank

JUNE 25, 2009

The answer depends on your answer to two questions: which step in the Customer Development process are you on? Customer Development and Selling Strategy If you’ve just started your company you are in customer discovery. Hiring a VP of Sales in customer discovery typically sets a startup back.

Technology 145

Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 145

ConversionXL

JANUARY 24, 2014

The importance of the customer feedback cycle & the role it plays for AWeber. How to get your software business to the point where you can hire a business development director. Hunter shares some extremely valuable insights that will prove useful in building beneficial relationships and getting highly qualified customers.

Developer 104

Developer Cofounder API New Jersey 104

Steve Blank

JULY 16, 2009

Successful pinball companies didn’t hire Hollywood talent. Meanwhile our company was pouring an enormous amount of dollars into building tools and video compression technology, while also hiring a lot of high-priced Hollywood talent like art directors, and script and story editors. I know what’s great and what’s not.

Silicon Valley 223

Silicon Valley RSS Video San Diego 223

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 15, 2019

This typically plays out in three ways: Often the first plan from leadership for innovation is hiring management consultants who bring out their 20th-century playbook. A competitive environment should drive a company/government agency into new forms of organization that can rapidly respond to these new threats.

Government 322

Government Technical Review Acquisition Metrics 322

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 22, 2013

What you really need is a VP of Marketing and Customer Development, who can help with lead generation and honing the message, rather than an executive to manage a sales team and existing customers. Evangelism marketing is an advanced form of word of mouth marketing (WOMM), now largely replaced by Facebook and Twitter.

CTO Hire 244

CTO Hire Fractional CTO Startup Angel Investor 244

Steve Blank

APRIL 14, 2013

The large players like Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent historically would be more likely to simply copy a startup’s features than to hire their talent. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. China Customer Development Technology Venture Capital' It usually doesn’t end well.

China 328

China Silicon Valley Non-Compete Intellectual Property 328

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

They close on the $750k, hire a buddy or two, buy some Macs, and get to work. Things start to get a little fuzzy in terms of priorities, but not to fret, the new office is coming along really well with all of the hiring! Early customer development talks are going great which keeps the team really excited.

Burn Rate 152

Burn Rate Equity Software Review Early Stage 152