Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 11, 2014

In the 20 th century corporate skunk works were used to develop disruptive innovation separate from the rest of the company. ——– In the 20 th century companies could be leaders in a market for decades by just focusing on their core product(s). They were the hallmark of innovative corporations.

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Channel Customer Development Distribution Restful 296

Steve Blank

JANUARY 6, 2014

This process forced companies to release and launch products by model years, and market new and “improved” versions. In the last few years Agile and “Continuous Deployment” has replaced Waterfall and transformed how companies big and small build products. The Old Days – Waterfall Product Development.

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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. Read the rest of The Startups Rules of Speed - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. Labels: product development Speed up or slow down? (for This is the speed-up-or-slow-down moment.

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

You can almost set your watch to six months or so after first customer ship, when Sales starts missing its “numbers,” the board gets concerned and Marketing tries to “make up a better story.” Now the company is in crisis mode because the rest of the organization (product development, marketing, etc.)

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Burn Rate Management Business Model Customer Development 253

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 2, 2010

One such technique is called Five Whys, which has its origins in the Toyota Production System, and posits that behind every supposedly technical problem is actually a human problem. Read the rest of The Five Whys for Start-Ups. Read the rest of The Five Whys for Start-Ups. Applied to a start-up, heres how it works.

Technical Review 132

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 132

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

At the very least, you can plug those assumptions into your financial model, now that you have a sense for what the cost of acquiring new customers might look like. Even more importantly, you can start to experiment with feature set, positioning, and marketing - all without building a product. Any specific experiences to share?

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 5, 2008

But I have a special sympathy for the "product manager" in a startup that is bringing a new product to a new market, and doing their work in large batches. I met one recently that is working on a really innovative product, and the stories I heard from their development team made me want to cringe.

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San Francisco Management Software Review Product 158

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2015

Startups have finite time and resources to find product/market fit before they run out of money. They’ve found product/market fit (what products customers want to buy). They’ve learned the best distribution channel to get the product from their company to the customer.

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Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 15, 2010

Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review Way back when the money was doled out, the team made a compelling pitch about the large market that was going to adopt their new innovative product or service. Read the rest here. Lets return to our team thats failing to hit their targets.

Hockey Stick 105

Hockey Stick San Francisco Entrepreneur Lean 105

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 7, 2010

Read the rest at The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. Read the rest at The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Is Entrepreneurship a Management Science? No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

San Francisco 119

San Francisco Management Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2010

You can read the rest of his posts on his blog : Introduction , Part 1 , Part 2.) When I first encountered customer development , it was considered pure lunacy by mainstream entrepreneurs and VCs. You can read the rest of his posts on his blog : Introduction , Part 1 , Part 2.) We all owe him our thanks for persevering.

San Francisco 133

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 133

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

This technique rests on three things: identifying the kinds of work that need to get done, creating the right type of teams for each kind, and steering the company by allocating resources among them. Strategy - startups first encounter this when they have the beginnings of a product, and theyve achieved some amount of product/market fit.

San Francisco 88

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 30, 2009

.&# In 2002 I became exposed to the idea of “agile software development&# and subsequently was a first round investor in Rally Software which is now the market leader in Agile application lifecycle management software. Read the rest. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 2, 2008

but rest assured they would be. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Alas, they arent published in a dead-tree medium yet, so I cant say something like "they are the essential reference on my bookcase." No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

San Francisco 125

San Francisco Software Review Technical Review Continuous Deployment 125

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

Heres my favorite part: If youve got a team, part of the team should obsess about the backlist, honing it, editing it and promoting it, while the rest work to generate (as opposed to promote) the frontlist. The opportunity isnt to give into temptation and figure out how to recklessly and expensively market the frontlist.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 76

OnlyOnce

AUGUST 12, 2013

” In other words, should we just be taking the same kind of lean/agile approach to CX that we do with technical product development and UX — but basically do it more holistically across every customer touchpoint, from marketing to invoice? “Customer Experience is a journey, not a project.

Lean 94

Lean Agile B2B Metrics 94

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

But, as any startup can tell you, this opens up a tremendous set of opportunities for the rest of us. Now, helping potential customers discover new things they might like is the job of the discipline of marketing. The key tools of this new marketing are: targeting, filtering, and customer insight. Is that a lot?

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

So if youre new, consider not paying any attention to the rest of this post, and just diving into the archives, if you havent already. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

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San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 18, 2010

Recently, he was bitten by the lean startup bug and has started writing about his experiences attempting to apply lean startup and customer development principles. Managing weekly releases got a lot harder once I started doing customer development. Things started to slip. Things started to slip.

Continuous Deployment 151

Continuous Deployment San Francisco Lean Wiki 151

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 2, 2009

For the rest of us, there is an alternative: to create credibility by building a lean startup. At IMVU, we were terrified by how early we shipped (and charged for) our first product. Here in Tampa, our biggest challenge is convincing the regions technology "leadership" that grassroots economic development is a good thing.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Tampa Continuous Deployment Lean 60

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 1, 2009

Sloan realized that the traditional centralized management structures (like General Motors had in 1920) were poor fits for the management of GM’s already diverse product lines. auto market with 60% of the U.S. car market. When Sloan took over as president of GM in 1923, Ford and its Model T was the dominant player in the U.S.

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Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2009

We spent the rest of our time pretending to work on the assigned homework, but really trying to do interesting side projects, like sending juvenile messages across the school network or building primitive video games. Third, you market it far and wide. And as for marketing it, this post is already on the first page of Hacker News.

Programming 143

Programming San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 143

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

One is used by engineers to refer to the process of getting code fully integrated into production. Another is used by marketing to refer to what customers see. In traditional batch-and-queue development, these two concepts are linked. All customers will see the new software as soon as it’s deployed.

Continuous Deployment 167

Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Unfortunately, after months or even years of development, many companies discover that customers arent willing to buy their new wares. Thats why some entrepreneurs are trying another approach to product launches: marketing a product online before spending much on research and development or inventory.

San Francisco 137

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 137

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 11, 2010

Read the rest: For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? - Read the rest: For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? - The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Finding the right balance requires an understanding of the fundamental feedback loop that powers all startups.

San Francisco 120

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 120

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 12, 2010

This program is designed for people who have a stake in creating great products: engineers, designers, product managers, marketers and businesspeople—from companies of any size. Read the rest here. Read the rest here. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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Lean San Francisco Web Continuous Deployment 129

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 4, 2009

If you are willing, please take a moment to fill it out before proceeding with the rest of the post; itll mean less biased results, and youll have a better idea what Im talking about later. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

Ali G meets with business leaders and investors on Wall Street to learn how to create a new company around a new product idea. After some general lessons, he then proposes his first product idea, complete with flip charts, business plan, and marketing plan. Read the rest (and be sure to watch the videos).

San Francisco 104

San Francisco DC Continuous Deployment Lean 104

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 8, 2010

Read the rest of Entrepreneurs: Beware of Vanity Metrics at The Conversation on Harvard Business Review. Read the rest of Entrepreneurs: Beware of Vanity Metrics at The Conversation on Harvard Business Review. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Metrics 121

Metrics San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 121

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

One of the sayings I hear from talented managers in product development is, “good enough never is.&# And, most importantly, it helps team members develop the courage to stand up for these values in stressful situations. And the rest is history: Google Maps was a huge success. Ship it.&# No press should be allowed.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Software Review 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 6, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 6, 2008 When NOT to listen to your users; when NOT to rely on split-tests There are three legs to the lean startup concept: agile product development , low-cost (fast to market) platforms , and rapid-iteration customer development. But none of that happened.

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 128

Steve Blank

MAY 18, 2009

Next, you have to deal with the daily crisis of product development and acquiring early customers. And here’s where life gets really interesting, as the reality of product development and customer input collide, the facts change so rapidly that the original well-thought-out business plan becomes irrelevant.

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Founder Silicon Valley RSS China 313

Steve Blank

JULY 29, 2013

Its goal is to take the original idea and search for a repeatable and scalable business model - first by finding product/market fit, then by testing all the parts of the business model (pricing, channel, acquisition/activation, partners, costs, etc.). They deal with the daily crisis of product development and acquiring early customers.

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Cofounder Advisory Board Customer Development Leadership 335

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

This is a designated web2open hybrid session - which means you can attend for free even if youre not attending the rest of the conference. This is a designated web2open hybrid session - which means you can attend for free even if youre not attending the rest of the conference. Its the only hybrid session happening on Tuesday.

New York 94

New York Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment 94

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 19, 2009

2gov.org will take care of the rest. 2gov.org will take care of the rest. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? To that end, were tweeting about it, and would like to ask you to join us. The Geeks are doing their part.

San Francisco 150

San Francisco Founder DC Washington 150

Steve Blank

AUGUST 24, 2009

It’s been thirty years, but every once an awhile I still wonder what happened to the rest of their lives. By the time I came back to the United States, he was gone from the company. Too often people abandon their ethics because “hey the other guys is doing it, I have to to do it to compete.&# I’m not buying it… literally.

Silicon Valley 215

Silicon Valley PR Technical Review RSS 215

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 23, 2009

.&# If you keep iterating at it, you keep making it a little bit more sophisticated, at a certain point after you’ve been through 10 iterations, that you still got no uptake whatsoever, and the feedback you’re getting from customers is still a yawn, you might say to yourself,&# You know what?

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 167