Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 5, 2010

I believe it is the best introduction to Customer Development you can buy. As all of you know, Steve Blank is the progenitor of Customer Development and author of The Four Steps to the Epiphany. You can imagine how well that worked. On the minus side, that has made it a wee bit hard to understand.

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Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 166

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 16, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, March 16, 2009 Combining agile development with customer development Today I read an excellent blog post that I just had to share. In most agile development systems, there is a notion of the "product backlog" a prioritized list of what software is most valuable to be developed next.

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Agile Customer Development Developer San Francisco 111

viniciusvacanti.com

SEPTEMBER 7, 2010

I pick my cofounder's brain almost daily about the inner workings of our product, so that I can be better informed about the tech side of things. Vinicius Vacanti It's smart for you to show interest on the tech side.

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Cofounder Technical Cofounder Founder Ruby 43

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Startups especially can benefit by using technical debt to experiment, invest in process, and increase their product development leverage. The biggest source of waste in new product development is building something that nobody wants. Leverage product development with open source and third parties.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 20, 2008 The engineering managers lament I was inspired to write The product managers lament while meeting with a startup struggling to figure out what had gone wrong with their product development process. Good luck, engineering manager. It was painful for a lot of people.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 26, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Sunday, April 26, 2009 Product development leverage Leverage has once again become a dirty word in the world of finance, and rightly so. But I want to talk about a different kind of leverage, the kind that you can get in product development. Its a key lean startup concept. Great post!

Product Development 88

Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 88

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

I had the opportunity to pioneer this approach to funnel analysis at IMVU, where it became a core part of our customer development process. To promote this metrics discipline, we would present the full funnel to our board (and advisers) at the end of every development cycle. Check your assumptions, what went wrong?

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

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 then that new breed of managers will, Im sure, confidently go around saying: good enough never is.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Software Review 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

The application of agile development methodologies which dramatically reduce waste and unlock creativity in product development. See Customer Development Engineering for my first stab at articulating the theory involved) Ferocious customer-centric rapid iteration, as exemplified by the Customer Development process.

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Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

Own the development methodology - in a traditional product development setup, the VP Engineering or some other full-time manager would be responsible for making sure the engineers wrote adequate specs, interfaced well with QA, and also run the scheduling "trains" for releases. Labels: product development 15comments: mukund said.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 1, 2009

Also SJ's obsession with better taste (positively) contributes to the overall product development process. There are some good anecdotes about Chief Engineers in the Toyota Product Development Book. Some of these reaffirm that they do indeed validate assumptions through interaction with customers.

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 166

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. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

Software Review 144

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. Their product development team is hard at work on a next-generation product platform, which is designed to offer a new suite of products – but this effort is months behind schedule.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 7, 2010

There are often counter-intuitive changes in customer behavior that depend on little details. In fact, the curse of product development is that sometimes small things make a huge difference and sometimes huge things make no difference. When we’re optimizing, product development teams encounter similar situations.

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Lean Metrics Design 154

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 22, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, June 22, 2009 Pivot, dont jump to a new vision In a lean startup , instead of being organized around traditional functional departments, we use a cross-functional problem team and solution team. Each has its own iterative process: customer development and agile development respectively.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 167

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

If you cant find any , maybe that means you havent figured out who your customer is yet. And if you dont know who your customer is, perhaps some customer development is in order? Labels: customer development , search engine marketing 13comments: Jim Lindstrom said. What is customer development?

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 29, 2008

The technical interview is at the heart of these challenges when building a product development team, and so I thought it deserved an entire post on its own. Still, a startup product development team is a service organization. Were there to serve customers direclty, as well as all of the other functions of the company.

San Francisco 146

San Francisco Lean Agile Java 146

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Luckily, I now have the benefit of a forthcoming book, The Principles of Product Development Flow. Labels: five whys root cause analysis , product development 11comments: Peter Severin said. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Interesting post.

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment Development Team Review 161

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 2, 2009

Labels: five whys root cause analysis , product development 15comments: Anonymoussaid. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Leave your thoughts in a comment. If you’ve tried Five Whys, please share your experiences so far. I’ll do my best to help.)

San Francisco 164

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 5, 2008

But first I think we need to save the product manager from that special form of torture only a waterfall product development team can create. Labels: product development 8comments: Vincent van Wylick said. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Management Software Review Product 158

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you? But a Viral company who is focused there is probably going out of business. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 3, 2009

Refreshing to finally see lean and agile thinking emerge in product/business-floors and not only in technology. Critical also, as the lean company/start-up can not be lean by just using lean principles in IT and not in Product Development/Management - a common misinterpretation of the Toyota Production System.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? What is customer development? Using AdWords to assess demand for your new online. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R. ScienceDaily: Corporate culture is most important.

Software Review 167

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, September 22, 2008 Thoughts on scientific product development I enjoyed reading a post today from Laserlike (Mike Speiser), on Scientific product development. I agree with the less is more product development approach, but for a different reason. Now that is fun.

Product Development 68

Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 68

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. I think Drucker said it best.

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 128

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2010

When I first encountered customer development , it was considered pure lunacy by mainstream entrepreneurs and VCs. When I first encountered customer development , it was considered pure lunacy by mainstream entrepreneurs and VCs. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

San Francisco 133

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 133

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Expo New York New York, NY Nov 19 The Lean Startup at MIT Boston, MA Nov 20 Lunch workshop at Dogpatch Labs Boston, MA Dec 17 Lean Startup Cohort program begins San Francisco, CA KISSmetrics KISSmetrics is loading.

Continuous Deployment 167

Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 28, 2010

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Expo New York New York, NY Nov 19 The Lean Startup at MIT Boston, MA Nov 20 Lunch workshop at Dogpatch Labs Boston, MA Dec 17 Lean Startup Cohort program begins San Francisco, CA KISSmetrics KISSmetrics is loading.

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment SEC 158

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Expo New York New York, NY Nov 19 The Lean Startup at MIT Boston, MA Nov 20 Lunch workshop at Dogpatch Labs Boston, MA Dec 17 Lean Startup Cohort program begins San Francisco, CA KISSmetrics KISSmetrics is loading.

San Francisco 155

San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2010

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Expo New York New York, NY Nov 19 The Lean Startup at MIT Boston, MA Nov 20 Lunch workshop at Dogpatch Labs Boston, MA Dec 17 Lean Startup Cohort program begins San Francisco, CA KISSmetrics KISSmetrics is loading.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Sweden Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 17, 2010

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ▼ June (3) What is a startup? Expo New York New York, NY Nov 19 The Lean Startup at MIT Boston, MA Nov 20 Lunch workshop at Dogpatch Labs Boston, MA Dec 17 Lean Startup Cohort program begins San Francisco, CA KISSmetrics KISSmetrics is loading.

Technical Review 164

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 8, 2009

When it becomes possible to build products "live" with customers, the cycle time changes and design becomes a much more dynamic process. We still struggle to create Firm software that is defect-free, and it still requires customer insight (and maybe some customer development) to discover what will Delight.

Software Review 87

Software Review Design Software San Francisco 87

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 10, 2009

This development philosophy created a culture around rapid prototyping of features, followed by testing them against large numbers of actual customers. It would be hard to argue against this product development strategy, in general. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Continuous Deployment 123

Continuous Deployment San Francisco Software Review Lean 123

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Do some Customer Development instead. When we finally did launch the company, even though our product had grown and changed significantly, Wired didnt cover it. New York Times, Wall Street Journal, CNN, the works. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

San Francisco 168

San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

Those rates gave us a map that told us a lot about our customers; insights that proved stable even when the company grew orders of magnitude bigger. Only much later did I realize that this was an application of customer development to online marketing. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

SEM 164

SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 14, 2009

Each of these four currencies represents a way for a customer to “pay&# for services from a company. A great product enables customers, developers, partners, and even competitors to exchange their unique currencies in combinations that lead to financial success for the company that organizes them.

Customer 156

Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156

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