Steve Blank

JULY 27, 2009

I’ve built my company using the Customer Development Model from Day One. I recently completed the Validation step (less the industry analyst presentations) and am ready to move on to Customer Creation. It turns out that whether they want higher salaries or more help at home, women often find it hard to ask.

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley RSS Technical Review California 120

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

These tools—Customer Development, Agile Engineering, and Business Model design—became the lean start-up methodology , a rigorous approach to testing hypotheses and building prototypes, and, on the basis of data and evidence, adjusting or pivoting to a variant of the original hypothesis. Scaling is the crux of ambidexterity.

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Incubator Lean Agile Business Model 419

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Teams use the Lean Startup toolkit: the Business Model Canvas + Customer Development process + Agile Engineering. These three tools allow startups to focus on the parts of an early stage venture that matter the most: the product, product/market fit, customer acquisition, revenue and cost model, channels and partners.

Oakland 330

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics 330

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

It wasn’t so many years ago that starting a new e-commerce business on the Internet was a complex custom development project, usually costing a million dollars or more. As an old rule-of-thumb, startups realized that employees cost double the salaries paid, to cover office costs, health-care benefits, and workers compensation.

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Cost Entrepreneur Burn Rate Social Media 405

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 19, 2009

Almost all of it is in one giant fixed-cost bucket: salaries. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? I want to talk specifics, and when you come right down to it, most technology startups dont have a very interesting cost structure.

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Lean Hiring San Francisco Continuous Deployment 140

Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2013

Lean Start-up Connection: Customer Development. Thousands, then millions of new customers were coming to the site through SEO, just like we’d guessed with our customer acquisition hypothesis. Filed under: Customer Development. Customer Development' In fact, some probably still do. Validation.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 27, 2014

It wasn’t so many years ago that starting a new e-commerce business on the Internet was a complex custom development project, usually costing a million dollars or more. As an old rule-of-thumb, startups realized that employees cost double the salaries paid, to cover office costs, health-care benefits, and workers compensation.

Entrepreneur 260

Entrepreneur Burn Rate Social Media LLC 260

David Teten

APRIL 1, 2021

I have developed a founder curriculum on my blog. Relationships with Venture Partners, Entrepreneurs in Residence , and other non-salaried personnel who can help your companies. Customer Development. A well-developed model is Andreessen Horowitz’s Executive Briefing Center. AskAnything.VC

Private Equity 78

Private Equity Venture Capital Portfolio Equity 78

Seeing Both Sides

JULY 11, 2013

Before this occurs, the sales process is a craft or an art - custom-made by the founder or evangelist sales VP. You dive deep into a customer development process, working closely with a few customers who feed you requirements and are willing to trial an imperfect product that is evolving quickly.

Sales 50

Sales Technical Review Software Review B2B 50

Steve Blank

MAY 17, 2011

While I earned a good salary, I got up and went to work every day not because of the pay, but because I loved what I did. Now…a decade later… that course called Customer Development … is the basis of an entirely new way to start companies. To be honest, I would have gladly done so.

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Philadelphia Miami Thailand Silicon Valley 336

rob.by

MARCH 8, 2012

They can easily get great benefits and a six figure salary. I have been self-funding the business and have the commitments of a few angels to help pay salaries for some months when I find the right person/people, because I have come to appreciate that offering at least some salary helps a lot.

Technical Cofounder 42

Technical Cofounder Cofounder Software Engineering Fractional CTO 42

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2009

My ideas about Customer Development started evolving around these concepts. However, I think if I had understood the basics of Customer Development I might have done 5-6 startups rather than 8 to get to retirement. When I moderated my behavior it was when they were my startups.) I looked at my kids and never went back.

Entrepreneur 334

Entrepreneur Silicon Valley RSS Customer Development 334

Steve Blank

MARCH 28, 2009

Sure the rest of the stories diverge though… can’t really imagine a Soviet counterpart to the Customer Development method. I made them a pretty good offer – hire me as a training instructor at the salary they were [.] Reply Ben C. ,

Silicon Valley 231

Silicon Valley Thailand RSS Michigan 231

www.instigatorblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

I do believe that early employees should trade salary for equity. And if the equity values increase, it provides more reasonable wiggle room between salary and equity. the better the startup will be. Of course, it is a great idea when you are short of funds but want a way of keeping the best talent you can get for your new enterprise.

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Equity Employee Startup Vesting 41

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 30, 2008

Voluntary salary reduction program. Ive also used the voluntary salary reduction tool - its particularly useful as a way to get passionate employees who dont have a lot of personal expenses to buy into the mission of the company at a deep level. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 121

viniciusvacanti.com

SEPTEMBER 7, 2010

We thought that would give us enough credibility to bring someone on board and enough money to even compete, at least in the short term, with some of the other salaries. Our prototype also got us into Dreamit Ventures. In a way it did this, but the opportunities didn't really come until nearly 3 months into the program.

Cofounder 43

Cofounder Technical Cofounder Founder Ruby 43

Steve Blank

MARCH 1, 2016

We want to take care of our employees and we’re willing to sacrifice our own salaries in order to do that. Filed under: Customer Development , SiriusXM Radio Show. We’ll pay him before we pay ourselves.” ” That was a moment where we realized, OK, we’re setting a precedent here.

Cofounder 120

Cofounder Entrepreneur Michigan Silicon Valley 120

Steve Blank

APRIL 28, 2016

I hadn’t taken a salary in two years just from when I started the company and we were low on capital, our personal wealth. Filed under: Customer Development , SiriusXM Radio Show. My wife was pregnant at the time, we were running out of cash. I was getting a tremendous amount of pressure.

Entrepreneur 120

Entrepreneur Cofounder Seed Capital Texas 120

Steve Blank

APRIL 28, 2016

I hadn’t taken a salary in two years just from when I started the company and we were low on capital, our personal wealth. Filed under: Customer Development , SiriusXM Radio Show. My wife was pregnant at the time, we were running out of cash. I was getting a tremendous amount of pressure.

Entrepreneur 120

Entrepreneur Cofounder Seed Capital Texas 120

Steve Blank

JUNE 29, 2009

I made them a pretty good offer – hire me as a training instructor at the salary they were going to pay me as a lab technician. Out of desperation and a warm body right in front of them, they realized I was probably better than nothing. So I got hired for the second time at ESL, this time as a training instructor.

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Agile Silicon Valley RSS California 269

grasshopperherder.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Without receiving a real salary, I’d be wary of signing a non-compete in an area which I have domain expertise in. The founder who owns 51% of Company B can elect to pay himself a salary of $1 USD. Top 3 Ways to Fail at Customer Development. Personas for Customer Development. Customer Development (27).

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Sweat Equity Equity Cofounder Non-Compete 41

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 24, 2012

I had received my first salary, moved into a colonial house in Panama City Casco Viejo district next to the Pacific Ocean. But the salary hadn’t been transferred yet. When we launched Traindom, we knew nothing about lean startup methodology or customer development. They make all the difference in the world.

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Panama Africa Internet Email 124

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 11, 2014

They have many, many man-years of development and customer development in them. You may call it employee number one with a really low salary and really generous stock options and as the company grows, you’ll fix their salary. Edwin: There are a million others. Maybe that’s one way to go, right?

Technical Cofounder 220

Technical Cofounder Cofounder Software Review Management 220

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 29, 2009

It would charge its investors annual “management fees” to pay for the firm’s salaries, building, etc. Was there some other structure? The limited partnership offered one way to structure an investment company. The fund would have limited life.

Silicon Valley 130

Silicon Valley SBIC San Francisco RSS 130

grasshopperherder.com

FEBRUARY 19, 2011

Saying things like, “You’ll earn a salary, as soon as we close our funding round,&# make me throw up slightly in my mouth. Don’t Bullshit Me I know about the famous “ reality distortion field.&# Unless your name is Mesmero the Magnificent, it’s probably not going to work on me.

Cofounder 47

Cofounder NDA Founder Sweat Equity 47

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

2) Co-Founders are the largest form of dilution (if you’re raising) 3) Everything around LeanStartup / Customer Development 4) Understand the micro economics of your business early. When starting a new venture, esp one in concept phase should you be drawing a salary? I personally only take salary once there’s profits.

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

A more rational career path for money-making is one that rewards effort, in the form of promotions, increased security, salary and status. A more rational career path for money-making is one that rewards effort, in the form of promotions, increased security, salary and status.

San Francisco 111

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 111

techcrunch.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Options and future value are great ‘add ons’ but not for a welfare check salary until ‘this great idea makes it.’ Everything Seth said is absolutely spot on, except I’d encourage founders to make sure they do some customer development (even in the consumer space) in parallel to cranking out the first product.

Technical Review 84

Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 84