![\"Lean](\"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Startup-510x255.jpg\" "\\"Lean")
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Let me ask you a dumb question: Does your organization produce or provide products or services that customers use? Of course. But maybe a better question would be: how many of you would like to produce them faster or with more innovation?<\/p>\n
If you produce new products or services, you potentially could use a Lean Startup approach and create them faster and with more value. It doesn\u2019t matter if you work for a small company, at a major multi-national company like GE (who uses lean startups), or for government or a non-profit. Lean startups are useful and needed in all industries and organizations.<\/p>\n
The Lean Startup method was created by Eric Ries and described in his groundbreaking book The Lean Startup[1]<\/strong><\/a><\/em> back in 2011. I first came across his work a few years after that and it struck me as intuitively sensible. Part of the reason it resonated with me was a few years earlier our company conducted a lean startup type of effort. We built our Online Study Exams product<\/a> based on customer needs and Ries\u2019 concepts really hit home. They also made we wish I had known then what I know now. So here is a series of 3 articles to help others based on lots of mistakes and learning! It takes the concepts of the Lean Startup process and shows how business analysis techniques support this process.<\/p>\n What we\u2019ll explore in this 3-part series is:<\/p>\n Lean Startup is a \u201cmethodology for developing businesses and products, which aims to shorten product development cycles by adopting a combination of business-hypothesis-driven experimentation, iterative product releases, and validated learning.\u201d Wikipedia<\/em>[2]<\/a><\/p>\n The reason we all need to care reflects the state of business today[3]<\/a>:<\/p>\n But which solutions does an organization pursue? The key is to define the problem(s) first and use them to figure out what our customers need. Then we can work on solutions. It seems obvious, but that approach is not always followed for a multitude of reasons.<\/p>\n Kathy Fish, the CTO of Proctor and Gamble and a big proponent of Lean Startups, puts it well: \u201cWhen you fall in love with the problem and not the solution it opens your mind up in a really different way.[4]<\/a>\u201d Fish goes on to say by following a different funding approach to new products, they are moving faster and spending 25-50 percent less money to boot.<\/p>\n Lean Startups are based on five principles[5]<\/a>, most of which are beyond the scope of this article. We will focus on the Build-Measure-Learn methodology.<\/p>\n Lean Startup shares its heritage with lean manufacturing. It relies on the knowledge and creativity of individual workers, shrinking of batch sizes, Just-in-Time (JIT) inventory, and faster cycle times. You might recognize the underpinnings of Agile here, too, since they are also based on these principles. Lean Startup borrows from other management and product development ideas as well, including design thinking and customer experience\/development.<\/p>\n But, wait, if they are similar, what\u2019s wrong with just using Agile? Well, Agile alone is not enough. It helps you build a product the right way; it doesn\u2019t mean you will build the right product. We need to figure out what the right product is<\/em>, then use Agile to build it right<\/em>. Lean Startups help us determine the right products and features.<\/p>\n In The Lean Startup<\/em>1<\/sup>, Eric Ries describes the methodology for building the \u201cright product.\u201d The basic kernel of what makes Lean Startup work is cycling multiple times through what is called the Build-Measure-Learn (B-M-L) cycle. See Figure 1<\/em>.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a typical flow: After building an initial product increment, we measure how it is adopted and used. From those measures, we learn what worked and didn\u2019t and use it for the next cycle. I think it literally flips around the normal cycle of learning what customers need and then building what we think will need. It also promotes innovation since we can incrementally discover what customers truly value and deliver it to them as we learn what is valuable to them.<\/span><\/p>\n Figure 2\u00a0<\/em>shows the cycle from a flowchart perspective:<\/span><\/p>\n The methodology assumes you have identified a problem and have a vision<\/strong> and ideas on how to solve it. From a process standpoint, those are \u201cpre-conditions.\u201d It also relies on having an overall strategy<\/strong> for the product\u2019s direction to support it. Without those, we\u2019d be meandering around a lot instead of focusing on solving particular customer problems. Each time through the B-M-L loop we produce a new product increment<\/strong>. See Figure 3<\/em> for a graphical view of this \u201cframework.\u201d’<\/p>\n To conclude, Lean Startups give us a simple, repeatable, and rigorous way to build products that customers want and need, not just what they say they want. The core of the method is the Build-Measure-Learn Cycle, which produces product increments that we can measure and use data to learn whether the features are valuable or not. It is more complex, of course, but my aim with this article is to give a practical overview of the methodology.<\/p>\n In Parts 2 and 3, I\u2019ll continue by exploring the B-M-L Cycle further and showing the business analysis techniques that can propel Lean Startups to build creative and effective solutions.<\/p>\n \n [1]<\/a> Eric Ries, The Lean Startup: How Today\u2019s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses<\/em>, New York: Crown Business Books, 2011<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Lean_startup<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Adapted from Clayton M. Christensen, The Innovator\u2019s Dilemma<\/em>, New York: Harper Collins, 1997-2011<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Downloaded from https:\/\/leanstartup.co\/how-procter-gamble-uses-lean-startup-to-innovate\/<\/a>, Downloaded Sept. 4, 2018<\/p>\n\n
Part 1: What is Lean Startup and why is it needed?<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Lean Startup Methodology<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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All these disciplines share a focus on value, which from a lean perspective is anything that provides <\/span>benefit to the customer <\/strong>(and not just what we think they want or might want). Plus, they all have an aversion to non-value-added features.<\/span><\/p>\n![\"B-M-L](\"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Figure-1_-Build-Measure-Learn-Cycle.png\")
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