This transcript summarizes a podcast interview between Mark Graban and Eric Ries about Lean startup methodology. Eric got introduced to Lean thinking through his experience with Agile software development and saw parallels between reducing batch sizes and Lean principles. He realized the wrong manufacturing metaphor of waterfall was being used for startups and that Lean principles could be applied if adapted for the high uncertainty of startups. Eric defines a Lean startup as using rapid iteration and continuous customer feedback to reduce uncertainty and determine where to invest resources under conditions of uncertainty. The interview discusses how Lean startup principles can apply to both startups and large companies developing new products.
Design the Conversation: An approach to help you stay focused on the customer Sara Walsh
This workshop shared a tactic you can use to design and plan content for customer experiences. It's an activity we use at Capital One to help us make sure our content is clear, human, and relevant across our experiences -- and it helps get key work partners from all disciplines aligned too.
Design the Conversation: An approach to help you stay focused on the customer Sara Walsh
This workshop shared a tactic you can use to design and plan content for customer experiences. It's an activity we use at Capital One to help us make sure our content is clear, human, and relevant across our experiences -- and it helps get key work partners from all disciplines aligned too.
Design the Conversation: A case study on making digital banking clear and humanSara Walsh
This is a case study of how we in Capital One Small Business Bank changed the content and design of our online account opening conversation so that 92% of customers completed the experience versus 26%. I shared it at the J. Boye Aarhus 2016 conference in Denmark in November.
Too busy to learn UX methods that can save you tons of time?
Wondering which UX techniques are most likely to provide useful results all along your project? Let's talk about some tactics we tried. Success stories and epic fails of methods we have tested to build digital products and interfaces consumers love to use.
Freelance Designer Guide - How To Be A Successful Freelance DesignerIlya Bilbao
Table of Contents
Table of Contents ........................................................... 3
Introduction..................................................................... 5
Getting Started ............................................................... 6
Computer ........................................................................ 6
Internet............................................................................. 8
Software .......................................................................... 9
Types of Designers .......................................................... 11
Your Portfolio .................................................................... 13
Getting Work ..................................................................... 15
Forums...................,,,......................................................... 15
Freelance Sites ................................................................. 16
Gig Sites ............................................................................ 17
Classified Sites .................................................................. 17
Contests ............................................................................. 18
Conclusion........................................................................... 19
Resources ........................................................................... 20
You may ask this:
1 do freelance designers charge tax
2 do freelance designers need a business license
3 do freelance designers pay taxes
4 graphic designer can earn on freelancer
5 how can i become a freelance graphic designer
6 how can i become a freelance web designer
7 how do freelance designers find design work
8 how do freelance designers get paid
9 how do freelance designers work
10 how much can a freelance graphic designer make
11 how much can a freelance web designer make
12 how much can you earn as a freelance designer
13 how much do freelance designers charge
14 how much do freelance designers make
15 how much do freelance graphic designers charge
16 how much do freelance graphic designers make
17 how much do freelance web designers make
18 how much does a freelance designer charge
19 how much does a freelance designer make
20 how much does a freelance web designer make
21 how much money do freelance designers make
22 how much should a freelance designer charge
23 how much should a freelance designer charge for a logo
24 how much should a freelance graphic designer charge
25 how much should a freelance interior designer charge
26 how much should a freelance web designer charge
27 how much should i pay a freelance graphic designer
28 how much to charge as a freelance designer
29 how to be a freelance designer
30 how to be a successful freelance designer
8 employer branding must-haves to engage developersTaras Makh
In order to hire good specialists for the company, it’s not enough to establish a recruiting process. The employer’s brand is no less important. It needs a lot of work.
From this guide you will learn how:
Set the right employer’s branding goals
Generate content that will inspire developers to learn more about your company
Optimize the employer’s branding strategy and tell a story that will attract developers’ attention.
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to deliver a talk at Shift in Split, Croatia.
Shift is a developer conference, so initially, I thought it would be entertaining to talk about what it’s like to work with an engineer, from a designers perspective. The working title of the talk was Things Engineers Hate About Working With (Me) a Designer.
I was going to share the mistakes I’ve made, and learned from, along the way. A manifesto of what not to do when working with an engineer. However, feedback included phrases like “it’s a bit tongue & cheek” and the best talks are ones that are “raw, honest and vulnerable.”
You don’t write code, but you’ve been successful in spite of it. The lines are blurring between design & engineering. Why not talk about how tools have helped bridge that gap?
There was something more interesting to talk about. I realized that I didn’t write code because I didn’t need to. For years I’d been spoiled, and to some extent enabled, by a handful of incredibly talented iOS engineers. The realization didn’t sit well with me.
I scrapped everything and went back to the drawing board.
Tools were my first introduction to a hobby that turned into a passion that has become an obsession
They have been steadily influencing and shaping me as a designer from the first time I sat in front of a computer in elementary school. I would not realize how much they’d impact my life until much much later.
Tools have had a massive influence on me and my work, but had they on others?
Design the Conversation: A case study on making digital banking clear and humanSara Walsh
This is a case study of how we in Capital One Small Business Bank changed the content and design of our online account opening conversation so that 92% of customers completed the experience versus 26%. I shared it at the J. Boye Aarhus 2016 conference in Denmark in November.
Too busy to learn UX methods that can save you tons of time?
Wondering which UX techniques are most likely to provide useful results all along your project? Let's talk about some tactics we tried. Success stories and epic fails of methods we have tested to build digital products and interfaces consumers love to use.
Freelance Designer Guide - How To Be A Successful Freelance DesignerIlya Bilbao
Table of Contents
Table of Contents ........................................................... 3
Introduction..................................................................... 5
Getting Started ............................................................... 6
Computer ........................................................................ 6
Internet............................................................................. 8
Software .......................................................................... 9
Types of Designers .......................................................... 11
Your Portfolio .................................................................... 13
Getting Work ..................................................................... 15
Forums...................,,,......................................................... 15
Freelance Sites ................................................................. 16
Gig Sites ............................................................................ 17
Classified Sites .................................................................. 17
Contests ............................................................................. 18
Conclusion........................................................................... 19
Resources ........................................................................... 20
You may ask this:
1 do freelance designers charge tax
2 do freelance designers need a business license
3 do freelance designers pay taxes
4 graphic designer can earn on freelancer
5 how can i become a freelance graphic designer
6 how can i become a freelance web designer
7 how do freelance designers find design work
8 how do freelance designers get paid
9 how do freelance designers work
10 how much can a freelance graphic designer make
11 how much can a freelance web designer make
12 how much can you earn as a freelance designer
13 how much do freelance designers charge
14 how much do freelance designers make
15 how much do freelance graphic designers charge
16 how much do freelance graphic designers make
17 how much do freelance web designers make
18 how much does a freelance designer charge
19 how much does a freelance designer make
20 how much does a freelance web designer make
21 how much money do freelance designers make
22 how much should a freelance designer charge
23 how much should a freelance designer charge for a logo
24 how much should a freelance graphic designer charge
25 how much should a freelance interior designer charge
26 how much should a freelance web designer charge
27 how much should i pay a freelance graphic designer
28 how much to charge as a freelance designer
29 how to be a freelance designer
30 how to be a successful freelance designer
8 employer branding must-haves to engage developersTaras Makh
In order to hire good specialists for the company, it’s not enough to establish a recruiting process. The employer’s brand is no less important. It needs a lot of work.
From this guide you will learn how:
Set the right employer’s branding goals
Generate content that will inspire developers to learn more about your company
Optimize the employer’s branding strategy and tell a story that will attract developers’ attention.
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to deliver a talk at Shift in Split, Croatia.
Shift is a developer conference, so initially, I thought it would be entertaining to talk about what it’s like to work with an engineer, from a designers perspective. The working title of the talk was Things Engineers Hate About Working With (Me) a Designer.
I was going to share the mistakes I’ve made, and learned from, along the way. A manifesto of what not to do when working with an engineer. However, feedback included phrases like “it’s a bit tongue & cheek” and the best talks are ones that are “raw, honest and vulnerable.”
You don’t write code, but you’ve been successful in spite of it. The lines are blurring between design & engineering. Why not talk about how tools have helped bridge that gap?
There was something more interesting to talk about. I realized that I didn’t write code because I didn’t need to. For years I’d been spoiled, and to some extent enabled, by a handful of incredibly talented iOS engineers. The realization didn’t sit well with me.
I scrapped everything and went back to the drawing board.
Tools were my first introduction to a hobby that turned into a passion that has become an obsession
They have been steadily influencing and shaping me as a designer from the first time I sat in front of a computer in elementary school. I would not realize how much they’d impact my life until much much later.
Tools have had a massive influence on me and my work, but had they on others?
Industry stories on agile, scrum and kanbanBusiness901
Eric is an Agile Project Manager who has been using Kanban for software development since 2007. He has worked with Scrum, XP and other agile methods for over the past 5 years, and has been managing software projects for over 10 years. Eric has his own blog, Corporate Coder which can be found at http://EricLandes.com. He is also a frequent contributor to http://developer.com.
Your open source project competes with millions of others for users, contributors, and perhaps financial support. To stand out from the crowd, you need marketing. If that term makes you shudder (or if you simply think you don’t know how), don’t worry. Deirdré Straughan takes you through what you need to know about open source marketing.
Deirdré details what marketing is (and isn’t), explains why and how you need to do it, and provides practical examples and case studies. Join in to get an overview of marketing tools, and when each is useful, and a guide to the time and resources you’ll need. Along the way, Deirdré explains the importance of overall customer experience (a.k.a. community) and what that implies for your project. You’ll come away knowing why marketing matters, even when you’re not trying to sell something—along with some helpful tips and shortcuts.
What you'll learn
Discover what marketing (really) is and why your open source project needs it
Understand marketing strategies and related activities that can help a project and community grow and thrive
Learn useful tips and shortcuts for developing content and other marketing materials
Get a primer on the importance of a healthy community in attracting users and contributors to a project
Deirdré Straughan
Amazon Web Services
Deirdré Straughan is the open source content lead at Amazon Web Services, where she helps technologies grow and thrive through marketing and community. Her product experience spans consumer apps and devices, cloud services and technologies, operating systems and kernel features. Her toolkit includes words, websites, blogs, communities, events, video, social, marketing, and more. She has written and edited technical books and blog posts, filmed and produced videos, and organized meetups, conferences, and conference talks. You can learn more about her at Beginningwithi.com.
Using Design Thinking for Growth is a transcription of a Business901 podcast.. It contained great thoughts on how Design Thinking may be to Business Growth the way Lean and Six Sigma has been to quality.
Driving agility into your customer experiencemarc mcneill
Presentation given at the Customer Experience Management for Banking and Financial Services conference in London.
* Discover how lean and agile thinking delivers customer driven innovation at speed
* Learn how to build the voice of the customer into your delivery process
* Understand how to rapidly respond to changing customer expectations across multiple customer touch-points
Presents eight ideas for agility, moving out of IT and into the realm of experience design.
Sharing our Pitch Deck with the community. This is the deck we used to raise our pre-seed funding and got $1.4M.
We are sharing this because we know the pain we went through when figuring out how to make a presentable deck for potential investors. It is very hard in the SaaS space.
Most of the content on the internet gives you advice that is only usable if you already have a scaled product and a proof of concept. What if you only have an awesome product?
That's what we had and that was enough. We break everything down for you here, slide by slide. Hope this helps at least a startup or two out there.
Go get them! ;)
During the last years, Markus main focus has been on transitions towards Lean and Kanban product management and development practices across his portfolio. With Arne Roock, he co-authored ‘Replenishment’, a free eBook on Kanban. Markus is one of thought leaders of the Kanban Movement and is speaking at the upcoming Lean Kanban Central Europe Conference (It is in Hamburg, Germany, Nov 4-5, 2013) about Boundaries of Kanban – Disruptive Innovation.
Getting into UX: How to take your first steps to a career in user experiencePhil Barrett
Want to work in UX but can't get a job without experience? Here are a few ideas about how to break into the UX business, make a portfolio, win at your interview and design assessment - and whether UX is the right career for you. You can start doing UX in the job you already have, then build a portfolio from that.
My keynote from the UX South Africa 2014 conference in Cape Town, South Africa
It's a look at the state of play including:
- It's still easy to find poor website UX in South Africa
- Informing digital strategy by making and launching things
- Problems that executives of traditionally non-digital companies face as software slowly eats the word - and some solutions: Proactive research, digital product management, agile...
- Some of the skills and talents that unicorn UX designers need to have
Agile methodologies have quickly become central to the way we create and refine digital products. These rapid cycles of building, measuring, and learning are great for refining an already innovative product but these tools are being increasingly called upon to produce innovation itself and they suck at it.
In this high-level, philosophical talk, Scott draws from 25+ years of experience in digital product strategy and design to take a critical and sometimes controversial look at processes that claim to promote innovation but too often fail to deliver.
He also highlights some principles and practices that seem to promote real innovation and help it survive the perilous journey from the minds of innovators to the hands and hearts of users.
WTF is a 'product-led' transformation anywayTim Malbon
A summary of what we at Made by Many mean by 'Change by making' and 'Product-led transformation', and the presentation I made on the subject at Google Firestarters
It is a well-known fact that Design Sprint is a very good technique – wonderful perhaps – but something incomplete (at least in its conception), that is for two reasons, 1.- it only allows you to concentrate on a single flow of a single product (what is not always optimal depending on the time and environment), and 2.- it facilitates you to fall into many inconsistencies that can end up affecting your entire UX process.
YOU CAN EXPECT TO LEARN:
* Ways to solve defects caused by focusing on a single flow of a single product
* What are the most common inconsistencies and possible ways to solve each of them
* Show a real case (my particular case) about how Sprint Design can be inserted in a UX macro process
Innovation is one of the ultimate buzzwords of our era but what is it really? What is its meaning? How can we see it? Replicate it? Scale it? In his talk, I propose that innovation really is the “removal of friction” from a system; and that through this lens we can understand the rise of design, lean startup, Silicon Valley and possibly many other innovative happenings across time.
The talk covers the following topics:
1. The Real Lesson Steve Jobs Taught Us
2. The Rise of Design
3. Innovation = The Removal Of Friction?
4. Co-opting Innovation
Our Favorite Mistakes: Creating a Culture of Learning from MistakesMark Graban
Presented by Mark Graban for the Lean Leadership Week event hosted by Lean Frontiers.
We all make mistakes, even the most successful people we know. Are people successful because they avoid mistakes or because they make sure to learn from them? Mark Graban thinks it’s the latter based on podcast conversations he’s had with corporate CEOs, athletes, entrepreneurs, and entertainers – and former Toyota employees.
Are we willing to admit mistakes to ourselves, yet alone our colleagues, employees, or leaders? Do our organizations create a culture where it’s safe to talk about mistakes, as a first step toward preventing future mistakes? Can we shift from blaming and shaming to building a culture of continuous improvement?
In this talk, you will learn and hear stories about:
• Why it’s important to admit mistakes
• How to reflect on mistakes without being too hard on ourselves (or others)
• How to prevent repeating mistakes
• What key leader behaviors create a culture where it’s safe for people to admit mistakes
Mark Graban is an independent consultant, professional speaker, and entrepreneur. He is also a senior advisor for the technology company KaiNexus and advises healthcare clients through the firm Value Capture.
He is the author of Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More. Mark’s previous books include the Shingo-Award winning Lean Hospitals and Healthcare Kaizen. He was creator and editor of the anthology Practicing Lean.
Mark hosts many podcasts including “Lean Blog Interviews,” “Habitual Excellence, Presented by Value Capture” and “My Favorite Mistake.”
Mark has a B.S. in Industrial Engineering from Northwestern University, along with an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering and an M.B.A. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Today’s Effective Leader: Shifting From Cop to Coach and CounselorMark Graban
A webinar presented by Mark Graban for the Iowa Lean Consortium
This webinar, facilitated by Mark Graban, will provide practical approaches for changing the way you lead.
How often do we hear phrases like "If only people would just do what they're told," or "They're being resistant to change"? High quality organizations realize that "resistance to change" actually should be the beginning of a conversation about change, not the end.
This webinar will feature Mark Graban, an internationally recognized consultant, explaining how organizations can shift from a culture of compliance to a culture of continuous improvement – and in the process, get on the path to better quality and higher levels of performance.
Using real-life examples, Mark will share practical approaches for changing the way you lead to engage everyone in ongoing and sustainable continuous improvement. Mark also will introduce innovation mindsets and tactics from a surprising place – clinical counseling and addiction therapy – and share proven methods that have helped Toyota and other companies realize that "resistance to change" is a normal part of the change process.
The Steps You Need to Take to Get Your Business Ready to Reopen (Proactive Ma...Mark Graban
As our businesses enter the new phases of a return to post-pandemic life, it will be critically important for leaders to be proactive with their employees and customers – for the sake of the health of our people and our organizations.
By the end of this webinar, you will:
- Recognize the difference between merely containing a COVID-19 related problems and preventing them from occurring again, especially if we see a fall resurgence.
- Learn why it’s important to see problems, solve problems, and share problems in your organization.
- Understand how to use methods like FMEA (“Failure Mode Effects Analysis”) and root-cause problem solving to be more proactive in your management and improvement efforts post crisis.
Hosted by Mark Graban, M.B.A., M.S., a top expert in Lean Management. Graban is the author of “Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More” a book about using simple, yet practical statistical methods that help leaders overreact less to their metrics, which frees up time for real, focused, sustainable improvement. While he works with startups, entrepreneurs and midsized businesses, Mark previously worked for General Motors, Dell, Honeywell, and divisions of Johnson & Johnson. Graban is a guest lecturer at MIT, Wharton, Ohio State University, and several international universities.
Getting from Data to Analysis and Insight in the Covid-19 Pandemic (Final)Mark Graban
Presented by Mark Graban and Christopher R. Chapman.
The aim of this webinar is to expose attendees to the “Process Behavior Chart” methodology, using data and examples related to the current pandemic. Mark will provide a quick introduction to the method, using a few charts from healthcare organizations. Chris will share a deeper dive using data from the province of Ontario related to testing and cases over time.
Learning objectives:
* Learn how Process Behavior Charts are more helpful than rolling averages and two-data-point comparisons
* Understand how to determine if performance is getting better or getting worse? Or is it just fluctuating around a stable average?
* Know how to better understand cause-and-effect when a system is changed
* Forecast how the system will behave and under what conditions
Mark Graban is President of Constancy, Inc. and is author of the book "Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More."
Christopher R. Chapman is Owner and Chief Agile/Lean Coach, Derailleur Consulting, Inc., based in Toronto.
Busting Myths About Just in Time: The Implications for Healthcare Supply ChainsMark Graban
During the Covid-19 crisis, some have blamed “just in time” or “Lean” for the current (and tragic) shortages of life-saving items like masks and ventilators. JIT has been vilified after nearly every major natural disaster that has disrupted supply chains. Is this fair?
In this webinar, Mark Graban, a Shingo award-winning author, will dispel some common myths about just in time and Lean management. He will share a broader context of JIT and Lean, along with practical suggestions that can help organizations in various industries.
How Authors Can Stress Less Over Their MetricsMark Graban
This is a webinar presented by Mark Graban, author of the book "Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More."
The webinar was hosted by Cathy Fyock, "The Business Book Strategist." https://www.cathyfyock.com/
Cathy coached me through the book writing process and I am grateful to her and her community of authors.
She invited me to give this presentation for her group of authors... so I tried to tailor a talk that focuses on authors, their metrics, and how to best manage them in a way that reduces stress and overreaction.
YouTube recording:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kRaxGiKOAY
Improve Your Lean Management System With a Simple ChartMark Graban
Many organizations have discovered the benefits of Lean management system practices, ranging from Strategy Deployment in the boardroom (and on down the organization) and Lean Daily Management practices at the front lines (and on up).
In our zeal to reduce waste in the actual work, how often are we introducing additional waste through our management practices? Too often, in the varied experience of our webinar presenter, Mark Graban. Reacting to every up and down in a metric or demanding a root cause explanation for every below average data point (or any data point that doesn’t hit a target) might be consuming time that would be better spent actually improving the system that generates your results.
In this webinar, you’ll learn practical tips and methods for being more effective in your Lean improvement efforts, including:
• Why two data points are not a trend (except for the few cases when they are)
• Why Run Charts or, better yet, “Process Behavior Charts” are far more helpful than red/green color-coded tables of numbers, a.k.a. “Bowling Charts”
• How to create a Process Behavior Chart for a metric
• How to use a Process Behavior Chart over time to separate “signal” from “noise,” which shows you when to react and look for a root cause for that last data point – and when to step back and improve more systematically
Mark will share lessons from his new book, Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More. Less
Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve MoreMark Graban
In this webinar, Mark Graban shares key insights from his new book that will help you be more effective with your Lean management system. He will share the practical methods and mindsets of “Process Behavior Charts” that apply at the boardroom strategy deployment level and for frontline unit huddle boards. Every metric shows variation over time, but if we react to every change in every metric, then nothing is a priority. This approach can help us waste less time, which means we can improve more effectively and sustainably.
In this webinar, participants will:
Know the three questions people should ask about their metrics and the system that leads to those results
Learn how to interpret their metrics with “Process Behavior Charts”
Determine when to react to a change in a metric, based on three simple rules for determining that we have found a “signal” in the noise
Understand how Process Behavior Charts are more effective than “Bowling Charts” or “red/green” analysis
Respect for People and Continuous Improvement for HealthcareMark Graban
Presented by Mark Graban to a healthcare conference gathering in Turkey in April 2018. Mark Graban is the author of the book "Lean Hospitals" and co-author of "Healthcare Kaizen," the books that are essentially source material for this talk.
Improving profitability for small businessBen Wann
In this comprehensive presentation, we will explore strategies and practical tips for enhancing profitability in small businesses. Tailored to meet the unique challenges faced by small enterprises, this session covers various aspects that directly impact the bottom line. Attendees will learn how to optimize operational efficiency, manage expenses, and increase revenue through innovative marketing and customer engagement techniques.
What is the TDS Return Filing Due Date for FY 2024-25.pdfseoforlegalpillers
It is crucial for the taxpayers to understand about the TDS Return Filing Due Date, so that they can fulfill your TDS obligations efficiently. Taxpayers can avoid penalties by sticking to the deadlines and by accurate filing of TDS. Timely filing of TDS will make sure about the availability of tax credits. You can also seek the professional guidance of experts like Legal Pillers for timely filing of the TDS Return.
Premium MEAN Stack Development Solutions for Modern BusinessesSynapseIndia
Stay ahead of the curve with our premium MEAN Stack Development Solutions. Our expert developers utilize MongoDB, Express.js, AngularJS, and Node.js to create modern and responsive web applications. Trust us for cutting-edge solutions that drive your business growth and success.
Know more: https://www.synapseindia.com/technology/mean-stack-development-company.html
Implicitly or explicitly all competing businesses employ a strategy to select a mix
of marketing resources. Formulating such competitive strategies fundamentally
involves recognizing relationships between elements of the marketing mix (e.g.,
price and product quality), as well as assessing competitive and market conditions
(i.e., industry structure in the language of economics).
The world of search engine optimization (SEO) is buzzing with discussions after Google confirmed that around 2,500 leaked internal documents related to its Search feature are indeed authentic. The revelation has sparked significant concerns within the SEO community. The leaked documents were initially reported by SEO experts Rand Fishkin and Mike King, igniting widespread analysis and discourse. For More Info:- https://news.arihantwebtech.com/search-disrupted-googles-leaked-documents-rock-the-seo-world/
What are the main advantages of using HR recruiter services.pdfHumanResourceDimensi1
HR recruiter services offer top talents to companies according to their specific needs. They handle all recruitment tasks from job posting to onboarding and help companies concentrate on their business growth. With their expertise and years of experience, they streamline the hiring process and save time and resources for the company.
Falcon stands out as a top-tier P2P Invoice Discounting platform in India, bridging esteemed blue-chip companies and eager investors. Our goal is to transform the investment landscape in India by establishing a comprehensive destination for borrowers and investors with diverse profiles and needs, all while minimizing risk. What sets Falcon apart is the elimination of intermediaries such as commercial banks and depository institutions, allowing investors to enjoy higher yields.
RMD24 | Debunking the non-endemic revenue myth Marvin Vacquier Droop | First ...BBPMedia1
Marvin neemt je in deze presentatie mee in de voordelen van non-endemic advertising op retail media netwerken. Hij brengt ook de uitdagingen in beeld die de markt op dit moment heeft op het gebied van retail media voor niet-leveranciers.
Retail media wordt gezien als het nieuwe advertising-medium en ook mediabureaus richten massaal retail media-afdelingen op. Merken die niet in de betreffende winkel liggen staan ook nog niet in de rij om op de retail media netwerken te adverteren. Marvin belicht de uitdagingen die er zijn om echt aansluiting te vinden op die markt van non-endemic advertising.
Lean Blog Podcast #115 - Mark Graban Interviews Eric Ries on "The Lean Startup"
1. Transcript of Podcast #115, With
@EricRies on #LeanStartup
From www.leanblog.org
Here is a transcript of LeanBlog Podcast #115 with Eric
Ries, author of the book The Lean Startup: How Today’s
Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create
Radically Successful Businesses . We recorded this in
March 2011 before the book was out. Auditory learners
can listen to audio at www.LeanBlog.org/115 or you can
download the audio and subscribe to my series via Apple
iTunes.
Mark Graban: Hi, this is Mark Graban. This is episode 115 of my podcast for
March 10th, 2011. My guest today is Eric Ries, entrepreneur and author of
the upcoming book, “The Lean Startup.” Now, today we’ll talk about how Eric
got introduced to Lean, to core materials such as books by Womack and
Jones and Jeff Liker. And how he has put a lot of thought into how to take a
proven Lean principles, such as reduced batch sizes, five whys analysis,
faster time to market and customer focus, and applied them to startups.
And we both agree that there are a lot of applications of these Lean startup
principles, even if you the listener are working on new products and larger,
older manufacturing settings. So, I hope you’ll take 20 minutes to listen
regardless of your background, as Eric’s work has certainly stretched my
attempts at Lean thinking in new and better directions.
You can find the web page for this post at leanblog.org/115, which will have
links to Eric’s sites and other posts about him and his work. So, as always,
thanks for listening.
[music]
Mark: Eric, it’s really nice of you to take time out of your busy schedule to
talk on the podcast. Thanks for being here.
Eric Ries: Thank you very much for having me.
Mark: I was wondering if you can introduce yourself, briefly, for the
2. audience. And also to talk a little bit about how, as a software developer, you
got exposed to Lean or ideas that you eventually discovered seems very
much like Lean.
Eric: Yeah. Well, my background is as a computer programmer. I’m one of
those kids that grew up programming computers, and I was pretty surprised,
pleasantly so, when I found out you could get paid to do that as a career. I
just thought of it as something you did for fun in the basement. And I always
had the experience as a programmer, just, maybe it’s just my bad luck or
who knows? Working on projects that either never saw the light of day, or
that basically failed in the marketplace. So, I have worked on a lot of
different really cool pieces of technology that have no customers today.
And, as a programmer, I naturally was always looking for technical solutions
to that problem. I always assumed that if I just used the right programming
methodology, if we just used the right platforms and APIs and the right open
source technology — I was a big believer in open source, user generated
content — that those things would all solve that problem. And they didn’t.
And it was pretty frustrating, because, as a entrepreneur, as I started to do
more things that were more entrepreneurial, I would always see these
stories in magazines and see the movies, and there’s some great movies out
now, where the crazy core programmer works on something really cool and
then kind of dot dot dot. Then they’re on the cover of magazines, they make
a lot of money.
And I kept doing all the same things that the person in the movie does, and
then not having that outcome, and being a little bit, frankly, frustrated about
that. So, I started to move away from purely technical solutions and I started
to really think about how could we increase the odds the stuff that we’re
building actually matters to customers?
I didn’t get exposed to Lean thinking directly until relatively late in my
career, but I had been exposed to something called Agile programming,
which is basically an application of Lean principles to the methodology of
developing software. So, much lower app size, much faster cycle time than
was traditional in what they call Waterfall style programming.
The irony, of course, is that Waterfall was taught to me, as a computer
engineer in Silicon Valley, was taught to me as the manufacturing metaphor
of software development. But it’s a completely linear assembly line, straight
out of the Henry Ford playbook.
3. So, you can imagine how pissed off I was when I eventually discovered that
they don’t use it in manufacturing anymore.
[laughter]
Eric: So, it wasn’t clear to me why it made a good metaphor for software
development. But the challenge of software development is that it’s
completely intangible. You cannot see the product as it’s being built. It’s all,
intangible lines of code, the ghost in the machine. And so, people felt like a
very rigid planning oriented methodology made sense to try to make the
progress more tangible. That had never worked for me, so I was kind of open
to new ideas. And also, Agile didn’t really work for me, either.
So, at the start ups where I was trying to apply Agile we would wind up
building more efficiently by driving down batch size of work by making things
more like what the customer wanted.
But, of course, we didn’t really have any customers. We were a start up. So,
we would wind up using internal customers, or kind of the internal project
visionary, as the person who set out the spec and we would wind up building
that which is specified more efficiently.
But then that didn’t actually work very well because then it would turn out
that the person that we thought was our customer wasn’t and the visionary
was wrong. We were kind of right back where we started.
I was going to just finish the story by saying that we started to develop new
techniques for how to bring the customer, and our kind of theories about the
customer, into the product development process, itself, and take some of the
Agile paradigm and accelerate it even further.
So, for example, driving the batch size of our work down all the way, as low
as we could, to almost get into single piece flow, but rather than with
physical widgets with the actual bits of code that we were deploying to
customers. So we would deploy software to production, 50 times everyday
using a process called continuous deployment.
And those techniques didn’t make sense according to all of the theories that I
had been taught about what software development was and how startups
should be managed. And so, it made it really difficult for me evangelize the
techniques, even to other people who I worked with: my coworkers, my
bosses, our investors.
4. Everyone would always say, “Why are you doing this crazy thing that doesn’t
make sense?” And I was always struggling to say, “No, the thing that you’re
doing doesn’t make sense. Look at the terrible failure rates in our industry,
and look at how much better results we’re getting here.”
But when a dominant paradigm’s being challenged, that is hard. And so, I
was on a crazy reading spree, just trying to learn as much as I could,
searching for models to just make sense of my own experience and help me
explain it.
And when I read “Lean Thinking,” it was like a light bulb went on for me. It
was such a dramatic experience, because I said, oh, we’re just using the
wrong manufacturing metaphor for our work. And if we use one that’s better,
actually, it works quite well.
And, of course, what we’re doing is so different from traditional Lean
manufacturing, because we still have this big unknown about the customer.
But with a few tweaks, it seemed like we could take ideas that had been well
proven in other industries and bring them into the entrepreneurship industry.
And that was the origin of Lean startup.
Mark: Yeah. And I like how you draw those connections and parallels. If you
look at Toyota’s approach, it’s often described as a customer in philosophy.
And if you look at Toyota product development system for vehicles, the
lessons around, not just building a truck and then trying to push it on
customers. You need to understand their needs and also, understand the
pricing. And make sure you engineer the vehicle to hit a certain price point,
as opposed to just saying, well, here’s our cost and we’re going to market up
and things you should buy.
Eric: That’s right.
Mark: Now, before we talk about, I’d like you to define Lean startup
methodology. But, maybe one other point I’d like you to make, because I
think we have a lot of listeners who maybe, who don’t work at startups. And
I hope they continue listening anyway, because your definition of an
entrepreneur, I think, is applicable, as well, to people who may be working in
big large companies. Would you agree?
Eric: Oh, sure. Yes, absolutely. In fact, one of the biggest surprises, once I
started being asked to speak in public about Lean startup is, I used to, part
of my work was to try to bring the practice of entrepreneurship onto a more
rigorous footing. I’m a very logical deductive style thinker, so it was
5. important to me to have good definitions, returns, and really understand
what is entrepreneurship, who is an entrepreneur, so that I’m not just basing
my life’s work on what I saw in the movies, which I just thought was not a
very effective model. And so, I had this definition of a startup is a human
institution designed to create something new under conditions of extreme
uncertainty. And it was from that basic definition that I had proceeded to
define a Lean theory of entrepreneurship. And one of the funny things about
that definition is it doesn’t say anything about industry, sector of the
economy, or company size. It just says you’re trying to create something
new, build an organization to create something new under conditions of
extreme uncertainty.
And so, for at my very first talks, I would say, and by the way, this is
completely applicable to entrepreneurs inside big companies. And at that
time, I was just speculating. I felt a little bit like a scientific theorist, making
a prediction about the physical world without knowing whether it was going
to be true or not. It just said, the theory predicts that these people should
exist. So, if any one of you are in the audience, please come talk to me.
And from that very first talk, I remember it really clearly, there were people
like that in the audience and they came up to me afterwards. And they were
actually the most vehement of the people who wanted to really ask me, well,
how specifically do I do this. How can we convince people in my organization
to adopt it?
Because most of the, kind of, theories of disruptive innovation, most of the
frameworks that they were using to create new products inside their own
companies, treated the innovation like a black box. And just said, you get the
right kind of people, and you give them the right budget, and you kind of do
the organizational structure around them properly, and then magic happens.
And that’s basically what we used to believe about entrepreneurship, too,
incidentally. And what these guys would say is, they’re like, “Listen, I’m the
manager of this team, we’re in the black box.” And they said it to me like,
I’ve got the firewood, and the kindling and my matches and the paper and all
the ingredients right here. Where’s my fire? And when the fire doesn’t
appear, they’re like, what specifically, am I supposed to tell my people to do?
And I felt like, well, OK. That’s actually the exact same problem we see with
venture backed entrepreneurs, who get, you know, managed to raise a check
for $5 million. And they’re like, now what? What specifically am I supposed
to do every day? How can I tell if I’m making progress? And so, what has
happened is this thing has grown into a movement as we have pulled in
entrepreneurs from all kinds of different industries and sizes of company, and
I think that’s one of the most exciting things about it.
6. Mark: And I like the way, I think it’s insightful the way you help emphasize
the idea of that uncertainty being both technical risk and market risk. So, can
you maybe talk about the two of those and dovetail that into what a Lean
startup is and how it applies to situations like that.
Eric: Yeah. We live in a world of increasing uncertainty, just in general. And
yet, our capabilities are also at their all time high. So, and this is, Lean
manufacturing is a huge part of the reason why we find ourselves in this
situation. We literally have more productive capacity than we know what to
do with. So, the dominant question of our time is really not, can it be built,
but should it be built. We really live in a time when any product, with the
exceptions of ones that are based on true fundamental scientific
breakthroughs, but the vast majority of products, they actually could be
built, given sufficient time and resources. And the question really is, is there
a market for those products? Is there a way to build a sustainable
organization around a set of products and services?
And so, if you think of the world in a kind of a two by two matrix. On one
axis we ask, how much market uncertainty is there compared to technical
uncertainty? So, in some products, dominant questions are, can it be built.
Market uncertainty means, can we build a business around it.
You could, kind of, put industries on that map. And you say, OK, well, for the
classic new automobile introduction, we can say for sure that if we can hit a
certain price point and get certain performance characteristics, customers will
want it. Whereas in other businesses, we face a lot more disruptive
innovation, we have a lot more questions. Like, if I build this new software
product, will customers want it? If I can actually help people manage their
advertising inventory and their enterprise more effectively, will they actually
be willing to pay for it? All those kinds of questions. That’s one axis.
And on the other axis we have the question of, what’s the underlying cycle
time of that business? So, again, automobile manufacturing situation, maybe
we’ll bring a new model, a minor introduction, a minor change of a model
once a year at the new model year, and every four or five years we bring a
new major model to market. But in worlds like software, a year is an
eternity, and so we can actually change the version of the product quite
rapidly. In fact, when we practice continuous deployment, we can do it at
multiple times every day.
Again, you could align industries along that axis too. In that upper right-hand
quadrant where you have very fast cycle time and lots of market uncertainty,
that’s the place where Lean Startup really excels, where we try to use our
advantage in cycle time to help us reduce that uncertainty as quickly as
possible in order to understand where to invest.
7. But there’s a caveat. Because the people usually hear this talk and they say,
“OK, that sounds great. Lean Startup sounds like a great idea for those other
industries that are in that quadrant. But, of course, in my industry we don’t
have to worry about this.” You ask yourselves, “In what direction is the world
moving right now on both axes?” My contention is it’s only moving in one
direction, and it’s the same.
Every industry is being pushed inexorably towards more market risk. As
everything gets cheaper and it gets easier to start new companies, it gets
easier to introduce new products and to distribute them, we all face much
more competition, both globally and domestically. And consumers are faced
with many more choices about what to do as technology changes faster and
the capabilities of primitive tools become more complex. So, the level of
uncertainty is increasing across all industries.
The same forces are also driving down cycle time across industries.
Interestingly to me, one of the forces is Lean Manufacturing. Because we
have been systematically applying a cycle time reduction strategy to the way
that we work so that we can bring new models to market quicker, we can
adapt demand to what customers really want. But that same capability can
be used not just for greater efficiency but also for exploring new product
concepts, which I think is one of the capabilities that then we introduce into
Lean Startup.
Mark: When I’ve heard you talk about your past experiences, you’re talking
about cycle time and speed. I appreciate, in general, how you emphasize
Lean is not about being cheap but it’s about being fast, and iterative. But
when I heard you talk before, there were also a lot of aspects of what I
would describe as Lean culture, respect for people, not blaming people for
their errors. Can you talk a little bit about maybe some of the cultural
aspects of what you would consider a Lean Startup to be.
Eric: I found Dr. Liker’s approach in “The Toyota Way” really helpful in terms
of framing the pyramid of topics and the way it shows how process is the
foundation for creating a Lean culture, which is really about fundamentally
empowering people. I think the same thing is true here.
Most of the people who try to create new entrepreneurial cultures do so
without having changed the process first. And as human beings, we always
misunderstand. We always think, when someone’s behaving badly or being
uncreative or doing something we don’t like, we assume it’s because of their
personality, or that somehow they’re a bad person, or uncreative person.
But, as we’ve all learned, those who have studied how work systems operate,
most people’s behavior is determined by this system and incentives that they
are embedded in.
8. And so, part of the work of Lean startup is to try and change the process by
which the companies are built, change their daily work process, so that,
when we’re working in smaller batches, we’re working more cross
functionally. We get faster feedback from customers. We actually have the
opportunity to unleash people’s creativity in a new way.
And I think that’s the most exciting possibility that this revolution is kind of
bringing to attention, that most of the new products that are being built
worldwide are a complete waste of time. And, as a society, we are
squandering our most precious resources, which is the time and energy and
creativity of our most talented people.
So, to me, this is about allowing those people to be more productive, but not
like just in a very narrow efficient sense of doing their individual function
really well. But making the products that they work on actually matter.
Mark: Yeah. And doing work that gives your life meaning.
Eric: Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, there’s nothing more satisfying than being
an entrepreneur. It’s scary and risky and has all kinds of ups and downs, but
so does life. It’s a very human enterprise. And so, the worst is when you
have that experience of having really devoted years of your life to something
and having believed in it so passionately, because you are wrapped up in
what we call, some how we call the reality distortion field. The ability of a
team or company to really convince everybody that the thing is definitely,
absolutely, positively going to succeed.
If you’ve ever had that experience, when you finally realize it’s going to fail,
you realize that you’ve been lied to. You’ve been deceived. You’ve been
tricked. And that’s the worst kind of failure to have. And that breeds a lot of
cynicism and bitterness in our modern workforce that can be removed, it can
be fixed.
Mark: Yeah. Now, one of the word, or maybe runs the risk of being a
misunderstood buzzword, this idea of the pivot. So, I’ve heard you talk
before, it’s been real interesting how you describe the nerve that it takes to
go start a company, the risk that you have to take isn’t always combined
with that willingness to listen to the market. So, that stubbornness that helps
you get started can also be your downfall. So, can you describe the pivot and
then maybe, in context of that, we did have a question come in via Twitter
from Joe Dager, at Business 901. How is a pivot different than just following
the plan, do you check at cycle, where you react and adjust accordingly?
9. Eric: Yeah. So, Lean Startup has a complimentary theory to PDCA. We call it
build, measure, learn. Basically, the fundamental feedback loop that we’re
working in, we translate ideas into products by building. We have the
customers interact with those products to generate data and that data
informs our next set of ideas. So, build, measure, learn. Our heuristic, just as
in any Lean context, is to minimize total time to the feedback loop, rather
than becoming really efficient at any one of the three activities. But we
reserve the term “pivot” to mean that one of our core business hypotheses
has been invalidated and it’s time to make a change.
So, Lean startups will constantly optimize their product, constantly make
change in response to customer feedback, to little split tests about, is one
way of presenting the product better than another, new marketing messages,
new features, new designs, all that, all kind of functional improvements to a
product.
But entrepreneurs have this very special thing, we call it the pivot, which is
that, sometimes your optimization techniques start to kind of yield
diminishing returns. Where, you are succeeding in making the product
better, but you’re not really getting any closer to having a sustainable
business. And this is a kind of thing that really doesn’t have a regular old,
kind of, Lean thinking analog.
Because, in general, once you start to manufacture a product and start to
drive out the waste in your manufacturing process, you tend to get
incremental benefit for incremental investment. Not, you know, 100 percent.
Not every investment pays off the same amount, but because you really can
understand, you have a way of forecasting demand, at least a little bit, you
pretty much know if you can improve the cost targets, you know what you’re
going to get.
But entrepreneurs often find themselves in a situation where we are actually
improving our work, but customers don’t care. Because we’re helping them
do something that they don’t care about. So, we’re making a bad product
easier to use, is the most common case. So, we’ve figured out an easier way
for people to discover what the product’s all about and get registered and get
involved, maybe even, we’ve made it easier for them to pay.
But, fundamentally, the value propositions offered by our product is not one
that any of our customers want. So, by making the product easier to use,
we’re actually helping them more quickly discover that they want to bail out
and not be our customers anymore.
So, that’s a situation where we have to make a significant change to our
10. business strategy. And we might make a change like a customer segment
pivot, when we realize, oh, we thought we were selling to one kind of
consumer, but actually, there’s another kind who would like our product
better. We might have to change from being an application to being a
platform or vice versa. We might have to change our engine of growth, so we
might move from being a viral product that spreads by word of mouth, to
being one that is supported by paid advertising.
And in each of these cases, what’s happening is, once we change strategy,
then there’s going to be a whole cascade of changes that are going to
happen as a result. Like, we might wind up having to throw out significant
chunks of our product. We might wind up switching from a product to a
service or vice versa. We might have to really change the way we market the
product or even where the company is located.
So, there’s all these kind of secondary changes that come out of a
fundamental change in strategy. So, it’s not something you want to
undertake lightly, and it’s not something you do all the time, but it is
necessary.
Because if you look at the history of startup success, you’ll notice this pattern
that, the majority of the time, successful entrepreneurs started with a really
bad idea. So if we are stubborn and persevere and just do that bad idea
efficiently then we’re just persevering the plane straight into the ground.
Mark: OK. Well, we’re running short on time, unfortunately. I do want to ask
you in the category of things that typically don’t iterate very quickly,
traditional publishing, you’re writing a book.
Eric: [laughs] Yes.
Mark: I pre-ordered a copy. So, OK, come on, when is it coming out?
[laughs]
Eric: Yes. I know, I know. [laughs] I wish.
Mark: Tell my listeners about how that’s coming, what the book is called.
Eric: Yeah. Oh great. I wish cycle times in the publishing industry were
faster, alas. The book will be called “The Lean Startup.” It’s going to be
published by Crown, which is one of the big New York business publishers.
It’s going to come out in the fall, we’re hoping, or early September. I’m real
11. excited about it because it’ll be the first chance that I’ve had to really walk
through the theory of a lean start-up and combine it with a number of really
detailed case studies that are designed for a general business audience.
Right now, the lean start-up is a very popular methodology with ventured
back entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley with a lot of different tech companies
and people who are kind of the early adopters for new ideas about
entrepreneurship.
But if you think back to what I said before about how we’re wasting so much
of people’s time, the biggest perpetrators of that waste are still general
managers, individual sole proprietors, private equity and investment
bankers, people who have a role to play in the innovation eco-system but
don’t necessarily think of themselves as entrepreneurs or don’t necessarily
think of themselves as needing new ideas about entrepreneurship.
The idea with this book is, really, to take the message to everybody in that
category. To say, “Listen. There is something new happening here and there
is a better way for managing entrepreneurship which is helpful regardless of
whether you yourself are an entrepreneur or whether your job is to hold
entrepreneurs accountable.”
It’ll be a complete contemporary business book complete with not just the
theory of a lean start-up but really a lot of specific case studies of the ideas
being applied in a wide variety of industries. I’m pretty excited about it. But,
yeah, it does take a long time.
Mark: Yeah. It is exciting. People can learn more at lean.st, is that correct?
Eric: Yeah, that’s right. We actually built our own website where people can
pre-order so that we can run experiments on you as you’re pre-ordering. So
please do. In fact, if pre-order one of the things you will get is access to our
complete experimentation system. You can step behind the curtain and you
can see all the experiments that we have run, and are running, and see how
we’re using the data to kind of evolve the marketing and kind of value
proposition of the book. So I’ve got to eat my own dog food and feel like I’ve
got to practice what I preach.
Mark: Yeah. Well, very cool. Well, again, Eric Reese was our guest today and
I want to thank you for taking time out to talk today about lean start-ups,
really interesting field.
Eric: Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. [music]
12. Man: Thanks for listening. This has been the Lean Blog Podcast. For lean
news and commentary updated daily visit www.leanblog.org. If you have any
questions or comments about this podcast email Mark at
leanpodcast@gmail.com.
Transcript by CastingWords
About LeanBlog.org: Mark Graban is a consultant, author, and speaker in the
“lean healthcare” methodology, focused on improving quality and patient
safety, improving access, reducing costs, and fully engaging healthcare
professionals. He is also the Chief Improvement Officer for KaiNexus.