No Silver Bullet

Once upon a time I was meeting with the CEO of a start-up I had helped found, hired for, invested in, and eventually ended up running for a period. We were discussing a problem the company was having (I don't remember what exactly) and I referenced a method or technique from Lean Startup, the book by Eric Ries.

"Yeah. I read it," said the founder somewhat dismissively.

Hmmm, I thought stroking my then beardless chin. "But why are you not applying it in this situation, given that, you know, it could potentially help the business?"

"..."

"What happens," I continued, "if some of your other investors start asking why you are using trial and error (with their money!) instead of applying some empirical processes to running the business and managing their investment?"

"..."

Awareness is Not the Same as Application

I have spent decades in and around start-ups and scale-ups and I can tell you this is far from a one-off story.

Just because there are now countless books, podcasts, Powerpoints on Slideshare and conferences on products and innovation methodologies does not mean people are aware of them.

Just because founders are aware of them, does not mean they are applying them.

And just because people are applying them in their endeavours does not mean they are using them successfully.

Nobody Knows Anything

"Nobody knows anything," as William Goldman famously quipped in his 1983 book Adventures in the Screen Trade. For full context Goldman wrote, "Nobody, nobody - not now, not ever - knows the least goddamn thing about what is or isn't going to work at the box office".

It's exactly the same situation when it comes to product development and entrepreneurship.

I don't care if they came up with Dropbox's viral referral mechanic, sold Paypal for a gazillion dollars or scaled Slack to a bazillion users. No-one has all the answers. No-one. Not least of all because of variances in markets, user segmentation, product-market fit, timing - and that's even before we get to the suitability of that particular method for your circumstances.

Same goes for your startup. No-one has all the answers, not even you - despite you being (probably) the closest to the coal-face and undergoing the daily grind of willing your product into existence. As entrepreneurs living in our own 'reality distortion field' we can often fall prey to missing the wood for the trees.

Process as Scaffolding, Not Overhead

Founders value fastest time to value, high signal to noise ratio, and prefer defined outcomes, over any amount of theory, and rightly so.

Process is an overhead and often can be a tax on the project and team. But it can also be a huge level-up bringing certainty, building trust, sharing context, enhancing capabilities and scaling operations.

The innovation methodologies and frameworks we use today have been battle-tested over decades of product and entrepreneurial development, have helped companies build products that changed peoples lives. We use them because they work, because they provide a north star.

Having said that, and with a nod to Goldman's comment earlier, they are no silver bullet. There's no single method or framework that will solve all your problems or bring you overnight success. But what methods do do, and do well, is provide a baseline for your activities and scaffolding for your company as it strives to find an audience and that ever-elusive product-market fit, and then later scale to the moon.

You can think of methods as 'glue & grease' - the 'glue' to hold your team together as you traverse the speedbumps and the 'grease' to remove as much friction as possible while on the journey.

What Happens Without Them

• Difficult investor conversations
• No baselines to set direction
• Trial and error instead of empiricism
• No common lingua franca with your team
• Vague guesses at the current situation and, at best, handwavey strategic direction

What Happens When You Use Them

• You bring certainty, not doubt to board meetings
• Baseline data and actionable insights
• Structured, repeatable empirical processes as scaffolding for growth
• You bring direction to your team and not ambiguity and hopium!

The Map is Not the Territory

Innovation is most definitely not a linear, straightforward process, and definitely NOT a 'one-size fits all' solution. "The map is not the territory" is a famous dictum by scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski, meaning that our mental models, abstractions, and language (maps) are not the actual reality they represent (the territory). It warns against confusing simplified representations with complex, nuanced truth. Your business does not need generic advice from 10,000 feet - it needs concrete next steps tailored to your unique situation.

Methods are the ingredients and the recipe - but you are the chef.

No matter what framework we choose, or which methodology we prefer over others, we should be cautious to not blindly follow any process or advice no matter who posted it on Twitter or what Silicon Valley pundit wrote on the latest business best-seller. No cargo cult thinking. Experiment and evaluate within your own context, keep your critical thinking hat on. Trust, but verify.

But do keep cooking.

Ready to find the right methods for your situation? Explore the full collection or try a curated playlist to get started with a structured approach tailored to your stage.