Lean Startup
Lean Startup
What is Lean Startup?
Lean Startup is an offshoot of the Lean discipline that is specifically oriented towards digital innovation. It is based on the idea that the most efficient innovation is the one that focuses on solving a real user demand and that the biggest loss is creating a product or service that no one needs. Did you know Dropbox, Zappos, and Slack all used Lean Startup to develop their business? These companies were able to execute a rapid pace of innovation that allowed them to seemingly erupt overnight.
Lean Startup takes advantage of the Scientific Method to create business models. This experimentation-based approach ensures that failure is as “quick and cheap” as possible. In other words, Lean Startup doesn’t waste time or money investing in an idea without first exploring and determining its viability. In this way, the likelihood of failure is understood and has already been taken into consideration before resources are used in making the idea a reality.
The Lean Startup method consists of 3 stages:
- Build. Start with a vision, a business idea with some initial hypotheses, and then build something fast and cheap that allows for experimentation.
- Measure. Evaluate the results to validate or nullify the initial hypotheses.
- Learn. Based on the data obtained, decide whether to move forward as is, revise the hypotheses, or discard the idea all together.
Why is it important?
The Lean Startup method allows organizations to launch new digital products or services in environments with high uncertainty. High uncertainty can be created when potential customers’ problems are difficult to understand or if it is unclear how new solutions to a problem should be built.
Innovate and adapt or die. A past full of success does not guarantee the future. The digitization of business has caused large, once-stable organizations to fall, and digital businesses have allowed new players to disrupt the market at a speed that was once unthinkable. Use the Lean Startup method to become your own market disrupter.
