The Lean Startup model is a scientific method designed to help businesses get the desired product to customers faster by shorterning the product development cycle. Lean manufacturing, which has been around for decades, aims to create more value with fewer resources. However, what if a company was efficient at creating a product that was not in demand?
Proposed by Eric Ries in 2011, this model is a combination of hypothesis-driven experimentation, iterative products and validated learning. This business model encourages startups to quickly discover whether their business idea or product is viable by talking to potential customers in the early stages of product development. It makes a switch from traditional waterfall approach of having a big design up front to an iterative agile techniques. It’s a method for creating and sustaining innovations in all types of organization.
Ries believes that by creating a product that was tailored to its early customers, they could minimize market risk. The lean start up model was created from a concept where small batches were manufactured to minimize loss of time and money. After the failure of the first startup “Catalyst Recruiting”, Ries seeked to focus on early and continuous customer feedback during the product development to ensure that time and money are not invested on designing features the customers don’t want.
This model consist of three steps: (1) Build the product (2) Measure data from consumers (3) Learn whether to pivot or persevere. Once an entrepreneur or individual has an idea, the goal of the business model is to create a minimum viable product (MVP). This is not to be confused with a prototype. The MVP is a product that has the highest return on investment versus risk. Therefore, by finding the MVP the company is able to launch their product into the market with reduced risk. It allows the team to collect maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort. This