Agile, Customer Development, Demo and Technology

Why Real Learning is Outside the Building, Not Demo Day

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013

While our teams have mentors, socialize a lot and give great demos, the goal of our class final presentations is “ Lessons Learned ” – about product/market fit, pricing, acquisition/activation costs, pricing, partners, etc. Technology in search of a market. The next customer segment we tried was startup founders.

Lean

Lean Customer Development Sales Cycle Business Model

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2021 Lessons Learned Presentations

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2021

Unlike traditional demo days or Shark Tanks which are, “Here’s how smart I am, and isn’t this a great product, please give me money,” a Lessons Learned presentation tells the story of a team’s 10-week journey and hard-won learning and discovery. . – while simultaneously building a series of minimal viable products. Stay tuned.

Lean

Lean Security Asia SBIR

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2020 Lesson Learned Presentations

Steve Blank

JUNE 12, 2020

Unlike traditional demo days or Shark Tanks which are, “here’s how smart I am, please give me money,” a Lessons Learned presentation tells the teams’ stories of a 10-week journey of hard-won learning and discovery. This was followed by an 8-minute slide presentation describing their customer discovery journey over the 10-weeks.

Oakland

Oakland Asia Lean Video

Going to Trade Shows Like it Matters – Part 2

Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

And inviting to the booth/dinner/private demo. General Comments for both Awareness and Lead Generation Demo’s I don’t care how small the booth or trade show is, do a canned demo every 20 to 30 minutes regardless of whether anyone is at your booth or not. Demo’s are the heart of the booth. One of them is a loser.

Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development

Raising Money Using Customer Development

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Chasing funding versus chasing customers and a repeatable and scalable business model, is one reason startups fail. Product Development – Getting Funded as The Goal In a traditional product development model, entrepreneurs come up with an idea or concept, write a business plan and try to get funding to bring that idea to fruition.

Customer Development

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley

The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency Goes Lean

Steve Blank

AUGUST 29, 2016

To promote innovation inside the NGA, they’ve staffed an Enterprise Innovation Office (EIO) to coach, educate and advise the entire agency, from core leadership to the operational edges, with methods and concepts of validated learning through rapid experimentation and customer development. And the winners get to go Stage 2.

Lean

Lean Silicon Valley Government Acquisition

The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency Goes Lean

Steve Blank

AUGUST 29, 2016

To promote innovation inside the NGA, they’ve staffed an Enterprise Innovation Office (EIO) to coach, educate and advise the entire agency, from core leadership to the operational edges, with methods and concepts of validated learning through rapid experimentation and customer development. And the winners get to go Stage 2.

Lean

Lean Silicon Valley Government Acquisition

300 Teams in Two Years

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 26, 2013

While a few of the I-Corps teams are in web/mobile/cloud, most are working on advanced technology projects that don’t make TechCrunch. It’s success is measured not only by the technologies that leave the labs, but how many U.S. in Science or Nature.

Lean

Lean Washington Incubator Agile

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2019

Steve Blank

JUNE 7, 2019

Unlike traditional demo days or Shark Tanks which are “here’s how smart I am, please give me money,” a Lessons Learned presentation tells a story of a journey of hard-won learning and discovery. Followed by an 8-minute slide presentation follow their customer discovery journey over the 10-weeks. Team: Panacea.

Oakland

Oakland Lean SBIR Afghanistan

Lessons Learned: A hierarchy of pitches

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 28, 2008

Now there was nothing wrong with their analysis: anyone who invents a technology as sophisticated as The Transformers is definitely going to make a lot of money. Turns out, they were incredibly well-credentialed graduate students who had, in fact, developed some interesting new robotics technology. whats the launch plan?

San Francisco

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC

The Lean LaunchPad – Teaching Entrepreneurship as a Management Science

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

There are few courses which teach aspiring entrepreneurs the skills (business models, customer and agile development, design thinking, etc.) We’ll build the class around the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. to optimize this search. What are hypotheses?

Wiki

Wiki Lean Management Business Model

Eureka! A New Era for Scientists and Engineers

Steve Blank

JULY 28, 2011

The combination of Venture Capital and technology entrepreneurship is one of the great business inventions of the last 50 years. It provides private funds for untested and unproven technology and entrepreneurs. They’ll explore the best way to deliver the product to customers, the resources required, as well as competing technologies.

Engineer

Engineer Silicon Valley United States Intellectual Property

Reinventing the Board Meeting – Part 2 of 2 – Virtual Valley Ventures

Steve Blank

JUNE 2, 2011

A revolution has taken hold as customer development and agile engineering reinvent the Startup process. The process they use to guide their search is customer development. They would: Blog their Customer Development progress as a narrative. Victor Hugo. When The Boardroom is Bits. Here’s how.

Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley Business Model Early Stage Venture Capital

Lessons Learned: The one line split-test, or how to A/B all the time

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

I had the opportunity to pioneer this approach to funnel analysis at IMVU, where it became a core part of our customer development process. To promote this metrics discipline, we would present the full funnel to our board (and advisers) at the end of every development cycle. Check your assumptions, what went wrong? Expo SF (May.

San Francisco

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment

The Mission Model Canvas – An Adapted Business Model Canvas for Mission-Driven Organizations

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2016

As a formal method, the Lean Startup consists of three parts: The Business Model Canvas – to frame hypotheses, Customer Development – to test those hypotheses in front of customers, and Agile Engineering – to build Minimum Viable Products to maximize learning. Customer Relationships is changed to Buy-in/Support.

Business Model

Business Model Revenue Channel Community

Eureka! National Science Foundation's I-Corps Trains a New Generation of Scientists in Business

ReadWriteStart

AUGUST 1, 2011

The combination of venture capital and technology entrepreneurship is one of the great business inventions of the last 50 years. It provides private funds for untested and unproven technology and entrepreneurs. They'll explore the best way to deliver the product to customers, the resources required, as well as competing technologies.

Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley Intellectual Property Balance Sheet Lean

How companies strangle innovation – and how you can get it right

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2017

They were trying to keep up with providing the core services necessary to run the current business and at the same time deal with a flood of well-meaning but uncoordinated ideas about new features, technologies and innovations coming at them from all directions. Ironically, by standing still, they were falling behind.

Incubator

Incubator Curation Engineer Government

It’s Time to Play Moneyball: The Investment Readiness Level

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Investors sitting through Incubator or Accelerator demo days have three metrics to judge fledgling startups – 1) great looking product demos, 2) compelling PowerPoint slides, and 3) a world-class team. We now have the tools, technology and data to take incubators and accelerators to the next level. We think we can do better.

Oakland

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2017 – Lessons Learned Presentations

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2017

Our mantra to the students was that we wanted them to learn about “Deployment not Demos.” Our observation is that the DOD has more technology demos than they need, but often lack deep problem understanding. Our sponsors did remind us, that at times getting a solution deployed meant that someone did have to see a demo!).

Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley Southern California Lean San Diego

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2018 – wonder and awe

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2018

Each of their slide presentations follow their customer discovery journey. All the teams used the Mission Model Canvas , Customer Development and Agile Engineering to build Minimal Viable Products, but all of their journeys were unique. The teams presented in front of several hundred people in person and online.

Southern California

Southern California San Diego Mississippi SBIR

The Lean LaunchPad Class: It’s the same, but different

Steve Blank

MARCH 26, 2019

So in 2011, with support from the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (the entrepreneurship center in the Stanford Engineering School), we created a new capstone entrepreneurship class – the Lean LaunchPad. When we started this class, the concept of Lean (business models, customer development, agile, pivots, mvp’s) was new to everyone.

Lean

Lean Business Model Balance Sheet Video

Startup Resources

www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

Every startup faces multiple choices and decisions when it comes to technology. Steve Blank on Lean Customer Development. Ad Serving Technology. Agile project management tool that enables real time collaboration. Agile project management. agile product management. Automates Agile / Scrum development.

Software Review

Software Review Technical Review Startup

Innovation – something both parties can agree on

Steve Blank

JANUARY 15, 2017

And finally this bill acknowledges that networks of entrepreneurs and mentors are critical in getting technologies translated from the lab to the marketplace. While a few of the I-Corps teams are in web/mobile/cloud, most are working on advanced technology projects that don’t make TechCrunch. Why This Matters.

Lean

Lean Technical Review Government Programming

Innovation – something both parties can agree on

Steve Blank

JANUARY 15, 2017

And finally this bill acknowledges that networks of entrepreneurs and mentors are critical in getting technologies translated from the lab to the marketplace. While a few of the I-Corps teams are in web/mobile/cloud, most are working on advanced technology projects that don’t make TechCrunch. Why This Matters.

Lean

Lean Technical Review Government Programming

StartUpRoar

Why Real Learning is Outside the Building, Not Demo Day

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2021 Lessons Learned Presentations

Trending Sources

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2020 Lesson Learned Presentations

Going to Trade Shows Like it Matters – Part 2

Raising Money Using Customer Development

The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency Goes Lean

The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency Goes Lean

300 Teams in Two Years

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2019

Lessons Learned: A hierarchy of pitches

The Lean LaunchPad – Teaching Entrepreneurship as a Management Science

Eureka! A New Era for Scientists and Engineers

Reinventing the Board Meeting – Part 2 of 2 – Virtual Valley Ventures

Lessons Learned: The one line split-test, or how to A/B all the time

The Mission Model Canvas – An Adapted Business Model Canvas for Mission-Driven Organizations

Eureka! National Science Foundation's I-Corps Trains a New Generation of Scientists in Business

How companies strangle innovation – and how you can get it right

It’s Time to Play Moneyball: The Investment Readiness Level

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2017 – Lessons Learned Presentations

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2018 – wonder and awe

The Lean LaunchPad Class: It’s the same, but different

Startup Resources

Innovation – something both parties can agree on

Innovation – something both parties can agree on

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