Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 17, 2010

The team hired only the best and the brightest. I was an engineer on the engineering team. For one, the engineers consider the artists stupid; the artists consider the engineers arrogant. Meanwhile the drawbacks of functional departments can cause real and lasting harm. The meeting was tense.

Technical Review 164

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

See Customer Development Engineering for my first stab at articulating the theory involved) Ferocious customer-centric rapid iteration, as exemplified by the Customer Development process. Since that time we've seen a massive change from product engineering to financial engineering. Seth Godin: How often should you publish?

Lean 168

Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 2, 2010

Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable Beware of Vanity Metrics For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable Beware of Vanity Metrics For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? Read the rest of The Five Whys for Start-Ups. Speed up or slow down? Speed up or slow down? Amazon PostRank

Technical Review 132

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 132

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 6, 2008

Steveys Blog Rants: Good Agile, Bad Agile : "Google is an exceptionally disciplined company, from a software-engineering perspective. They work hard to keep their house in order at all times, and there are strict rules and guidelines in place that prevent engineers and teams from doing things their own way. Amazon PostRank

Agile 76

Agile San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment 76

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2010

Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable Beware of Vanity Metrics For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable Beware of Vanity Metrics For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much? Read the rest of The Startups Rules of Speed - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. Amazon PostRank

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Its had tremendous impact in many areas: continuous deployment , just-in-time scalability , and even search engine marketing , to name a few. Every time an engineer checks in code, they are batching up a certain amount of work. I owe it originally to lean manufacturing books like Lean Thinking and Toyota Production System.

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment Development Team Review 161

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Waves of technology platforms The lean startup Customer Development Engineering Greasemonkey compiler Great open source scalability tools from Danga Ideas.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Agile Lean 94

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

In 2007, BusinessWeek named Ries one of the Best Young Entrepreneurs of Tech and in 2009 he was honored with a TechFellow award in the category of Engineering Leadership. I help lead the Engineering Leadership SIG at SDForum and wonder if you would be interested in speaking to our group about lean starups. hope to hear from you.

San Francisco 155

San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

So I initially gravitated to the CTO title, and not VP of Engineering. But since I spent a long time in a hybrid CTO/VP Engineering role, I still have this nagging question. I want to add one last idea, even though I recognize it is controversial, bordering on the boundary between the CTO and VP Engineering. Heres my take.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 16, 2009

In a startup, rather than think of ourselves as having a marketing department and an engineering department, I now believe its better to think of ourselves as focusing our energies on unknown problems and unknown solutions. Agile is one way to succeed, because pursuing unknowns iteratively is a good way to mitigate risk.

Agile 111

Agile Customer Development Developer San Francisco 111

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 8, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, February 8, 2010 Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Review) The next article in my series on entrepreneurship for Harvard Business Review is live today. Once again, we revisit the topic of Actionable metrics and their nemesis: Vanity metrics. Remember "metrics are people, too."

Metrics 121

Metrics San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 121

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Waves of technology platforms The lean startup Customer Development Engineering Greasemonkey compiler Great open source scalability tools from Danga Ideas.

Software Review 68

Software Review San Francisco Technical Review Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 2, 2008

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0, Take a look and let me know what you think.

San Francisco 125

San Francisco Software Review Technical Review Continuous Deployment 125

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

Inspiring ideas: real-time biz metrics; safe continuous deployment; A/B split testing. You can learn more about that by reading The engineering managers lament.) leanstartup We organized our engineering team at IMVU to try and maximize cross-functional collaboration. Articulate, inspirational.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Lean 113

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 12, 2008

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Waves of technology platforms The lean startup Customer Development Engineering Greasemonkey compiler Great open source scalability tools from Danga Ideas.

Audience 119

Audience San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 5, 2008

The VP Engineering spends all of his time trying to make sure the programmers understand and implement the spec. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Frustration is mounting. Amazon PostRank

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Management Software Review Product 158

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 15, 2010

Behind this analysis is a spreadsheet model, complete with detailed metrics for a set of customer behaviors that show just how valuable the new product will be. They are on-schedule and on-budget, but their gross metrics are way off. They are on-schedule and on-budget, but their gross metrics are way off.

Hockey Stick 105

Hockey Stick San Francisco Entrepreneur Lean 105

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Waves of technology platforms The lean startup Customer Development Engineering Greasemonkey compiler Great open source scalability tools from Danga Ideas.

San Francisco 142

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 142

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

Focus on the output metrics of that part of the product, and you make the problem a lot more clear. To promote this metrics discipline, we would present the full funnel to our board (and advisers) at the end of every development cycle. Max Levchin of Slide and Paypal has noted that 10% of Slides headcount is devoted to metrics only.

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 14, 2008

Later, when the company was much larger, we had everyone on our engineering team agree to sit in on one usability test every month. It wasnt a huge time commitment, but it meant that every engineer was getting regular contact with an actual customer, which was invaluable. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23.

San Francisco 131

San Francisco Customer Lean Continuous Deployment 131

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 30, 2009

Come to TS in Boston! Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. (Speaking of the fall tour, if youre interested in hosting or organizing a lean startup event near you, feel free to drop me a line.

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

At IMVU , our engineering team accumulated thousands upon thousands of tests, and we had a build cluster (using BuildBot ) that ran them. Joel is focused on the fact that in many environments, programmers are considered "just the hired help" akin to manual labor, and not treated properly. Do programmers have quiet working conditions?

Software Review 144

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 7, 2010

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0, Take a look and let me know what you think.

San Francisco 119

San Francisco Management Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 8, 2009

I thought a good place to start was with the origins of the idea that "software design" should be considered a discipline in its own right, on par with computer science, software engineering, and computer programming. Great engineers see it and smile. This is called set-based concurrent engineering (SBCE). [1]

Software Review 87

Software Review Design Software San Francisco 87

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 28, 2010

“Some people weren’t comfortable because it wasn’t as fun, and one senior engineer thought we’d be losing the part of kaChing that was an enabler for anyone who wanted to make it as a pro,&# Rachleff recalls. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment SEC 158

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Do the engineers understand what they are building? Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Processes are always deteriorating or self-regulating. Can they tell a good release from a bad one?

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 60

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 28, 2008

whos on the engineering team? Most important slide: demo (if the product solves an obvious problem), engineering resumes (if the product is nearly impossible to build), " day in the life of a customer " (if neither of the above) Breakthrough technology Key questions: who owns the patents? how do you know anyone would want it?

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 128

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

Labels: customer development , search engine marketing 13comments: Jim Lindstrom said. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Eric -- This is a pretty interesting idea. Amazon PostRank

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

I think this idea is particularly appealing to those of us from an engineering background. In a startup context, numbers like gross revenue are actually vanity metrics, not actionable metrics. Luckily, we also discovered that certain other metrics, like LTV and CPA were much better than we initially projected.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2009

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0, Take a look and let me know what you think.

Agile 60

Agile Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment 60

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 9, 2009

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. a guide for hackers) You buy virtual goods The free software hiring advantage Continuous deployment and continuous learning The lean startup @ Web 2.0

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Web Advisory Board 68

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2010

Our modern philosophy of management has this core belief (taken straight from scientific management) at its heart: that the performance of companies is determined by the systems they create, not just the people they hire. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0,

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Management Founder Lean 161

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 18, 2008

At Toyota , they are called Chief Engineer : Toyota realizes that the Chief Engineer job is probably the most important one in the company because the Chief Engineer listens to the customer and then determines what the functions need to do to address the customer’s desires.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

One is used by engineers to refer to the process of getting code fully integrated into production. In such a system, the primary goal of each engineer is to stay busy, using as close to 100% of his or her time for coding as possible. As luck would have it, one of IMVU’s engineers happened to be in the audience at the time.

Continuous Deployment 167

Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 1, 2008

These tests are written by the engineers themselves, and they must all pass every time. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Automated tests make defects visible. Amazon PostRank

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Developer Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Every board meeting, the metrics of success change. This is an incredible skill, one that most engineers overlook. Time-to-complete-a-sale is not a bad metric for validated learning at this stage. Perhaps they’ll be able to hire someone especially skilled in the marketing skills needed to find this positioning.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 12, 2010

Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0, Take a look and let me know what you think.

Lean 146

Lean San Francisco Wiki Startup 146