Business Plan, Customer Development and Engineer

Are Business Plans Still Necessary?

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2009

In an era of “launch and learn&# is there a need for a business plan? I have seen really great product people espouse the death of the business plan. So, definition: when I talk about a business plan I’m not talking about a 40-page Word document outlining your market approach.

Business Plan

Business Plan AJAX Venture Capital Technical Review

The Customer Development Manifesto: Reasons for the Revolution.

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

The first hint lies in its name; this is a product development model, not a marketing model, not a sales hiring model, not a customer acquisition model, not even a financing model (and we’ll also find that in most cases it’s even a poor model to use to develop a product.) release of the product.

Customer Development

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley

Blowing up the Business Plan at U.C. Berkeley Haas Business School

Steve Blank

MARCH 3, 2015

During the Cold War with the Soviet Union, science and engineering at both Stanford and U.C. Berkeley were heavily funded to develop Cold War weapon systems. Berkeley Haas Business School is a leader in entrepreneurship education. It has replaced how to write a business plan with hands-on Lean Startup methods.

Business Plan

Business Plan Silicon Valley Saudi Arabia Lean

When Hell Froze Over – in the Harvard Business Review

Steve Blank

APRIL 16, 2013

There was nothing suggesting that startups and new ventures needed their own tools and techniques, different from those written about in HBR or taught in business schools. To fill this gap I wrote The Four Steps to the Epiphany , a book about the Customer Development process and how it changes the way startups are built.

Technical Review

Technical Review Lean Venture Capital Customer Development

Lessons Learned: What is customer development?

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, November 8, 2008 What is customer development? But too often when its time to think about customers, marketing, positioning, or PR, we delegate it to "marketroids" or "suits." Many of us are not accustomed to thinking about markets or customers in a disciplined way.

Customer Development

Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer

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

Steve Blank

MARCH 26, 2019

It’s hard to imagine, but only a decade ago, the capstone entrepreneurship class in most universities was how to write – or pitch- a business plan. In my experience, I saw that most business plans don’t survive first contact with customers. Product/Market Fit Versus The Business Model Canvas.

Lean

Lean Business Model Balance Sheet Video

When Hell Froze Over – in the Harvard Business Review

Steve Blank

APRIL 16, 2013

There was nothing suggesting that startups and new ventures needed their own tools and techniques, different from those written about in HBR or taught in business schools. To fill this gap I wrote The Four Steps to the Epiphany , a book about the Customer Development process and how it changes the way startups are built.

Technical Review

Technical Review Lean Venture Capital Customer Development

Creating Startup Success – Customer Development + Business Model Design

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 15, 2010

In previous posts I’ve talked about what the combination of Business Model Design, Customer Development and Agile Methodologies mean to startups and intrapreneurs in large companies; it’s the beginning of entrepreneurship as a science with its own rules and methodologies. She posted her notes from the talk here.)

Customer Development

Customer Development Business Model Developer Design

A New Way to Teach Entrepreneurship – The Lean LaunchPad at Stanford: Class 1

Steve Blank

MARCH 8, 2011

It was designed to bring together many of the new approaches to building a successful startup – customer development, agile development, business model generation and pivots. We were positing that 20 years of teaching “how to write a business plan” might be obsolete. Would we signs of success early?

Lean

Lean Business Model Customer Development Guinea

Entrepreneurship as a Science – The Business Model/Customer Development Stack

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 25, 2010

Over the last 50 years engineers have moved from building computers out of individual transistors to building with prepackaged logic gates. It’s the combination of Business Model Design and Customer Development. Business Model Design. Business Model Design Gets Dynamic, Customer Development Gets Strategic.

Customer Development

Customer Development Business Model Developer Customer

Nokia as “He Who Must Not Be Named” and the Helsinki Spring

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 10, 2011

I was invited to Finland as part of Stanford’s Engineering Technology Venture Program partnership with Aalto University. Finland itself has significant engineering talent, and is also attracting entrepreneurs from Russia and the former USSR. Thanks to Kristo Ovaska and team for the fabulous logistics!) Lessons Learned.

Finland

Finland Naming Russia Government

Sometimes It Pays to be a Jerk

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 6, 2014

The class is designed for students who said they want a hands-on experience in what it takes to build a startup – not just writing a business plan or listening to lectures. This year, at one of the universities where I teach in the engineering school, our quarter was going to start right after the New Year.

Lean

Lean Customer Development Business Model Email

I-Corps @ NIH – Pivoting the Curriculum

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2014

We’re changing the order in which we teach the business model canvas and customer development to better-fit therapeutics, diagnostics and medical devices. The Lean LaunchPad class uses the three “ Lean Startup ” principles: Alexander Osterwalders “ business model canvas ” to frame hypotheses. Lessons Learned.

Intellectual Property

Intellectual Property Lean IP Open Source

Why Lean May Save Your Life – The I-Corps @ NIH

Steve Blank

JUNE 19, 2014

After seeing the process work so well for scientists and engineers in the NSF, we hypothesized that we could increase productivity and stave the capital flight by helping Life Sciences startups build their companies more efficiently. Filed under: Customer Development , Lean LaunchPad , Life Sciences , National Science Foundation.

Lean

Lean SBIR Intellectual Property Customer Development

Why Build, Measure, Learn – isn’t just throwing things against the wall to see if they work

Steve Blank

MAY 6, 2015

Back then, an entrepreneur used a serial product development process that proceeded step-by-step with little if any customer feedback. The goal of Build-Measure-Learn is not to build a final product to ship or even to build a prototype of a product, but to maximize learning through incremental and iterative engineering.

Lean

Lean Agile Business Model Customer Development

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2021 Lessons Learned Presentations

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2021

This was followed by an 8-minute slide presentation describing their customer discovery journey over the 10 weeks. While all the teams used the Mission Model Canvas , (videos here ), Customer Development and Agile Engineering to build Minimal Viable Products, each of their journeys was unique. It Started With An Idea.

Lean

Lean Security Asia Oakland

No Business Plan Survives First Contact With A Customer – The 5.2 billion dollar mistake.

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

With an out-of-this-world business plan. When it was spun out as a a separate company, Iridium’s 1990 business plan had assumptions about potential customers, their problems and the product needed to solve that problem. A Business Plan Frozen in Time. This business plan was a static document.

Business Plan

Business Plan Customer Business Model Customer Development

Lean Startups aren't Cheap Startups

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. The Customer Development process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that.

Lean

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS

The Customer Development Manifesto: Reasons for the Revolution.

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. What plan says that?

Customer Development

Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer

The Helsinki Spring

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 7, 2011

—— I was invited to Finland as part of Stanford’s Engineering Technology Venture Program partnership with Aalto University. Filed under: Business Model versus Business Plan , Customer Development , Teaching , Technology , Venture Capital.

Finland

Finland Venture Capital Government Russia

Qualcomm’s Corporate Entrepreneurship Program – Lessons Learned (Part 2)

Steve Blank

JANUARY 30, 2013

I earnestly believe that large corporations should emulate Lean Startups (Business model design, Customer Development and Agile Engineering.) It gets really tough when these projects are launched and have to fight for survival against current corporate business models. Lessons Learned.

Programming

Programming Technical Review Incubator Intellectual Property

Teaching Entrepreneurship in “Chilecon Valley”

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 13, 2010

I’ve spent the last week in Santiago, a guest of Professor Cristóbal García at the Catholic University of Chile as part of Stanford’s Engineering Technology Venture Program. Here’s the course announcement from Professor Vergara (in English): Customer Development Course in Chile – Lean Launchpad. Teaching in Chile.

Chile

Chile Silicon Valley Lean Agile

China Startups – The Gold Rush and Fire Extinguishers (Part 5 of 5)

Steve Blank

APRIL 14, 2013

And while startups and entrepreneurship courses are now being added to the curriculum, “How to write a business plan” seems to be the state of the art. Though they’re familiar with technology in the valley, I picked up some important cultural difference from students and startup engineers I talked to. Entrepreneurial Culture.

China

China Silicon Valley Intellectual Property Non-Compete

Eureka! A New Era for Scientists and Engineers

Steve Blank

JULY 28, 2011

Silicon Valley was born in an era of applied experimentation driven by scientists and engineers. From the point of view of scientists and engineers in a university lab, too often entrepreneurship in all its VC-driven glory – income statements, balance sheets, business plans, revenue models, 5-year forecasts, etc.

Engineer

Engineer Silicon Valley United States Intellectual Property

The Big Bang. The Lean LaunchPad explodes at University of Maryland

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 10, 2014

We didn’t know it at the time, but with that investment we had paid for front-row VIP seats to witness the origins of Customer Development and the Lean Startup. Our initial business plan started with an incorrectly identified buyer, value propositions that were wrong, and guesses everywhere else.

Maryland

Maryland Lean DC Virginia

How Scientists and Engineers Got It Right, and VC’s Got It Wrong

Steve Blank

JULY 25, 2011

Scientists and engineers as founders and startup CEOs is one of the least celebrated contributions of Silicon Valley. ESL, the first company I worked for in Silicon Valley , was founded by a PhD in Math and six other scientists and engineers. It might be its most important. ———-. Cold War Spin Outs.

Engineer

Engineer Silicon Valley United States Venture Capital

NYU Commencement Speech 2016

Steve Blank

MAY 23, 2016

NYU Engineering Commencement Speech. Thank you for the opportunity to address you on your graduation from this esteemed engineering school. Established businesses execute business models while startups search for them. By the way, the engineering definition of serendipity is, that life is too unpredictable to pre-compute.

Lean

Lean Technical Review Vietnam Engineer

The Class That Changed the Way Entrepreneurship is Taught

Steve Blank

JULY 13, 2021

By the end of the 20th century, case studies and business plans had reached an evolutionary dead-end for entrepreneurs. The Rise of Business Schools – Management as an Occupation. The business school was invented in the first decade of the 20th century in response to a massive economic transformation in the U.S.

Lean

Lean Agile Business Model Business Plan

The Business Model Canvas Gets Even Better – Value Proposition Design

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2014

It has three parts: a business model canvas to frame hypotheses, customer development to get out of the building to test those hypotheses and agile engineering to build minimum viable products. Teaches you how to use Customer Development to test it. Integration with Customer Development and Lean Startup.

Business Model

Business Model Design Customer Development Lean

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2020 Lesson Learned Presentations

Steve Blank

JUNE 12, 2020

This was followed by an 8-minute slide presentation describing their customer discovery journey over the 10-weeks. All the teams used the Mission Model Canvas , (videos here ) Customer Development and Agile Engineering to build Minimal Viable Products, but all of their journeys were unique. It Started with an Idea.

Oakland

Oakland Asia Lean Video

The LeanLaunch Pad at Stanford – Class 4: Customer Hypotheses

Steve Blank

APRIL 4, 2011

Talking to customers convinced the team that the need for robotic weeding was high, there was a larger potential market (organic crop production is doubling every 4 years and accelerating,) and they could make organic produce more affordable (labor cost reduction of 100 to 1) – and could possibly change the organic farming industry!

Customer

Customer Business Model Cloud Nebraska

Innovation, Change and the Rest of Your Life

Steve Blank

MAY 9, 2017

Everything a large company did, a startup should do – write a business plan; hire sales, marketing, engineering; spec all the product features on day one and build everything for a big first customer ship. Not kind of wrong but going out of business wrong. Where is it going? We now understand that’s wrong.

Restful

Restful Silicon Valley Puerto Rico San Jose

Teaching Entrepreneurship – Logistics

Steve Blank

MARCH 29, 2010

In my last post I described my approach to one of the three classes I teach at Stanford in the engineering school: Fundamentals of Technology Entrepreneurship. The key things I want students to take from the class are: Understand that a startup is a temporary organization designed to search for a profitable business model.

Business Model

Business Model Silicon Valley California Engineer

Time For Founders School

Steve Blank

JANUARY 28, 2014

0:43: Business Plans versus Business Models. 1:46: The Differences: Accounting, Engineering & Sales. 6:07: Engineering: Waterfall Development in a Large Company vs. Minimum Viable Product in a Startup. 1:28: Using the Business Model Canvas. 1:49: Use Customer Development to Test Your Hypotheses.

Founder

Founder Intellectual Property Lean Customer Development

China Startups – The Gold Rush and Fire Extinguishers (Part 5 of 5)

Steve Blank

APRIL 14, 2013

And while startups and entrepreneurship courses are now being added to the curriculum, “How to write a business plan” seems to be the state of the art. Though they’re familiar with technology in the valley, I picked up some important cultural difference from students and startup engineers I talked to. Entrepreneurial Culture.

China

China Silicon Valley Intellectual Property Non-Compete

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 18, 2010

After I retired, I began teaching Customer Development , a theory of how to reduce early stage risk in entrepreneurial ventures. The first time I taught the class at the Haas Business School, U.C. Love/Hate Business Plan Competitions……… 39. Customer Development Manifesto.

Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley Customer Development IP Developer

The Lean LaunchPad Online

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 6, 2012

I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. Experienced entrepreneurs kept finding that no business plan survived first contact with customers. So what would a search process for a business model look like? And we provided dedicated mentors for each team.

Lean

Lean Georgia Michigan Business Model

Search versus Execute

Steve Blank

MARCH 5, 2012

One of the confusing things to entrepreneurs, investors and educators is the relationship between customer development and business model design and business planning and execution. When does a new venture focus on customer development and business models ? Don’t Throw the Tomatoes.

Search

Search Business Model Customer Development Agile

The Lean LaunchPad Educators Class

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. It dawned on me that the plans were a symptom of a larger problem: we were executing business plans when we should first be searching for business models. We were putting the plan before the planning.

Lean

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model

SuperMac War Story 10: The Video Spigot « Steve Blank

Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

A month or two before the QuickTime public announcement in May, the SuperMac hardware engineers (who had a great relationship with the QuickTime team at Apple) started a “ skunk works ” project. So SuperMac engineering also developed video compression software, called Cinepak. The software was idiot proof.

Video

Video Silicon Valley RSS California

Learning Through Reflection

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2016

To be honest I built the class out of frustration watching schools teach aspiring entrepreneurs that all they need to know is how to write a business plan or how to sit in an incubator building a product. entrepreneurship is experiential and requires theory and a ton of practice. Every week the teams present their results.

Lean

Lean Incubator Business Model Channel

Get Out of The Building – And Win $50,000

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 11, 2010

This startup search process is the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. When founders discover their assumptions are wrong, as they inevitably will, the result isn’t a crisis , it’s a learning event called a pivot — and an opportunity to update the business model.

Agile

Agile Business Model Customer Development Lean

NEXT by Startup Weekend in Boulder

Feld Thoughts

OCTOBER 4, 2013

During my senior year, I took “Startup Essentials for Software Engineering” (taught by Zach Nies of Rally Software) and I can confidently say it was the best class I ever took at CU. We learned how to do customer development, conduct empathy interviews, and build a real MVP (not just an alpha version).

Startup

Startup Vesting Cofounder Lean

Are Business Plans Still Necessary?

The Customer Development Manifesto: Reasons for the Revolution.

Trending Sources

Blowing up the Business Plan at U.C. Berkeley Haas Business School

When Hell Froze Over – in the Harvard Business Review

Lessons Learned: What is customer development?

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

When Hell Froze Over – in the Harvard Business Review

Creating Startup Success – Customer Development + Business Model Design

A New Way to Teach Entrepreneurship – The Lean LaunchPad at Stanford: Class 1

Entrepreneurship as a Science – The Business Model/Customer Development Stack

Nokia as “He Who Must Not Be Named” and the Helsinki Spring

Sometimes It Pays to be a Jerk

I-Corps @ NIH – Pivoting the Curriculum

Why Lean May Save Your Life – The I-Corps @ NIH

Why Build, Measure, Learn – isn’t just throwing things against the wall to see if they work

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2021 Lessons Learned Presentations

No Business Plan Survives First Contact With A Customer – The 5.2 billion dollar mistake.

Lean Startups aren't Cheap Startups

The Customer Development Manifesto: Reasons for the Revolution.

The Helsinki Spring

Qualcomm’s Corporate Entrepreneurship Program – Lessons Learned (Part 2)

Teaching Entrepreneurship in “Chilecon Valley”

China Startups – The Gold Rush and Fire Extinguishers (Part 5 of 5)

Eureka! A New Era for Scientists and Engineers

The Big Bang. The Lean LaunchPad explodes at University of Maryland

How Scientists and Engineers Got It Right, and VC’s Got It Wrong

NYU Commencement Speech 2016

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The Business Model Canvas Gets Even Better – Value Proposition Design

Hacking for Defense @ Stanford 2020 Lesson Learned Presentations

The LeanLaunch Pad at Stanford – Class 4: Customer Hypotheses

Top 29 Startup Posts May 2010

Innovation, Change and the Rest of Your Life

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Time For Founders School

China Startups – The Gold Rush and Fire Extinguishers (Part 5 of 5)

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

The Lean LaunchPad Online

Search versus Execute

The Lean LaunchPad Educators Class

SuperMac War Story 10: The Video Spigot « Steve Blank

Learning Through Reflection

Get Out of The Building – And Win $50,000

NEXT by Startup Weekend in Boulder

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