Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

Automated testing dramatically reduces the cost of certifying changes, because it removes all of the grunt work QA traditionally does in software. I would add, though, a further question: Do new employees write code on their first day? To see why, take a look at Joels Top Five (Wrong) Reasons You Dont Have Testers.

Software Review 144

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

I now believe that the "pick two" concept is fundamentally flawed, and that lean startups can achieve all three simultaneously: quickly bring high-quality software to market at low cost. Those are the kinds of indefinite costs that make our team grind to a halt over time. First of all, its a myth that cutting corners saves time.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 17, 2010

Not to be outdone, the technologists on the team had also brought their big guns, and the meeting was packed with employees of every level – from VP’s all the way down to me. And lastly, it removes the engineering team’s ability to find breakthrough solutions that might deliver most of the value at a fraction of the cost.

Technical Review 164

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 3, 2009

The same has been true of an unfortunate number of startups, they manage to generate a lot of hype, raise a lot of money, and sometimes make some of their investors, employees, or founders rich. Although there is cost and overhead associated with continuous deployment, the benefits are immense. They dont really create value.

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Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Cofounder 60

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

They know how much it costs to bring in a customer and they know how much money they can expect to make on each one. This is why companies often get out-competed by former employees (Palm vs Handspring to name just one), even though the upstart lacks all of the familiar resources, tools, processes, and support they used to have.

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Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 19, 2009

In my presentation this morning, I emphasized three key areas: reducing the personal cost of failure for entrepreneurs, innovation-friendly legal reforms, and access to the digital means of production (slides from my White House presentation are available at the end of this post). Take a look and let me know what you think.

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San Francisco Founder DC Washington 150

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 23, 2009

There is a lot to be said about the opportunity cost of perfection, iterative evolution and the difference between shipping a lemon and shipping a band aid. I started writing and teaching about shipping imperfect products a few years ago but this is a far better, practical and more powerful presentation.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Audio 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 2, 2009

For example, I often cite a real example of a problem that has as its root cause a new employee who was not properly trained. I pick that example on purpose, for two reasons: 1) most of the companies I work with deal with this problem and yet 2) almost none of them have any kind of training program in place for new employees.

San Francisco 164

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

"We do not develop a product until we get a paying customer," says Orit Pennington , who co-founded the six-employee company with her husband in 2002. Development time is typically no more than two to three weeks, and it generally takes just a few orders to cover development costs. Take a look and let me know what you think.

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San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 137

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 20, 2009

In order to maximize such opportunities, this generation of entrepreneurs combines extremely low costs with faster cycle times to produce what I call lean startups. [.] Such a combination of new technology and new understanding is unlocking new opportunities. Its unit of progress is that of validated learning about its customers.

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Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 68

VC Cafe

MAY 28, 2020

Given it eliminates distance, travel time and costs, “this technology will likely stick around long after COVID-19 fears pass,” according to the Forbes article. By the time the rap group JVG finished its set, about 700,000 people — nearly 12% of the whole population of Finland — had tuned in. Virtual Helsinki.

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Technical Review Cloud Forecast 164

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 27, 2009

While some cost-cutting measures reduce that number, others increase it. In lean times, it’s most important to focus on cutting costs in ways that speed you up, not slow you down. Otherwise, cutting costs just leads to going out of business a little slower. How to build companies that matter (the lean start.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 117

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 7, 2009

We eventually discovered (via five whys ) that we also had to get each new employee acculturated to a fearless way of thinking. Because this was such a big cultural change for most new employees, we didnt leave them to sink or swim on their own. Most importantly, we immediately thrust our new employees into a mindset of reduced fear.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review Lean 131

ConversionXL

DECEMBER 29, 2015

They also found that most of the automatic enrollment employees maintain their default contribution rate and fund allocation through time. Here’s how the researchers put it: “This “default” behavior appears to result from participant inertia and from employee perceptions of the default as investment advice. Image Source.

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Conversion Illinois Austria Architecture 48

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Its obvious that can lower your development costs, but I think its even more important that it can reduce your time to market. Thats all helpful for recruiting, retaining, and ramping-up a new employee. It can benefit your team in other, more surprising ways as well. This approach gives you an edge in hiring.

Software Review 68

Software Review Software Hiring San Francisco 68

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 6, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 6, 2008 When NOT to listen to your users; when NOT to rely on split-tests There are three legs to the lean startup concept: agile product development , low-cost (fast to market) platforms , and rapid-iteration customer development. I think Drucker said it best.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 128

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

They spend so much of their time trying to convince everyone around them that their idea is great and the company is doing well: employees, investors, partners, friends, family, significant others - its a long list. Slow progress, but has cost less than 150k aud so far. How do they know they are making progress?

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San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

Hes a new employee, and he was not properly trained in TDD So far, this isnt much different from the kind of analysis any competent operations team would conduct for a site outage. This approach is a the heart of breaking down the "time/quality/cost pick two" paradox , because these small investments cause the team to go faster over time.

Software Review 167

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 1, 2009

Which comes to the second major principle: halt work that leads to more waste, even if it means abandoning sunk costs. Just because something looks pretty, or feels like a good idea, or has a lot of sunk cost in it, does not mean it should be pursued. The videos are Steve explaining the company's path forward to Next employees.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 166

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 7, 2008

Our online media company is small, we have 6 employees, great proven leaders, great talent, great cashflow. And taking on too many projects at once is a classic sub-optimization. Sure, it seems efficient. But when there is a task half-done, its actually slowing the team down. Imagine a team working from a forced-rank priority queue.

Software Review 94

Software Review Technical Review Part-Time VPE San Francisco 94

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 12, 2009

At the cost of a little extra indirection, you can organize your code around a series of long-lived objects, each of whom communicates with the other objects in simple, easy-to-understand ways. Yes, Python developers DO tend to cost more. There is a stark difference between both types of employees. Im curious.

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PHP Software Review Ruby San Francisco 166

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

This single decision wound up costing the company significant revenue and over the course of several months sent its customer growth into decline. In the end, we managed to repair the damage, but only after losing a lot of time and at significant opportunity cost. We were totally unprepared for the magnitude of what happened.

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Community Management Lean Software Review 158

pandodaily.com

NOVEMBER 29, 2012

Meanwhile, the rash of early liquidity and recent IPOs — unsatisfying as they were — gave liquidity to thousands of employees at large companies, and a subset of those made very real money. Old media’s problems are the costs not the lack of paywalls. Angels begot quick wins that produced even more angels.

Technical Review 93

Technical Review Silicon Valley Incubator Syria 93