Thoughts from Lean Startup Machine Sydney April 2013

I participated in Lean Startup Machine in Sydney in April 2013.  Here are a few things I noticed and thoughts I had...

Three customers

Sebastien Eckersley Maslin, CEO of BlueChilli, talked about his 3 customers concept:

1. Target Customer: Who has the direct problem you're solving?
2. Scale Customer: Who deals with your Target Customers in bulk?
3. Strategic Customer: Who can derive more value from your assets than you can?

This was from the perspective of exit strategy which I generally don't care for.  However, this concept is still interesting if you see this as a way to understand the bigger picture of what happens when a product / service is introduced in a market place.

What's your larger mission?

Jodie Fox, co-founder of Shoes of Prey, pointed out the importance of having a larger mission, even a potentially impossible mission, but one that provides a consistent direction.  For example, for Shoes of Prey this is "Every woman deserves a perfect shoe".  This was in response to a few teams that had "pivoted" to perhaps not as interesting concepts.

This reminded me of The Toyota Way and the importance of having a Long-Term Philosophy.

Teach a way of thinking or find another successful startup?

Is the purpose of events like Lean Startup Machine to teach a way of thinking? Or is it to find another successful startup?  I believe it really should be the former.

Structuring as a competition does not reflect that purpose.

Instead of a competition, the event would focus on teaching concepts, basic assumptions, principles, and tactics like Magic Tests, Concierge MVPs, selling approaches, etc.

Teams would be encouraged to identify problems that could be explored within the context of the event (i.e., on a weekend) AND/OR the event would be scheduled to allow different types of problems to be relevant.

Teams would be smaller so that participants would actually have to attempt all the skills themselves rather than rely on another team member.  Perhaps they would be 1-person teams to ensure that everyone has a direct understanding of what skills you actually need in the real situation, and therefore who you'd want on your team.  People would be exposed explicitly to what their strengths and weaknesses are.

Validation Board or Business Model Canvas?

Lean Startup Machine uses a Validation Board to structure our hypotheses and tests.  The focus is on testing problem-solution fit.  I like the focus of the board, but I miss the bigger picture aspects of the overall business model that you can see with the Business Model Canvas or even the Lean Canvas.  I think I'd rather use either of those to capture the overall business hypothesis and switch to a Validation Board like structure after the riskiest assumption was identified.