Lean Startup "Marketing Bullshit"

Post by gruseom » Sun, May 16, 2010, 11:55 PM UTC

plinkplonk wrote: post #26

patio11 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that Eric Ries et al need validation from me, but I nearly went to that conference. (The timing just did not work for me.) You think $700 is a lot of money? I was getting ready to buy a plane ticket across the Pacific. I thought it was likely to be cheap at the price, given the quality of the novel insights Eric Ries et al have been writing about. Take Minimum Viable Product, for example. It is similar to 37Signa…

"You think $700 is a lot of money?" Sure it is, for the differential in the information you can get by paying it and attending the "New Age Of Entrepreneurship Dawning" seminar vs reading, talking to people who actually run startups today, reading HN and so on. Obviously there are people who think otherwise. Doesn't change my views on the essential marginal value of Ries's offerings and "insights" vs Steve Blanks' or…

For what it's worth, I have the same sense as you describe -- that there's something consultanty and vaguely scammy about the Lean Startup movement (like there is about most software "movements") -- and for the same reason as you, namely pattern recognition from having observed these things in the agile space. The main lesson I learned from the latter is that the people selling consulting about how to build working software were, with some exceptions, not particularly able to build working software or run successful software projects themselves. They were like music teachers who couldn't play the instrument; their skill was in talking convincingly (and expensively) about how the instrument should be played. Their customers would frequently get very enthusiastic and shiny-eyed about what they'd heard, but it never seemed to lead in the end to better music being produced - only more talk about it. (Edit: and lots of ideological you're-doing-it-wrong thinking.)

I have seen no good answer as to what the leaders of this movement have actually done to justify authoritative stature on the subject of startups. (Steve Blank is an exception, but he also doesn't seem that directly involved.) The combination of that and the veneer of consultanty slickness is a real red flag.

I'm all in favor of people in the startup world trading great ideas and war stories. But the whole consulting thing, with its jargon and processes, its conferences, speaking engagements, and most of all its high fees... I think that model is broken and we'd be better off without it.

Post by rmc » Mon, May 17, 2010, 4:43 PM UTC

gfodor wrote: post #4

kylemathews wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vision is a critical part of a leanstartup and by no means is the fundamental principle "lazy product evaluation". To quote an Eric Ries post: "Lean Startups are driven by a compelling vision, and they are rigorous about testing each element of this vision against reality." The two most important leanstartup principles or teachings for me are a) I'm stupid and make really poor assumptions all the time. To combat that…

Your last paragraph has a lot of words but says very little. Can it not all be summed up as "talk to your customers?" Isn't this the foundation of any business? Does anyone actually advocate not doing so? Obviously you need to be aware of the problems your customers face as a business. But the notion that anything is the "most important" metric of progress reeks of classic silver-bulletism that plagues software engin…

'Talk to you customers' is a bi ambiguoud, and could be wrong. My reading of the lean startup thing is that you look at the numbers and metrics of what your customers are doing, rather than ask them what they want. If you're not sure what feature to add, don't ask people, and do surveys, do a half version of all the possibilities, and see what features your customers are using.

Re: Lean Startup "Marketing Bullshit"

Re: Lean Startup "Marketing Bullshit"