Iterative Approach to Product Development
“Running Lean equips entrepreneurs with a systematic approach to validate their business ideas, focusing on what truly matters: testing and learning.”
Quotes
“Speed of learning is the new unfair advantage.“
“Your job then isn’t just building the best possible solution, but owning the entire business model and making all the pieces fit.”
“The #1 reason why products fail is building something nobody wants. The #2 reason why products fail is not getting the right buy-in from key stakeholders.“
“No framework can guarantee success. But a good framework can provide a feedback loop for making better evidence-based decisions in the face of extreme uncertainty.”
Expert Reviews
“Your competition will use this book to outgrow you.”
~Mike Volpe, Hubspot.
“Alistair and Ben have written a much-needed dose of reality.”
~ Brad Feld, Foundry Group & Techstars
This is applicable to organizations of all shapes and sizes, from small business to big government.
~Jennifer Pahlka, Code For America.
“Lean Analytics is the missing piece of Lean Startup, with practical and detailed research, advice and guidance that can help you succeed faster in a startup or large organization.”
~ Dan Martell, CEO & Founder of Clarity.
Book Review
Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works by Ash Maurya is a pragmatic guide that equips entrepreneurs with essential tools and methodologies for navigating the startup journey. Maurya’s approach focuses on systematically testing and validating business ideas, making this book an indispensable resource for entrepreneurs at any stage.
The Lean Canvas, a central feature of the book, helps entrepreneurs break down their business ideas into key components. This one-page business model is particularly effective in
identifying and prioritizing the riskiest assumptions. Maurya’s emphasis on addressing these high-risk areas first ensures that entrepreneurs can validate or invalidate their hypotheses early, saving time and resources. However, the book assumes some familiarity with lean startup concepts, which might be overwhelming for complete beginners.
The book is structured into three parts: Model, Prioritize, and Test. The Model section guides readers in sketching their initial vision and communicating it effectively. The Prioritize section helps entrepreneurs identify critical risks and develop strategies to mitigate them. The Test section provides a systematic approach to stress-testing the business model through small, fast experiments, enabling continuous iteration from the initial plan to a viable business model. While the Lean Canvas is a powerful tool, it may not fully capture the complexities of more specialized or regulated industries.
A notable strength of Running Lean is its focus on actionable insights and real-world applicability. Maurya includes numerous case studies and examples, making theoretical concepts tangible and relatable. This practical orientation is especially beneficial for entrepreneurs who need to see how principles can be applied in actual business scenarios.
In conclusion, Running Lean is a must-read for entrepreneurs committed to systematically building and validating their business ideas. Its focus on lean methodologies, actionable insights, and real-world applicability makes it a valuable addition to any entrepreneur’s toolkit. Despite its challenges, the book’s structured approach offers a clear roadmap for navigating the uncertainties of startup development.
Who should read this book
- Aspiring and Serial Entrepreneurs: Those looking to systematically validate their ideas and build successful startups.
- Corporate Innovators and Intrapreneurs: Professionals aiming to foster innovation within larger organizations by applying lean methodologies.
- Product Managers: Individuals responsible for developing and launching new products who seek a structured approach to minimize risks.
- Makers and Visionaries: Creators who want to build the next generation of impactful products through a disciplined, iterative process.
Author’s Bio
Ash Maurya is the author of the international bestseller Running Lean: How to Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works and the creator of the one- page business modeling tool “Lean Canvas”. His new book is Scaling Lean: Master the Key Metrics for Startup Growth. Ash is praised for offering some of the best and most practical advice for entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs all over the world. Driven by the search for better and faster ways for building successful products, Ash has developed a systematic methodology for raising the odds of success built upon Lean Startup, customer development, and bootstrapping techniques.
Ash is also a leading business blogger and his posts and advice have been featured in Inc. Magazine, Forbes, and Fortune. He regularly hosts sold-out workshops around the world and serves as a mentor to several accelerators, including TechStars, MaRS, Capital Factory, and guest lecturers at several universities including MIT, Harvard, and UT Austin .Ash serves on the advisory board of a number of startups, and has consulted to new and established companies. Author’s Website
Publisher’s Note
We’re building more products today than ever before, but most of them fail–not because we can’t complete what we want to build but because we waste time, money, and effort building the wrong product. What we need is a systematic process for quickly vetting product ideas and raising our odds of success. That’s the promise of Running Lean.
In this inspiring book, Ash Maurya takes you through an exacting strategy for achieving product/market fit for your fledgling venture. You’ll learn ideas and concepts from several innovative methodologies, including the Lean Startup, business model design, design thinking, and Jobs-to-be-Done. This new edition introduces the continuous innovation framework and follows one entrepreneur’s journey from initial vision to a business model that works.
- Deconstruct your idea using a one-page Lean Canvas
- Stress-test your idea for desirability, viability, and feasibility
- Define key milestones charted on a traction roadmap
- Maximize your team’s efforts for speed, learning, and focus
- Prioritize the right actions at the right time
- Learn how to conduct effective customer interviews
- Engage your customers throughout the development cycle
- Continually test your product with smaller, faster iterations
- Find a repeatable and scalable business mode
Reading Lists Featuring This Book
6 Excellent Books on Minimum Viable Product (MVP) Development
Reader Reviews
There are no reviews yet. Be the first one to write one.