From Designer to. Designpreneur. An introduction to LEAN Startup methods, and how your UX Design skills are relevant to business modeling.

Transcription

1 From Designer to Designpreneur An introduction to LEAN Startup methods, and how your UX Design skills are relevant to business modeling.

2 Have you ever......designed something awesome, and realized that nobody actually needed it?...dreamed about making a business out of your idea, but not knowing if it would sell?...thought about being an entrepreneur?...had difficulties explaining your values of your UX skills to a business person?...tried to manage a design process, but not having a good tool?...broken a stick? Then this book has got some awesome stuff for you! 2

3 Say whaaaaat? This book introduces the principles and tools used by the LEAN Startup methodology, and shows how it relates to UX methods. The book provides a basic overview of the theory behind the tools, and how to use them in your own process. You can combine these tools with traditional tools, methods and processes that you already know from Interaction Design, Service Design, User-Centered Design, System Design, or more generally - UX Design. If you are/will be working closely with non-designers, learning the vocabulary and methods of LEAN Startup can be a great tool for communication and a great advocacy for UX Design. If you are a designer curious about the path of entrepreneurship, you will find a great help in understanding the concepts in this book. You can apply what you already know - in a business setting! Look inside to read about the LEAN methods and why you should care! 3

4 Background My name is Dag Jomar Mersland, and at the time of writing, I m an Industrial Design student at NTNU in Norway. In my fifth year I wrote a review article about the future education of Interaction Design students, and why universities and design schools should accommodate for a growing need of Designer Entrepreneurs. As a result of that article, I decided to find out about the processes required to be both an entrepreneur and a designer. On my way, I found some great tools that I believe all designers can benefit from. After learning about these new tools, I tried them out in real life. From that, I experienced the benefits of the tools, and also saw how they could relate to the traditional design process tools I had learned in school. This book is my way of sharing these experiences, and introducing the tools to others like me. ABSTRACT Educating the Future Interaction Design Entrepreneurs This paper looks at the intersection of Entrepreneurship and Interaction Design (ID). We point out an emerging field of Design Entrepreneurship, and why new and existing Interaction Design programmes should consider courses, programmes or initiatives that focuses on this unique ability. The paper looks at a sample of relatively known ID educational programmes, and a few initiatives that highlights the current state of ID education and also the growing opportunities. The paper discusses the importance of code and technology literacy in context of ID education and practice, and relates this as an important factor in Design Entrepreneurship. 4

5 Motivation Whenever you are designing something, you are planning how something should improve the status quo. As a designer, you aren t lacking the skills to come up with new ideas and to be creative. You probably have your own sketchbook(s) where you scribble down your ideas every now and then. Ideas spanning from small things that would your day better, to big ideas that could change the world. You have probably worked in a team with other designers, and together you can come up with the most genius, innovative, fun, crazy, life-changing ideas you could ever imagine. There s no end to a creative team s imagination, right? OK, so ideas are no problem. Anyone can come up with ideas. But how do you know what kind of ideas to come up with? What problems are you trying to solve? What behavior are you trying to change? That s were User-Experience design comes in, right? User observations, interviews and all that stuff - you know what I m talking about... You try to find a problem definition, and also user needs. Sounds familiar? Good. What I will give you in this book, is tools for you to manage your gathering of problem definitions, user needs and ideas. You will be introduced to a common framework for business modeling, as well as the vocabulary so you can learn more about this yourself if you want to. And also, you will be better equipped to communicate the importance of UX Design to business people and other non-designers. You should read this book from front-to-back, so I won t provide you with a list of contents. Just continue reading until the end, and you will be finished. It s not that hard - just sit down and do it. It will take you 30 minutes tops. Unless your really slooow. 5

6 What I learned in school about the Design Process During my years of study, I have learned a lot about different design processes. Some of it has been from lectures, some from my own research, and some from pure experience. I am sure you have your own ideas of what the design process is or should be, and what works for you and your team. On the next pages, I will sum up some of the basics of design processes and methods used, and make some comments. There will probably be nothing new to you in this section, other than the reflections I have made. But I will connect the dots in a later chapter, so have the next pages in the back of your mind... 6

7 WARNING WARNING WARNING Boring, complicated theory model illustrations may follow... 7

8 Early decisions influence most You might have been introduced to a similar graph, illustrating the idea that decisions made in the early stages have the greatest opportunity to influence cost. Meaning that if you make the right decisions early on, you avoid unnecessary costs due to changes in product at a late stage. To put it simply: If you don t get your facts straight early on - it might cost you big-time! 8

9 Combine sources of information In this illustration, the process of gathering information from different sources leads to the problem definition and requirements. From there one can make ideas and concepts. Well, it looks good on paper, but can design really be that linear? Haven t you often had an idea you though was golden, before even talking to anyone? Even so, you must manage this collection of information, and once you have it - do something with it. But of course, this illustration doesn t tell you how to do that...bummer. Guess we re stuck with a lot of post-its on the wall and no framework for analysis. Summary: You must manage your information. 9

10 Doing user task analysis... In the illustration above, a sample task analysis is shown. Ever done something similar? It can be a great tool to understanding the tasks of the users. But when is it appropriate to do such an analysis, and when is it a waste of time? Did you ask yourself that question the last time you did one? And if so - how do you fit the results with your other sources of information? How do you share the new knowledge with the rest of the team? I say... Use tools when appropriate, and be sure to manage the results efficiently! 10

11 Personas, personas, personas... You have probably done this exercise a few times during your studies, or professional career. Personas are a valuable tool for gathering and understanding the most typical attributes of a certain user group. However, to do this, you must have a sufficient amount of data to work with. If you have ever created a persona from a single person - the persona is most likely wrong...and you will be making wrong decisions, which we all know - can cost you dearly in the long run. There are lots of guides on how to make a good persona - I m not the one to tell you. But I will tell you this... Make sure your personas are true. Get your facts straight! 11

12 A well-defined problem is the key to a successful design solution This is a statement, you might have learned during your design education - as I did. To quote from a lecture named From Information Analysis to Problem Definition and Design Requirements : To understand Problem Definition one should understand the term: Problem. A problem is related to a discontentment of the status quo, what causes this status quo and how will it develop if nothing is done. Hereby it is important to know: Who is / are the problem owner(s) What are the goals What are the new problems related to the goals 12

13 but... So... Research and analysis methods are tools to find answers to these questions 13

14 ...what about multi-dimensionality? When you start researching the users within a system, you will most often find that there are multiple kinds of users, which have different goals, needs and wants - which may be conflicting each other. And you may also have some good solutions for each user group / personas. How do you know which ideas to keep, which to discard, and which user groups to prioritize? Do you come up with a visionary magic solution that works great for all parties? Or do you consider factors like time-to-market, business model, market opportunities, stakeholders, costs...? In an ideal situation, you will have a single type of user with few goals/needs that you will have to design a solution for. But in reality, you will find multiple user segments with a large total number of goals/needs, for which there may be many kinds of solutions. Do you have a framework in which to organize and limit your solution space? You need to prioritize which users, goals and solutions to focus on. 14

15 Dream situation Meanwhile, in reality... 15

16 ...now we are getting to the interesting parts... 16

17 In the next chapter, I will give you a brief overview of the philosophy and principles of the LEAN Startup Movement We will later relate these principles to the design process. 17

18 LEAN Startup Methodology The 5 Principles Entrepreneurs are everywhere You don t have to work in a garage to be in a startup. Entrepreneurship is management A startup is an institution, not just a product, so it requires management, a new kind of management specifically geared to its context. Validated learning Startups exist not to make stuff, make money, or serve customers. They exist to learn how to build a sustainable business. This learning can be validated scientifically, by running experiments that allow us to test each element of our vision. Innovation accounting To improve entrepreneurial outcomes, and to hold entrepreneurs accountable, we need to focus on the boring stuff: how to measure progress, how to setup milestones, how to prioritize work. This requires a new kind of accounting, specific to startups. Build-Measure-Learn The fundamental activity of a startup is to turn ideas into products, measure how customers respond, and then learn whether to pivot or persevere. All successful startup processes should be geared to accelerate that feedback loop. Source: (2012, December 6) 18

19 What does this have to do with you? The philosophy and it s principles and methodology is of value to designers as well as entrepreneurs. And if your both - a so called Designpreneur - it s a must! Concepts apply both to designing products and to developing a market - The New York Times As the name states, it is a methodology that is made specifically for Startups. However, as a designer you will recognize the underlying philosophy of user/customer relations and feedback to guide the design process. You are very familiar with the concept of user-testing, and the importance of getting quality feedback from the real users of a product. The LEAN Startup methods totally agree with much of the design tools you already use - but it s more about the framework in which you use these tools - the management of the information gathering, and the decisions you make on that data. It is built to increase the success factor of a business model creation - but can also be seen as a way to increase the success of a product design. But keep one thing in mind: The point is not necessarily to increase the chance for success of that single idea - but it s about finding the one idea of many which has the most likelihood of being a success. For a designer - this relates to the process of selecting ideas from the fuzzy front-end. In a way - you can look at it as a way of organizing and managing the fuzziness! 19

20 if you are interested, here s some background The Lean Startup is a business approach coined by Eric Ries that aims to change the way that companies are built and new products are launched. The Lean Startup relies on validated learning, scientific experimentation, and iterative product releases to shorten product development cycles, measure progress, and gain valuable customer feedback. In this way, companies, especially startups, can design their products or services to meet the demands of their customer base without requiring large amounts of initial funding or expensive product launches. Originally developed with high-tech companies in mind, the lean startup philosophy has since been expanded to apply to any individual, team, or company looking to introduce new products or services into the market. Today, the lean startup s popularity has grown outside of its Silicon Valley birthplace and has spread throughout the world, in large part due to the success of Ries bestselling book, The Lean Startup: How Today s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses. Ries developed the idea for the Lean Startup from his experiences as a startup advisor, employee, and founder. His first startup, Catalyst Recruiting, failed because they did not understand the wants of their target customers, and because they focused too much time and energy on the initial product launch. After Catalyst, Ries was a senior software engineer with There, Inc. Ries describes There Inc. as a classic example of a Silicon Valley startup with five years of stealth R&D, $40 million in financing, and nearly 200 employees at the time of product launch. In 2003, There, Inc. launched its product, There.com, but they were unable to garner popularity beyond the initial early adopters. Ries claims that despite the many proximate causes for failure, the most important mistake was that the company s vision was almost too concrete, making it impossible to see that their product did not accurately represent consumer demand. Although the lost money differed by orders of magnitude, the failures of There, Inc. and Catalyst Recruiting share similar origins, with Ries stating that it was working forward from the technology instead of working backward from the business results you re trying to achieve. Ries began to develop the lean startup philosophy from these experiences, and from others observed by working in the high-tech entrepreneurial world. Source: (2012, December 6) 20

21 Philosophy Similar to the precepts of lean management, Ries lean startup philosophy seeks to eliminate wasteful practices and increase value producing practices during the product development phase so that startups can have better chances of success without requiring large amounts of outside funding, elaborate business plans, or the perfect product. Ries believes that customer feedback during product development is integral to the lean startup process, and ensures that the producer does not invest time designing features or services that consumers do not want. This is done primarily through two processes, using key performance indicators and a continuous deployment process. Because startups typically cannot afford to have their entire investment depend upon the success of one single product launch, Ries maintains that by releasing a minimum viable product that is not yet finalized, the company can then make use of customer feedback to help further tailor their product to the specific needs of its customers. The lean startup philosophy pushes web based or tech related startups away from the ideology of their dot-com era predecessors in order to achieve cost-effective production by building a minimal product and gauging customer feedback. Ries asserts that the lean has nothing to do with how much money a company raises, rather it has everything to do with assessing the specific demands of consumers and how to meet that demand using the least amount of resources possible. On the next pages we will discuss some of the tools and methods used by LEAN Startup. Keep reading! 21

22 Build-Measure-Learn The Lean Startup method provides a scientific approach to creating and managing startups and get a desired product to customers hands faster. It utilizes a few core principles, such as the Build, Measure, Learn iteration loop. The idea is to do continuously improvements and changes to a product, by building small pieces of the product, testing it out, measuring the usability or effects of the changes, and learning from the results. This does not only apply to the actual product development, but also for developing the market, customer, and core product requirements. Yes - you may have been doing this for years... The UX community has used iterative methods for years now, and trying to make big companies and others see the value of building prototypes, and testing them out as fast as possible - learning from user behavior, and changing our product. Even though the BML process of LEAN Startup is not exactly the same as the iterative design process, you already have a good understanding of how it should work. And now you have new vocabulary to explain your own skills and value as a designer. You are an expert at this! 22

23 23

24 The Business Model Canvas The Business Model Canvas (BMC) is a tool that should be known to business people. If you wanna get fancy, you should know that it was proposed by Alexander Osterwalder, a recognized author, speaker and advisor on business model innovation. What it s for... In the world of business creation and startups, the BMC is a tool, that we can initially use for organizing our thinking, and use as a scorecard and measure of our progress as we turn our hypothesis into facts. 24

25 The Business Model Canvas Key Activities Key Partners Designed for: Designed by: On: Day Month Year Iteration: No. Value Propositions Customer Relationships Customer Segments What Key Activities do our Value Propositions require? Our Distribution Channels? Customer Relationships? Revenue streams? Who are our Key Partners? Who are our key suppliers? Which Key Resources are we acquiring from partners? Which Key Activities do partners perform? motivations for partnerships: categories Optimization and economy Production Reduction of risk and uncertainty Problem Solving Acquisition of particular resources and activities Platform/Network What value do we deliver to the customer? Which one of our customer s problems are we helping to solve? What bundles of products and services are we offering to each Customer Segment? Which customer needs are we satisfying? Key Resources What Key Resources do our Value Propositions require? Our Distribution Channels? Customer Relationships? Revenue Streams? types of resources Physical Intellectual (brand patents, copyrights, data) Human Financial characteristics Newness Performance Customization Getting the Job Done Design Brand/Status Price Cost Reduction Risk Reduction Accessibility Convenience/Usability Cost Structure What are the most important costs inherent in our business model? Which Key Resources are most expensive? Which Key Activities are most expensive? is your business more: Cost Driven (leanest cost structure, low price value proposition, maximum automation, extensive outsourcing) Value Driven ( focused on value creation, premium value proposition) sample characteristics: Fixed Costs (salaries, rents, utilities) Variable costs Economies of scale Economies of scope What type of relationship does each of our Customer Segments expect us to establish and maintain with them? Which ones have we established? How are they integrated with the rest of our business model? How costly are they? examples Personal assistance Dedicated Personal Assistance Self-Service Automated Services Communities Co-creation For whom are we creating value? Who are our most important customers? Mass Market Niche Market Segmented Diversified Multi-sided Platform Channels Through which Channels do our Customer Segments want to be reached? How are we reaching them now? How are our Channels integrated? Which ones work best? Which ones are most cost-efficient? How are we integrating them with customer routines? channel phases: 1. Awareness How do we raise awareness about our company s products and services? 2. Evaluation How do we help customers evaluate our organization s Value Proposition? 3. Purchase How do we allow customers to purchase specific products and services? 4. Delivery How do we deliver a Value Proposition to customers? 5. After sales How do we provide post-purchase customer support? Revenue Streams For what value are our customers really willing to pay? For what do they currently pay? How are they currently paying? How would they prefer to pay? How much does each Revenue Stream contribute to overall revenues? types: fixed pricing dynamic pricing Asset sale List Price Negotiation( bargaining) Usage fee Product feature dependent Yield Management Subscription Fees Customer segment dependent Real-time-Market Lending/Renting/Leasing Volume dependent Licensing Brokerage fees Advertising This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. 25

26 How does startups use the Business Model Canvas? 1. Assemble a team with diverse perspectives 2. Print the canvas on a poster... 26

27 3. Brainstorm like crazy with post-its Get business model prototypes that can be tested At this point, entrepreneurs are doing the same thing with a business model, that you as a designer do with your product prototypes - testing various aspects of the model prototype and changing it continuously to make it better. 27

28 Value Propositions, Customer Segments As a designer you have probably been working mostly with - but not limited to - the two categories in the model named Value Propositions, and Customer Segments. If you look at the key sentences on the right, you might recognize a lot of questions you already use in your design process, right? You are used to working with curtain customer/user segments, understanding who the users are, which ones are important, what their values are, what they want, what they need, what problems they have... As an entrepreneur, you would fill inn this box with your hypotheses of what things would add value to your customer. Now, these would only be assumptions if not based on really good data. What the LEAN Startup movement preaches, is that you need to get out of the building and test your assumptions. You make guesses on the canvas, and go out and test to see if your guesses are right. If they are wrong, you cross them out or modify them to fit your new knowledge. Through validated learning, you adjust your business model and product development strategy. As UX practitioners, we are constantly making guesses, and testing them out using interviews, field studies, surveys, usability tests, and so on. We are also making ourselves an image of our users, or customers with tools like personas. We are used to talking to users, and integrating the feedback into our decisions and iterative process. Pro Tip #1: If your talking to business people, try using the words Value Propositions, Customer Segments, and Validated Learning instead of your own design-jargon. 28

29 Value Propositions What value do we deliver to the customer? Which one of our customer s problems are we helping to solve? What bundles of products and services are we offering to each Customer Segment? Which customer needs are we satisfying? characteristics Newness Performance Customization Getting the Job Done Design Brand/Status Price Cost Reduction Risk Reduction Accessibility Convenience/Usability On: Iteration: Day Month Year No. Customer Segments For whom are we creating value? Who are our most important customers? Mass Market Niche Market Segmented Diversified Multi-sided Platform 29

30 What about the rest of the model? The whole BMC consists of 9 categories, namely: Value Propositions Customer Relationships Customer Segments Key Activities Channels Key Resources Key Partnerships Revenue Streams Cost Structure The complete BM Canvas is a series of guesses When go through each box of the Business Model Canvas, and put in what you already know/assume, we are left with a great number of hypotheses, or guesses. What is important to know, is that a startup is in search-mode. It is searching for a version of the BMC that will produce a sustainable business. If we can make sure our guesses are either right, or wrong - we are one step closer to finding such a model. As a designer - you are also searching. You are searching for the right design! But how do you know what the right design is? Is it based purely on specifications, or do you look at a larger picture? Have you ever proposed a design, only to have it smacked down by executives, because it doesn t fit the strategy of the company? Maybe you haven t, or maybe you will... If you have a knowledge of how the executives make strategy decisions, you might make better designs that already take all these aspects into account. Pro Tip #2: Gain a rough understanding of the whole BMC. It will allow you to contribute with more quality arguments in a strategy meetings, and you will be able to focus on future designs that actually fit the company business model. Or even propose changes to the BMC based on your own research findings. 30

31 Now, we will focus even more on the Value Propositions, and Customer Segments. On the next pages, I will introduce a tool you might want to use in your design process... 31

32 The Value Proposition Canvas The VP Canvas (also developed by Osterwalder et al.) allows you to zoom into the details of your Value Proposition and the Customer Segments you target. You can use it as a poster to design better Value Propositions with sticky notes. However, to make sure your customers really want what you design, you ll need to test all the assumptions you make with the VP Canvas. This will help us more systematically work towards achieving what the startup movement calls a product-market fit or problem solution fit. In other words, building/offering stuff that customers really want. This is probably where UX designers are most useful, and a good reason for designers to be part of a founding team. Pro Tip #3: Even if you are not part of a startup, the VP Canvas can be a valuable tool in your own design process. It is a great framework for managing your ideas, your research, and your results! On the next pages, I will explain in more detail how to use this tool... so keep on readin. 32

33 Create one for each Customer Segment in your Business Model Value Proposition Rank all products and services according to their importance to your customer. Are they crucial or trivial to your customer? Products and services may either by tangible (e.g. manufactured goods, face-toface customer service), digital/virtual (e.g. downloads, online recommendations), intangible (e.g. copyrights, quality assurance), or financial (e.g. investment funds, financing services). (e.g. products and services that help customers dispose of a product, transfer it to others, or resell, ) Transferrer (e.g. products and services that help customers co-design solutions, otherwise contribute value to the solution, ) Co-creator (e.g. products and services that help customers compare offers, decide, buy, take delivery of a product or service, ) Buyer Which ancillary products and services help your customer perform the roles of: Which products and services do you offer that help your customer get either a functional, social, or emotional job done, or help him/her satisfy basic needs? List all the products and services your value proposition is built around. Products & Services Fulfill something customers are dreaming about? Produce outcomes your customer expects or that go beyond their expectations? Help your customers better sleep at night? (e.g. by helping with big issues, diminishing concerns, or eliminating worries, ) Limit or eradicate common mistakes customers make? (e.g. usage mistakes, ) Get rid of barriers that are keeping your customer from adopting solutions? (e.g. lower or no upfront investment costs, flatter learning curve, less resistance to change, ) Make your customers feel better? (e.g. kills frustrations, annoyances, things that give them a headache, ) Fix underperforming solutions? (e.g. new features, better performance, better quality, ) Put an end to difficulties and challenges your customers encounter? (e.g. make things easier, helping them get done, eliminate resistance, ) (e.g. loss of face, power, trust, or status, ) Customer Segment Describe negative emotions, undesired costs and situations, and risks that your customer experiences or could experience before, during, and after getting the job done. Use in Conjunction with the Business Model Canvas For each pain indicate how often it occurs. Risks your customer experiences or could experience before, during, and after getting the job done? Rank each pain your products and services kill according to their intensity for your customer. Is it very intense or very light? (e.g. financial, social, technical risks, or what could go awfully wrong, ) Wipe out negative social consequences your customers encounter or fear? Eliminate risks your customers fear? (e.g. in terms of time, money, or efforts, ) Describe how your products and services alleviate customer pains. How do they eliminate or reduce negative emotions, undesired costs and situations, and risks your customer experiences or could experience before, during, and after getting the job done? Pains Describe the benefits your customer expects, desires or would be surprised by. This includes functional utility, social gains, positive emotions, and cost savings. Describe how your products and services create customer gains. How do they create benefits your customer expects, desires or would be surprised by, including functional utility, social gains, positive emotions, and cost savings? Pain Relievers Gains Gain Creators Rank each gain your products and services create according to its relevance to your customer. Is it substantial or insignificant? For each gain indicate how often it occurs. (e.g. lower cost, less investments, lower risk, better quality, performance, design, ) Help make adoption easier? (e.g. better performance, lower cost, ) Produce positive outcomes matching your customers success and failure criteria? Produce savings? Do they (e.g. makes them look good, produces an increase in power, status, ) Create positive social consequences that your customer desires? (e.g. flatter learning curve, usability, accessibility, more services, lower cost of ownership, ) Make your customer s job or life easier? (e.g. regarding specific features, performance, quality, ) Copy or outperform current solutions that delight your customer? (e.g. help big achievements, produce big reliefs, ) (e.g. good design, guarantees, specific or more features, ) (e.g. better quality level, more of something, less of something, ) Do something customers are looking for? (e.g. in terms of time, money and effort, ) Designed for: Create savings that make your customer happy? Do they The Value Proposition Canvas 33 (e.g. upfront investment costs, learning curve, resistance to change, ) What barriers are keeping your customer from adopting solutions? (e.g. usage mistakes, ) What common mistakes does your customer make? (e.g. big issues, concerns, worries, ) What s keeping your customer awake at night? (e.g. financial, social, technical risks, or what could go awfully wrong, ) What risks does your customer fear? (e.g. loss of face, power, trust, or status, ) What negative social consequences does your customer encounter or fear? (e.g. understanding how things work, difficulties getting things done, resistance, ) What are the main difficulties and challenges your customer encounters? (e.g. lack of features, performance, malfunctioning, ) How are current solutions underperforming for your customer? (e.g. frustrations, annoyances, things that give them a headache, ) What makes your customer feel bad? (e.g. takes a lot of time, costs too much money, requires substantial efforts, ) What does your customer find too costly? (e.g. lower cost, less investments, lower risk, better quality, performance, design, ) What would increase the likelihood of adopting a solution? (e.g. performance, cost, ) How does your customer measure success and failure? (e.g. big achievements, big reliefs, ) What do customers dream about? (e.g. good design, guarantees, specific or more features, ) What are customers looking for? (e.g. makes them look good, increase in power, status, ) What positive social consequences does your customer desire? (e.g. flatter learning curve, more services, lower cost of ownership, ) What would make your customer s job or life easier? (e.g. specific features, performance, quality, ) How do current solutions delight your customer? (e.g. quality level, more of something, less of something, ) What outcomes does your customer expect and what would go beyond his/her expectations? (e.g. in terms of time, money and effort, ) Which savings would make your customer happy? Designed by: No. Month Year Rank each pain according to the intensity it represents for your customer. Is it very intense or is it very light.? For each pain indicate how often it occurs. Copyright of Business Model Foundry GmbH (e.g. while driving, outside, ) Outline in which specific context a job is done, because that may impose constraints or limitations. Rank each job according to its significance to your customer. Is it crucial or is it trivial? For each job indicate how often it occurs. of a product, transfer it to others, or resell, ) Transferrer (e.g. products and services that help customers dispose Co-creator (e.g. esthetics, feel good, security, ) Buyer (e.g. trying to look good, gain power or status, ) Besides trying to get a core job done, your customer performs ancillary jobs in different roles. Describe the jobs your customer is trying to get done as: (e.g. communication, sex, ) What basic needs are you helping your customer satisfy? (e.g. esthetics, feel good, security, ) What emotional jobs are you helping your customer get done? (e.g. trying to look good, gain power or status, ) What social jobs are you helping your customer get done? (e.g. perform or complete a specific task, solve a specific problem, ) What functional jobs are you helping your customer get done? Describe what a specific customer segment is trying to get done. It could be the tasks they are trying to perform and complete, the problems they are trying to solve, or the needs they are trying to satisfy. Customer Job(s) Rank each gain according to its relevance to your customer. Is it substantial or is it insignificant? For each gain indicate how often it occurs. Day Iteration: On:

34 Supercharge the Lean Startup Process The VP Designer Canvas can add two crucial things to the Lean Startup process. Firstly, the VP Canvas gives you a simple and practical way to rapidly sketch out WHAT you are building and how you believe this will create customer value/benefits, as well as WHY your are building it: which customer jobs, pains, and gains you intend to address. Doing this BEFORE building a product of any kind, will help you better track and manage the testing, measuring, and learning process. Secondly, the VP Canvas helps you distinguish between product/vps and customer assumptions. If you just build a prototype to measure and learn, you won t know if a negative outcome of your experiment is related to your prototype or to a lack of customer interest. In science such a significant bias would invalidate your results all together. Hence, you need to separate the testing of your product/vp assumptions (i.e. WHAT) and your customer assumptions (i.e. WHY) whenever possible. The latter is something you can observe and investigate even before designing a product prototype. 34

35 1. Filling out the VP Canvas Describe the JOBS your customer is trying to get done and outline their PAINS and GAINS. List the PRODUCTS and SERVICES you intend to offer and describe how you believe they will ALLEVIATE your customer s PAINS and CREATE GAINS. 2. Test your Customer Assumptions Get out of the building - talk to as many (potential) customers as possible to verify if they really are trying to get those JOBS done that you described in the VP Canvas. Find out if those JOBS are crucial to them or unimportant? Find out if the really have those PAINS you believed they have. Are those PAINS severe or minor? Verify if they really value the GAINS you believed they value. 3. Adjust your Customer Assumptions based on Insights Now that you better know who your customers are you should revisit the Customer Profile in your VP Canvas. Ideally you now understand the significance of your customers JOBS, the severity of their PAINS and the intensity of their desired GAINS. 35

36 4. Redesign your Value Proposition Based on Insights Adjust which pains and gains you want to focus on, based on your customer insights. Then redesign your Value Proposition accordingly. Don t forget that great Value Propositions rarely address all customer PAINS and GAINS. They address a few really well! 5. Start Testing your Value Proposition Now it s time to build your prototype and continuously test and adjust your Value Proposition based on what you learn. Repeating the BML loop The VP Canvas will serve as your map to permanently track assumptions and tests, while you re pivoting through the Lean Startup process. The moment this circle ends is when you ve achieved a fit between your Value Proposition and what your Customers expect. This is what the startup movement calls productmarket fit or problem-solution fit. It s when you build stuff that customers really want! 36

37 Remember this statement? A well-defined problem is the key to a successful design solution Now read this again The moment this circle ends is when you ve achieved a fit between your Value Proposition and what your Customers expect. This is what the startup movement calls product-market fit or problem-solution fit. It s when you build stuff that customers really want! 37

38 Practical example of using the VP Canvas I started using the VP Canvas myself in a project, so that I could write a decent review of it in this book. Of course you don t have to add post-its on the canvas paper itself - you modify the usage to fit your project and workflow. The most important thing is to keep the categories; Gains, Pains and Jobs. In my case, I was researching the viability of an idea I had for a mobile application for easier information access during a sports tournament. As I was very much on the inner circle of the sport myself, I knew a great deal about it from experience, and I had participated on such tournaments many times. As many designers do - we tend to want to fix our own problems/pains and assume that everyone else also has these problems. Although we learn to deal with this, the feeling is there. I had an assumption of who would be the customer and who would be the users. The VPC principles tell you to make a separate canvas for each customer segment. I started out with four parallel canvases, which I filled with some post-its for my initial assumptions. Now, instead of getting ahead of myself, as I often do - making wireframes, or sketching various design suggestions to prototype - I decided to stick with the VPC methodology. I needed to talk to these customers/users and get feedback on my assumptions. After a quick phone call, I knew I needed to set up a meeting with some people. The next day I met with a representative of the host committee for the sports tournament. I also met with a coach for one of the teams. After these meetings, I had not only confirmed some of my early assumptions, but I also gained triple as many new insights. This shouldn t be a surprise to you, as you have probably experienced this yourself when doing user studies or interviews. But now it was extremely easy to place these new insights onto a map. Also, I experienced that having wireframes or even paper prototypes in this early stage could be a hindrance to the discussion with the users. Keeping the focus on their own experiences, jobs, pains and gains without proposing an early solution made it easier to get feedback on my assumptions, and NOT on a specific solution or prototype. And it would be very easy for any other team-members to see my new insights on the canvas, and also see the big picture. Of course, this process is supposed to be iterated many times, and results must be prioritized and quantitatively tested. Once you have a canvas that is tested and verified - you can begin the Build-Measure-Learn process, and begin to make a product that solves the real problems. 38

39 Initial setup Keeping the VP Canvas model in the middle, I laid out separate Customer Segments on the right, and Value Propositions on the left. Each A4 paper on the right represents a Customer Segment. Blue post-its represent assumptions. After a single iteration Red post-its represent new insights that needs to be further explored and tested. Blue post-its that was confirmed was marked with a green check mark. Incorrect assumptions got a red X. 39

40 VP Canvas as a collective Scoreboard Here follows a few examples of how you can integrate the VP Canvas way of categorizing your data throughout your design research process. Remember these from the beginning of the book? To find valid personas - make a VP Canvas for each potential user/customer segment. When you have validated attributes, such as pains, gains and jobs - you have good data for your personas. 40

41 Use a VP Canvas framework to place new insights from various sources... After a task analysis, you may have hypothesis on potential user pains. Put them on the VP Canvas, and test them out! If they are valid, they stay there - if not, take them away! 41

42 That s it! That s all I have to tell you for now. You should have a basic understanding of the processes that are used by LEAN Startups, and you should recognize how similar the methods used are to the UX methods you know yourself. If you want to learn more about LEAN Startup and the Business Model Canvas, I would suggest the following sites: Thanks for reading! 42

43 Oh - and here s the dots I promised to connect... 43

44 What I will give you in this book, is tools for you to manage your gathering of problem definitions, user needs and ideas. You will be introduced to a common framework for business modeling, as well as the vocabulary so you can learn more about this yourself if you want to. And also, you will be better equipped to communicate the importance of UX Design to business people and other non-designers. Written by: Dag Jomar Mersland 2012