Cut to the Core
“I am a perfectionist; I look at things from each and every angel
possible”. If I had a million dollars for each time I hear this statement I
would have been a billionaire.
The idea that we need a
thought to be perfect in order to express it , or wait for a business model to
be perfect in order to implement it, or wait for a musical riffs to be perfect
in order to put it down into an album. That is, sometimes, a destructive idea.
Because waiting for the perfect time, perfect place, and perfect
people to achieve a perfect goal never happens; it’s too perfect to be true.
It is never a perfect time to start a technological revolution; it
is never a perfect situation to start your business. In truth, most of the time
it is not even a good idea and you will face huge obstacles on your path and
those who are strong enough, creative enough and consistent enough are the ones
who cut through.
Here are a few examples for people who didn’t wait for the perfect
moment:
•
The co-founder of John Paul Mitchell Systems and Patron Spirits
was actually homeless twice in his life. The first time, DeJoria was 22
with a 2-year-old. The second time, he slept in his car for two weeks while
starting the now $900 million-a-year haircare business. Today,
•
The investor, founder of Micro-Solutions and Broadcast.com and
owner of the Dallas Mavericks is now worth $2.3 billion, but Cuban wasn't always wealthy. In his book How
to Win In the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It, Cuban
candidly reflects on all he had to do to make his billions. Before he started
Micro-solutions, Cuban was fired from a PC company for not telling anyone he
was going to lunch to try to close a deal. At the time, he was living with five
other guys in a three-bedroom apartment and didn't even have a bed.
•
Before Walt Disney died in 1966, his studio had released 81 films
resulted in winning 32 Academy Awards. Today, Walt Disney's company has a
market cap of nearly $104 billion and 166,000 employees. But before all of this
commercial success, Disney was struggling to survive. He was fired from
the Kansas City Star in his early 20s
because "he lacked imagination and had no good ideas".
It was never perfect for
Lincoln, Tesla, Jobs or Honda for that matter (who would sell Japanese motors
to American markets after World War 2?). However, these examples and many
others ask one question in the mind of creative individuals; if we don’t wait
for perfection in our action, our thoughts our plans what should we do?
The answer to the ultimate perfection question can be found in
Silicon Valley. They have cracked the code for answering this question. The
answer is a model they developed which is called MVP.
In product development, the minimum viable product (MVP) is
the product with the highest return on investment versus risk. The term was
coined and defined by Frank Robinson, and popularized by Steve Blank, and http://bit.ly/1JnzRVi
. It may also involve carrying out
market analysis beforehand.
A minimum viable product has just those core
features that allow the product to be deployed, and no more. The product is
typically deployed to a subset of possible
Customers,
such as early adopters that are thought to be more
forgiving, more likely to give feedback, and able to grasp a product vision
from an early prototype or marketing information.
It is a strategy targeted at avoiding building
products that customers do not want, that seeks to maximize the information
learned about the customer per dollar spent.
"The
minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to
collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least
effort."
The definition's
use of the words maximum and minimum means that it is decidedly not formulaic.
It requires judgment to figure out, for any given context, what MVP makes
sense.
An MVP is
not a minimal product; it is a strategy and process directed towards making a product
and selling it to customers.
It is an iterative process of generating an
idea, prototyping, presentation, data collection, analysis and learning. One
seeks to minimize the total time spent on iteration. The process is iterated
until a desirable product/market fit is obtained, or until the product is deemed to be non-viable.
Purposes
•
Be able to test a product hypothesis with minimal resources
•
Accelerate learning
•
Reduce wasted engineering hours
•
Get the product to early customers as soon as possible
•
Base for other products
Guy Kawasaki the Silicon-Valley based author, speaker and
entrepreneur had some improvement of his own to the model. He said to the
startup grind interview that his view of the concepts adds two V’s to the mix.
MVVVP:
A- Minimal.
B- Viable: it is foreseeable that you will gain a profit that your
revenue will exceed your coast
C-Valuable: that your changing the world, that you’re doing
something significant.
D-Validation: it validates your vision in the future.
E- Product.
The concept of MVP or MVVVP is vital in boosting creativity
especially to the “cut to the core” technique.
Cutting to the core technique is the act of revealing the core
concept of a product or a service to enhance, modify or radically change the
fundamental concept. A very clear example of cutting to the core technique is
the green products and services.
Starting from the packaging
industry where the green cut to the core of grocery packaging and pushed for
using paper instead of plastic.
Another great example for cutting to the core is the
transformation of the automobile industry, Tesla motors provides a perfect
illustration to the concept this is how they define the models on their
website:
Tesla Motors
was founded in 2003 by a group of engineers in Silicon Valley who wanted to
prove that electric cars could be better than gasoline-powered cars.
With instant torque, incredible power, and
zero emissions, Tesla’s products would be cars without compromise. Each new
generation would be increasingly affordable, helping the company work towards
its mission: to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable transport.
Tesla’s
engineers first designed a powertrain for a sports car built around an AC induction
motor, patented in 1888 by Nikola Tesla, the inventor who inspired the
company’s name.
The
resulting Tesla Roadster was launched in 2008. Accelerating from 0 to 60 mph in
3.7 seconds and achieving a range of 245 miles per charge of its lithium ion battery,
the Roadster set a new standard for electric mobility.
Tesla
would sell more than 2,400 Roadsters, now on the road in more than 30
countries.
Notice
that in the first line they cut to the core of the industry and provide their
own model to revolutionize the industry, and who would cut to the core other
than a group of engineers in Silicon Valley.
Feel free to follow me on twitter : @Fouad_khafaga
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