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on July 31, 2016
The concept of Lean is centered on value adding activities and reducing everything else. The Toyota Production System (TPS) implemented in the 1990s focused on eliminating waste at the manufacturing plant in Japan. Their efficient manufacturing system subsequently became known as the first lean process. So lean methodologies have existed for some time, but Eric Ries succeeds in putting an entirely new spin on the concept by applying it to innovation. As someone who majored in Industrial & Systems Engineering in college, the themes in the book struck right at home for me.
The Lean Startup model focuses on creating a minimum viable product for the market and receiving customer feedback along the way to improve the product. Oftentimes a rough draft of a working product is enough to gain valuable feedback and ideas that would never have been thought of if the project had been refined to death by its developers. What if your team toiled away for years creating advanced software and the finished product doesn’t have the features the customer really wanted? Avoid this mistake. The Lean Startup methodology is a way to ensure the final product is as optimized as possible.
Eric also introduces pivots as a means to take a new approach, if necessary, instead of starting over from scratch. This is in contrast to the old way of doing business where a product is launched only when it is fully functional and high quality in the creator’s eyes. Oftentimes, perfectionism can be costly both in time and in money. Eric does a wonderful job outlining how a product (online or physical) can be built and refined from a customer feedback loop.
Not only does The Lean Startup serve as a methodical roadmap for creating your business efficiently and effectively, but also the book delves into startup metrics that will give a new meaning to how you measure your progress. Ries calls this “innovation accounting”. Innovation accounting is a way of looking past the headline numbers such as revenue growth and instead tracking changes in customer adoption, retention and usage patterns.
A successful startup does not just flourish because of a brilliant idea. Success in a condition of uncertainty (in this case innovation) requires managing people through all the challenges of innovation and growth. It means understanding your customer and keying in on statistics that tell the true story of progress. Whether you are a product developer for a company or an executive at a high-tech startup or even a fresh-faced college graduate, this book benefits positions from all perspectives in every industry.
Read more here: [...]
The Lean Startup model focuses on creating a minimum viable product for the market and receiving customer feedback along the way to improve the product. Oftentimes a rough draft of a working product is enough to gain valuable feedback and ideas that would never have been thought of if the project had been refined to death by its developers. What if your team toiled away for years creating advanced software and the finished product doesn’t have the features the customer really wanted? Avoid this mistake. The Lean Startup methodology is a way to ensure the final product is as optimized as possible.
Eric also introduces pivots as a means to take a new approach, if necessary, instead of starting over from scratch. This is in contrast to the old way of doing business where a product is launched only when it is fully functional and high quality in the creator’s eyes. Oftentimes, perfectionism can be costly both in time and in money. Eric does a wonderful job outlining how a product (online or physical) can be built and refined from a customer feedback loop.
Not only does The Lean Startup serve as a methodical roadmap for creating your business efficiently and effectively, but also the book delves into startup metrics that will give a new meaning to how you measure your progress. Ries calls this “innovation accounting”. Innovation accounting is a way of looking past the headline numbers such as revenue growth and instead tracking changes in customer adoption, retention and usage patterns.
A successful startup does not just flourish because of a brilliant idea. Success in a condition of uncertainty (in this case innovation) requires managing people through all the challenges of innovation and growth. It means understanding your customer and keying in on statistics that tell the true story of progress. Whether you are a product developer for a company or an executive at a high-tech startup or even a fresh-faced college graduate, this book benefits positions from all perspectives in every industry.
Read more here: [...]
on June 27, 2016
I bought into the hype of this so called "bible" of entrepreneurship after being force fed with it in innovation and entrepreneurship classes at university. It is ranked as the quintessential entrepreneurship book/movement of our time, but let me warn you, it's not. Don't fall into this half baked, candy coated approach to 'successful' business creation.
This book could've easily been a 2 page essay but instead it is a 300 page college-esque (and very boring) essay. It also feels like an ad for Eric Ries' unheard-of internet businesses. There is nothing Lean about the Lean Startup, it should be called the Learn Startup instead. The Lean Startup approach to business creation kills disruption and true innovation, it is a guide for building a catered (incrementally improved at best) business. If Henry Ford followed this we would indeed have faster horses. Read Thiel's From Zero to One instead. This is garbage.
This book could've easily been a 2 page essay but instead it is a 300 page college-esque (and very boring) essay. It also feels like an ad for Eric Ries' unheard-of internet businesses. There is nothing Lean about the Lean Startup, it should be called the Learn Startup instead. The Lean Startup approach to business creation kills disruption and true innovation, it is a guide for building a catered (incrementally improved at best) business. If Henry Ford followed this we would indeed have faster horses. Read Thiel's From Zero to One instead. This is garbage.
on January 15, 2014
No need to waste your time on 350 pages while the author has one point repeated over and over: test your assumptions with a minimum viable product as early as possible instead of waiting to develop the "perfect" product that you have in your mind.
on December 8, 2016
If you have a sound business strategy and need to figure out how to carry it out, this book is for you. The book focuses more on implementation (how to make decisions to waste the least time/money) than business strategy (how your business plans to make money). The Lean Startup provides simple methods to measure the efficacy your actions, and gives common sense advice for how to structure your time to make the best business decision. It is slightly redundant, but each of the supporting example sheds different perspectives on the overarching theme of the build-measure-learn loop. I am an engineer myself, and it gave me some sound business pointers going forward with a small business. It is overall very well written, and gives clear lean guidelines to follow. I will definitely read it again in the future.
on June 15, 2015
As an aspiring entrepreneur I found this book very helpful and informative. It Gives entrepreneurs the tools they need to turn ideas into products and avoid common mistakes. It is clear that the author has years of experience creating startups and he provides the reader with the mindset that entrepreneurs and innovators should have. Eric Ries takes the uncertainty associated with creating a startup and turns it into a science.
I initially feared that this book would read like a business textbook but I was quickly proven wrong. The book is very well written and easy to read. Eric Ries explains everything in plain english so that it is clear and intuitive. Ries does a good job of using real world examples and anecdotes to explain his concepts. Ries has experience consulting for companies like Intuit and IGN and includes lots of valuable insider information that can't be found in most business textbooks. He also includes alot of real start up success stories as well as many failures and discusses what must be learned from each.
Before reading this book, I was discouraged from going forth with my Ideas because I feared my lack of business experience would hold me back. Now I feel like I have the tools to execute my ideas. If I had not read this book, I could easily see myself making some of the common mistakes that lead to startup failures. Instead of creating a minimum viable product to quickly get feedback like Ries recommends, I would spend months or even years developing what I considered to be the perfect prototype, only to find out nobody wanted to use it. All his ideas make perfect sense. Don't make assumptions about what people want, rather find out what your customers want before hand. Everything is about feedback, collecting it then applying it to your product. Don't waste anytime developing something unless you know it creates value.
Anyone who is considering creating a startup or new product should read this book. The best thing about this book is that you don't need business experience to understand the core concepts.The principles he talks about can be applied to all types of types of business but are particularly helpful for software and tech products.He answers alot of the questions I had and even question I did not think of but should have been asking.It is only a matter of time before the lean startup method is universally adopted.
I initially feared that this book would read like a business textbook but I was quickly proven wrong. The book is very well written and easy to read. Eric Ries explains everything in plain english so that it is clear and intuitive. Ries does a good job of using real world examples and anecdotes to explain his concepts. Ries has experience consulting for companies like Intuit and IGN and includes lots of valuable insider information that can't be found in most business textbooks. He also includes alot of real start up success stories as well as many failures and discusses what must be learned from each.
Before reading this book, I was discouraged from going forth with my Ideas because I feared my lack of business experience would hold me back. Now I feel like I have the tools to execute my ideas. If I had not read this book, I could easily see myself making some of the common mistakes that lead to startup failures. Instead of creating a minimum viable product to quickly get feedback like Ries recommends, I would spend months or even years developing what I considered to be the perfect prototype, only to find out nobody wanted to use it. All his ideas make perfect sense. Don't make assumptions about what people want, rather find out what your customers want before hand. Everything is about feedback, collecting it then applying it to your product. Don't waste anytime developing something unless you know it creates value.
Anyone who is considering creating a startup or new product should read this book. The best thing about this book is that you don't need business experience to understand the core concepts.The principles he talks about can be applied to all types of types of business but are particularly helpful for software and tech products.He answers alot of the questions I had and even question I did not think of but should have been asking.It is only a matter of time before the lean startup method is universally adopted.
on January 2, 2017
Half shilling for the second-rate and never-ran startups the author work for and consulted for, and half lean development and manufacturing buzzwords, all padding out one borrowed good idea. For entertainment, and to see how well these ideas have worked out, look up the specific ventures discussed in the case studies of the book and see what happened to them.
The useful parts of this book could have been laid out in a few pages. Spoiler: frequent re-evaluation can save you from wasted effort.
The useful parts of this book could have been laid out in a few pages. Spoiler: frequent re-evaluation can save you from wasted effort.
on September 6, 2016
Eric Ries’ book, Lean Startup, is a hidden gem to anyone considering the path of entrepreneurship. Eric Ries, who started his career as a software developer, begins Lean Startup with his early experiences as an entrepreneur. After the burst of the Tech Bubble in the early 2000s, Eric Ries was still able to grow his software company to millions of dollars in revenue. The core principal Ries expresses throughout Lean Startup and with his own success is to fail forward by rapidly building MVPs (minimal viable products.)
By continuously experimenting and tweaking products that the customer wants, Ries projects that more companies would be successful or at least know if their business can be successful. Throughout the book, Ries gives examples of success stories and not so successful stories, all to express how this mindset should be utilized not only amongst startups, but with Fortune 500 companies and governments as well.
I highly recommend Lean Startup if you are starting your own startup or if are looking for a way to update your current working environment.
By continuously experimenting and tweaking products that the customer wants, Ries projects that more companies would be successful or at least know if their business can be successful. Throughout the book, Ries gives examples of success stories and not so successful stories, all to express how this mindset should be utilized not only amongst startups, but with Fortune 500 companies and governments as well.
I highly recommend Lean Startup if you are starting your own startup or if are looking for a way to update your current working environment.
on May 27, 2013
A number of websites recommended The Lean Startup and I finally decided to follow their recommendations and read it. I'm glad I did.
Eric Ries provides a map on starting a business with concrete steps and strategies for executing a plan. He gives guidance on how and when to persevere with the initial plan or to "pivot" into another approach based on the results, or lack of results, arising from an entrepreneur's initial plan. Entrepreneurs need to learn what their market wants and to provide this and not some product or service that the entrepreneur thinks that the market should want or need. To do this requires building and testing a minimum viable product to determine the markets reaction. He advocates attention to innovation accounting to measure progress in the market's acceptance of your product or service and to avoid vanity metrics. Of all the concepts in the book the idea of what it will take to build a minimum viable product is the one necessity for which I didn't see any clear-cut guidance. I do not say this as a criticism of the book because the entrepreneur must use vision and judgment to decide what a minimum viable product or service must be. It is this product or service that starts the process of learning what the market wants that is critical to success. Simply building a product or providing a service because the entrepreneur thinks that the market wants it leads to failure. Ries gives an approach based on testing and learning what the market wants while conserving money and resources that gives an entrepreneur a better chance at success.
This is a book written by someone who has experienced success and failure. He understands what it takes to succeed. I strongly recommend the book.
Eric Ries provides a map on starting a business with concrete steps and strategies for executing a plan. He gives guidance on how and when to persevere with the initial plan or to "pivot" into another approach based on the results, or lack of results, arising from an entrepreneur's initial plan. Entrepreneurs need to learn what their market wants and to provide this and not some product or service that the entrepreneur thinks that the market should want or need. To do this requires building and testing a minimum viable product to determine the markets reaction. He advocates attention to innovation accounting to measure progress in the market's acceptance of your product or service and to avoid vanity metrics. Of all the concepts in the book the idea of what it will take to build a minimum viable product is the one necessity for which I didn't see any clear-cut guidance. I do not say this as a criticism of the book because the entrepreneur must use vision and judgment to decide what a minimum viable product or service must be. It is this product or service that starts the process of learning what the market wants that is critical to success. Simply building a product or providing a service because the entrepreneur thinks that the market wants it leads to failure. Ries gives an approach based on testing and learning what the market wants while conserving money and resources that gives an entrepreneur a better chance at success.
This is a book written by someone who has experienced success and failure. He understands what it takes to succeed. I strongly recommend the book.
on September 14, 2015
Believe the Hype, because this time it's not from the author or the publisher, but from those who read this and found themselves yelling "Yes" at the book at various stages... It's true, that there's a lot in here that there is not new, but the author doesn't pretend to be the Fount-of-All-Knowledge (which, in itself is new, not to mention refreshing). The merit is in taking something that has plainly transformed one industry, and then applying it to an *entirely* different industry. Moreover, because of the way it's presented - clearly, accessibly, with personal insight and experience - to *any* industry, as one can see in the experience of those who have taken the principles forward and applied them in the public and private sector, in industries from healthcare to banking and even to the manufacturing industry in which many of the principles had their genesis. Yes, some of the chapters are a little engineer-math geeky on measurement techniques, but for those who don't want to go there (i.e. my people, for better or worse) there is plenty before and after to more than justify the rest of the purchase price.
