Explore

Clips from notes

I’m useful and usable. Which means I start but understanding the specific not giving into a set process

I’m not scalable and that’s fine it’s me. Didn’t like cookie cutter as a customer.

If the goal is to get to a great launched product

And the problem is that there’s a problem

I can help

My problem is that I don’t know how my potential customers TALK about the problems

I don’t know how to fill in the blank: I need to go find a consultant who can help with x

The problem is different than the solution.

In broad terms, my solution always combines untangling, aligning, focusing, and translating. Because that’s where these problems come from.

Senior teams are always at least a little tangled. A bunch of strong brains, and or strong voices ( both don’t always depend on the other), and performance expeditions from their bosses, and career aspirations always make conversations, processes, decsisoon making less-than-100%-logical and rational.

You can spend all the time you want on problems that arise from this but if you don’t deal with this you’re leaving the root of every problem. And they will grown back. And there are easy questions to ask yourself to determine if this is an issue—but I bet you don’t have to.

Aligning —the game of telephone. And there are easy tests for this

Focusing. You can be aligned around anything from big to small. But there’s always a step where you have to get from general alignment to very specific (and of course aligned) focus. That’s “exactly what do we want to build or innovate on or explore right now? How will we know if wr succeeded?”

And translation. There’s something between senior teams and launch—and that’s everybody else. I’m specifically good at COLLABORTAIVELY translating everything into a map of the experience you want to create and support for customers. Once you can see the experience, everything gets easy for design code etc.

Your execs want innovation. Why? Because of completion of other souufces do disappojent about your products or service. But so many of you have very talented teams. They COULD totally be more innovative, or creat better experiences. In fact they all want to. So do you really need an innovation workshop? A design sprint? Maybe. But does the output have any chance of actually be solid something launchable? Not unless you clear the roadblocks and potholes. Less fun, more complicated, but always doable.

One thing at a time. There are always layers of problems.

Btw, most clients say “we can skip the x part because that’s not an issue for us.” I give them a test to self administer. I also say that I Simple’s can’t do MY work without this process. And then I say luckily since you’re so innit it won’t take long with YOU

Whi am I for? Senior product leadership teams. In small companies and startups these are founders or c-levels. In bigger companies they aren’t. But no matter who I’m working with (unless it’s the founders) there’s some element of manhunt up

Self assessment

One of our founders is driving everyone craz

our team need a therapist

and important person is going to leave

we are thinking of hiring a senior product person

i can sell grapes to nannies is different from i can sell fruit to caregivers

I’d be more than happy to sacrifice economics to go back to experience.

On the Acquired podcast

the first pivot

Ai is using data so it’s looking in the past. Underpants.

Data doesn’t work when you feel strongly about something

Let me explain user experience to you and use your screen practitioners. First of all, we are always right. It is always the case that the earlier you get real insights about what real people are trying to do before you try to design solutions for those people the better. We also get really defensive about those insights. And like any other industry or field we have created lots and lots of ways to do these kinds of things Often we get upset because we are not allowed to do all of the great things that we know how to do like use the research and collection and analysis and etc. etc. and we can’t do it later like user testing ability testing because there is a time there isn’t time and money. And we whine about that and rightfully so. The thing we don’t understand as a group is how Business actually works and how politics and business actually work and many different pressures that have nothing to do with doing things for the right way. What we also don’t understand as a group is that aligning around something is better than aligning around nothing so there is a way to be more customer center even without more data about customers and the way to do that is to at least all agree on which customers we’re going after what their problems are how we intend to solve them, and what we intend to give them that know, but they might not even be thinkingto ask for. We have to have usability practitioners have to start to be able to speak the language of business but it’s helpful for you business people to understand a little bit more about the quote right and wrong quote to do user design, which is the right way to be, but not always the practical.

Plan to launch Send copies to all of the CEOs that I’ve worked with, and considered an acknowledgment in the book and thank you for taking a chance on the person who did it weird in the beginning

do things taht don’t scalen

https://www.paulgraham.com/ds.html⁠

⁠

bonasia business

what's the problem and how will you know you solved it

[ ] business results--clear path forawrd confidence in decisions create ar eco on how your team can resolve this cuusiness issueu based on consumer insights. resolve the issuesthat are getting in the way o fyoudesigning and launching sucessful products. then a process. table three cols. deliverable or outcome, action, last colmn deadline/ milestone. becasue tehy pay for outcomes not actions

[ ] competitors are v1. first movers never win (but we act like they do!)

[ ] what’s a roadmap? Do you even know? does it make you want to throw up?

[ ] ceo is the loneliest job. this doesn’t really sink in until you’re pretty far into fundraising.

[ ] when most have the aha moment: Product isn’t converting and we need to get traction

[ ] why i look for predisastered founders

[ ] the one thing that never changes: the humans

[ ] never hire a ft product person when you think you have to hire a ft prodcut person.

[ ] racehorses. You open the paddock door and off they go. racetracks (constraints) are where racehorses are at their most racehorsey. constraints don’t constrain racehorses.

[ ] wildflowers if you want to attract a lot of people

[ ] what doe we offer that no one else can and why should our cusotmers care?

[ ] Means you have to know what you can build, what other people already built, who your customers are, and what they care about in their own terms.

[ ] magic document—list of ‘i want i need’ statements

[ ]

How i help early stage startups

Get you from 0-1

Translate the pressure you are getting from investors into a plan for aproduct to meet and beat their expectations

Deal with the ‘catch 22 of hte mvp’--it’s supposed to be built to be tossed, but it never is

Handle your first giant pivot–from the enormous picture in your deck to something you can launch that people will actually want to, and be able to, use

Start to learn how to do product strategy, roadmapping, user journeys, prioritization, user testing, and other user-centered design methods

Figure out who you really need to hire and describe those roles to get the best matches

Figure out who you DON”T need ot hire right away

Clips

Lonnie in to do product market for. Innovation is great but have you cleared the roads? If internal crap is getting in the way then innovative ideas may happen, but they won’t make it to launch.

7 powers and 1 he in acquired

38 minutes into the urx screenshot for the slack on alignment

thetrap of wireframes—it’s all in teh details and the cases

yes / no flowcharts

if you find yourself talking about more than two cases in a screen you have to break it out

OPUX other people’s ux

Controller in dwolla—in control vs financila controllers

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