My take on Eric Ries' book The Lean Startup, as presented to my colleagues at XING Barcelona. DISCLAIMER: This is a sketched presentation. Can be disappointing.

1. The Lean Startup

2. Lean:
● production practice
● that considers the expenditure of resources
for any goal other than the creation of value
for the end customer to be wasteful,
● and thus a target for elimination.
Startup:
● A human institution
● designed to deliver a new product/service
● under conditions of uncertainty.
Entrepreneurship == Management

3. 1. Generate an hypothesis
○ Value hypothesis (“customers come back?”)
○ Growth hypothesis (“customers recommend us?”)
2. Build it
○ Minimum Viable Product
○ Small batches
3. Prove it
○ Metrics
○ Feedback
The scientific method approach to
management

4. Outcome: “validated learning”
“It is not so important to be productive, to do things on time
or budget. The goal is to figure out the right thing to build as
quickly as possible”
Employee productivity != Project productivity
Corollary:
Profit != Value
Growth != Value
(look for value, profit and growth will come)

9. Ideas
Think big, start small.*
Get out of the building (genchi gembutsu)
Remove any feature, process, or effort that
does not contribute directly to the learning you
are seeking.
*applies to build, measure and learn

11. Build
Examples
● The Concierge MVP (Food on the Table)
● The Video MVP (Dropbox)
Words of caution:
● MVP != prototype (business model vs UX)
● If we don’t know who the customer is, we
don’t know what quality is.
Start with early adopters (they are forgiving)
and localized (no fireworks yet). Give them the
best you’ve got.

13. Measure
Examples:
● Wizard of Oz Testing
● The Smoke Test
The AAA’s of Metrics:
● Actionable
● Accessible
● Auditable
Vanity Metrics vs. Actionable Metrics

15. Learn
Example:
● The 5 whys
○ Ask 5 times why to a problem
○ Solve each proportionally (proportional investment)
○ Work with small batches (adaptative organisation)
VISION — STRATEGY — PRODUCT
(untouched) (pivots) (optimizes)
Rigorously measure the actual numbers. Devise
experiments to learn how to move the numbers to the
desired business plan.

17. Thank you
“A solid process lays the foundation for a
healthy culture, one where ideas are evaluated
by merit and not by job title.”