03.11.2016
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upstatebusinessjournal.com
MOVERS, SHAKERS AND DISRUP TORS SHAPING OUR FUTURE
| INNOVATE | 13
Let your customers in Share your design with the marketplace before you invest heavily in developing it By JOHN MOORE CEO, NEXT
The thought of creating something new and sharing it with others before it’s finished is a very uncomfortable thought to most folks. To show a new creation like a piece of art, a concept for a new neighborhood program or a new product for the marketplace while it is still being developed seems premature and a recipe for disaster. We would rather continue working on it until we have it just right before we dare share it with the outside world. To do otherwise would seem irrational and impatient. Yet as it pertains to the world of entrepreneurship, this closed, internal approach to innovation actually creates additional risk of failure, not less. This “work until it’s just right” approach chews up valuable time and resources to fully refine the product and its features, only to still risk that design not actually meeting customer needs in the end. In his book “The Lean Startup,” Eric Ries emphasizes the principle of development cycles that engage actual customers for input even from the earliest stages of design. He teaches that these iterative cycles of creation solicit customer feedback on product design, leading to what he calls “validated learning” that can guide new product launches toward greater market alignment. To launch such an effort, the lean startup approach says that innovators should not invest heavily in developing and refining a final product before sharing its design with the marketplace. Instead, Ries suggests creating a “minimum viable product” or “MVP” that provides just enough information and/or experience to potential customers to elicit feedback. An MVP is literally the minimum depiction of the product, whether a prototype, photo or even just a sketch, that can elicit feedback on the pros and cons of the design from actual potential users. By going the MVP route and sharing new product designs and features at their nascent stage, entrepreneurs can save valuable time and money that otherwise would have been used developing the product more fully. It also helps ensure those precious resources aren’t wasted building a product that customers won’t buy. At NEXT, we have used the Lean Startup approach through the years. Our whole approach to building the entrepreneur ecosystem and supporting our local
DEFINED Minimum viable product (MVP): “That version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.” Source: Eric Ries, “The Lean Startup”
ventures has been built around customer-designed products. In fact, all of the various programs and ecosystem projects created by NEXT were proposed through some form of MVP and refined numerous times with customer input. Though it’s a little unsettling to openly share ideas at such an early stage, especially with customers, it is the best way for de-risking innovation and speeding the time to a successful market launch of new ideas. With NEXT, our facilities are the best example of following this approach and reaping its rewards. Almost every month, we host visitors to the NEXT Innovation Center, NEXT on Main and our newly opened NEXT Manufacturing locations. These visitors come to learn about these collaborative spaces and why they are consistently at or near capacity. The secret is really not hard to understand. We talked to the customers before, during and after creating the spaces to ensure their needs are met. Out of necessity, NEXT interfaces with its customers on literally a daily basis, and we are constantly asking them about their needs, which we then work to fulfill. Our facilities are an answer to our customers’ need for collaborative space, and each was screened, designed and developed in close partnership with the entrepreneur over the course of many months of design and redesign meetings. Most communities try and attract new entrepreneurs by employing a “build it and they will come” model with cool new subsidized space, only to find that their facility does not actually meet entrepreneurial needs. Every NEXT facility was scrutinized and redesigned numerous times with the target customers before the plans were ever finalized by
Some of the risks associated with innovation can be greatly reduced by following the simple yet hard-to-follow principle of sharing product ideas with customers and seeking their input early on. the NEXT organization or our real estate development partners. One interesting fact highlighting the weight placed on customer input with our facilities is that the site for our first facility, the award-winning NEXT Innovation Center, was not first identified by NEXT staff nor by our development partner, Hughes Development. Instead, it was first proposed by Peter Barth, CEO of The Iron Yard, after touring other potential sites with NEXT and Hughes Development on their way back to the Greenville Chamber. That’s a great example where a highly regarded commercial developer, Bob Hughes, was willing to listen to the customer and eventually develop that idea to a very successful conclusion. To compete in any field today, even in economic development, one must innovate constantly. Yet innovation brings with it inherent risks of failure. Fortunately some of the risks associated with innovation can be greatly reduced by following the simple yet hardto-follow principle of sharing product ideas with customers and seeking their input early on. The process of quickly building a product MVP, engaging potential customers in the marketplace for feedback, and then redesigning the product is one that can truly transform a product, a company, or even a community.