Hi there -
Here is this week’s “1 principle, 2 strategies, and 3 actionable tactics” for running lean…
1 Universal Principle
“Love the problem, not your solution.”
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In the image above, the line on the right appears longer than the one on the left, even though they are identical in length. You can verify this with a ruler. But, no matter how many times you do this, the illusion still works to trick your eye.
The same is true of cognitive biases.
No matter how many times you encounter a cognitive bias, the bias still works to muddy your thinking.
One of the top contributors to new product failure is the Innovator’s Bias. This is when we prematurely rush toward a specific solution shortly after getting hit with a new idea. But most first solutions seldom work and the high-order bit is prioritizing problems before solutions.
Love the problem, not your solution.
This is more easily said than done.
As with the illusion above, the trick isn’t trying to avoid being biased but instead building tripwires and antidotes to detect and defuse these biases.
In today’s issue, I’ll share some practical techniques for keeping your Innovator’s bias in check, starting with why and then how.
2 Underlying Strategies at Play
I. A problem well-defined is half solved.
Great thinkers, from Charles Kettering to Albert Einstein, have emphasized the importance of prioritizing a deep understanding of problems before formulating solutions.
Most people jump to a solution immediately after encountering a problem, but you must learn to build in pauses to go beyond surface problems to root causes.
II. Problems, not solutions, earn attention and trust.
If you can describe a problem more clearly than your customers, you cause a transference of expertise. They start seeing you as an expert and think you must also have a solution.
This same phenomenon is at work at the doctor’s office. Within minutes of a good diagnosis, if a doctor can start describing your symptoms accurately, you believe they know what’s wrong with you and happily follow their prescription.
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These are two reasons you should prioritize a deeper understanding of problems before solutions. But these reasons alone won’t prevent you from falling prey to the Innovator’s Bias.
What follows are some initial steps to catch yourself early.
3 Actionable Tactics
I. Sketch a Lean(er) Canvas.
Whenever I am considering a new feature or product idea, I reach for a Lean(er) Canvas:
Notice that there is no solution box on this canvas. The Lean(er) Canvas forces you to make a case for a new solution by first getting clear on:
- Who’s it for? (Customer segment)
- What’s changed? (Early adopters)
- What’s currently used? (Existing alternatives)
- What’s broken with the existing alternatives? (Problems)
II. Pitch the problem, not your solution.
Next, I use my Lean(er) Canvas to craft an elevator pitch and test it on people other than myself. Like a good movie trailer, a good elevator pitch is audience-agnostic and should trigger interest.
See my Why Now Elevator Pitch template here.
If my elevator pitch fails to trigger interest, that’s usually a sign that my customer/problem story isn’t visceral enough and needs work.
The best (and fastest) way to uncover deeper problem insights is through carefully unscripted customer interviews.
III. Sell before you build.
Getting paid with interest is the first step, but you can’t build a viable business on interest alone. Once you have an elevator pitch that earns attention, target it at early adopters and follow through with an offer (demo + call-to-action).
You will inevitably hit additional objections and roadblocks.
- Asking “why” is how you move from surface-level problems to root causes, and
- Asking “how” is how you move from basic features to delighters.
If you get this far, you go from hoping people will buy and use your feature or product to knowing they will.
The Innovator’s Bias continues to rear its ugly head throughout the product lifecycle. The key to continuously defusing it is to build additional stress tests and systems across your team to counterbalance it. If you want to dive deeper, check out my Continuous Innovation playbooks, where I cover additional frameworks for quickly vetting good ideas from bad.
That's all for today. See you next week.
Ash
Author of Running Lean and creator of Lean Canvas
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P.S. Problems, not solutions, create space for innovation.