Why the Collaborative Age is about Lean – Accelerating our Learning

Have you read the ‘The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses‘ by Eric Ries? I must say I was a bit reluctant at first because it seemed to be a very trendy flashy concept – of the kind that are trendy for a season and then disappear in the forgotten-great-concepts-that-were-supposed-to-change-the-world.

Pushed by my curiosity I still read it and I must say that I dived into it. Because what Eric Ries is describing there in the realm of startups can probably be applicable to all types of endeavors in the Collaborative Age. An Age where failure does not cost a lot, and where on can try multiple ideas without committing too much funds or time. An Age where learning from actual feedback can be dramatically accelerated.

The Lean Startup proposes a structured framework to accelerate Learning. It proposes to propose to the world a ‘Minimum Viable Product’ as soon as possible, listen to the feedback, and accelerate the learning curve. Most people and companies do the mistake of taking long time to develop the ‘perfect product’ – that nobody really wants, because we never asked the potential user!

You might also have heard about ‘pivoting’ in the context of startups: it is about deciding to change completely the plans and the business model to respond to the actual feedback. And most successful startups need to pivot once or twice. Hopefully they can do it before they reach the end of the cash runway! Lean enables companies to learn quicker what works and what does not work.

Read the book or watch this video. It’s worth it!

Get Lean, and accelerate your learning. Stop perfecting your product, throw your ’Minimum Viable Product’ to the world!