UVA- Jefferson Entrepreneurs Program

Customer Discovery Hacks!
Jefferson Entrepreneurship at UVA

info@alexandercowan.com 
alexandercowan.com"
@cowanSF

Copyright 2012 Cowan Publishing

Design Thinking!
Lean Startup!
Customer Dev.!
Agile

}

BIG VOID

{

Actual Practice


DESIRE

KNOWLEDGE

to learn
more about
launching
new ideas

of software
development
not assumed

ACTION

to work on
new ideas

IDEATION
PLANNING
ORGANIZATION
DEVELOPMENT

IDEATION
Back Then

And Then

Survival Self-Love


IDEATION


IDEATION
Back Then

And Then

And Now

Survival Self-Love Design
Thinking

DESIGN THINKING- WHAT IS

Empathy

Creativity

IDEATION
1

Entry

2

Urinate as they go

3

Edges preferred

4

Speedy

5

PB > cheese

Empathy

Check & Repair

1

UV Validation

2

Relevant Placement

3

A Better Mouse Trap

4

Powered by Better Bait

5

Creativity

IDEATION

?
Problem!
Personas
Scenarios


IDEATION

"

•Women
•Age 28-45
•Have kids
•Socialize with other mom’s
•Online with Facebook
•86% said they’d like to be

more organized
•70% said they’d use an
application that organizes them

IDEATION

Mary the Mom
Mary is a mom by choice. She had a successful

career in accounting, but welcomed the opportunity to
be a stay at home mom. She loves it. But it’s not like

having kids purged her creative, social instincts. She
wants to connect, she wants to learn, she wants to

interact. Being a mom is a job and she wants to do it

well. That means corresponding with other mom’s on
relevant topics and keeping the family calendar in

ship shape. She posts to Facebook at least twice a

week and responds to other moms’ items more often
than that. "

For household stuff, Costco is the go-to place, but

she’ll pick up fresh items at the farmer’s market when
it’s up and splurge at Whole Foods when they’re
having company.


IDEATION

?
User
Problem!
Personas
Scenarios Stories


IDEATION

Drafting
Stories

PERSONAS
Epic Stories
Stories
Test Cases
“As a [persona], "
I want to [do something] "
so that I can [derive a beneﬁt]”

STORIES

Borrowed with utmost regard from Banksy (banksy.co.uk)

IDEATION


PLANNING
Then

Now

Five Year
Plan

Iterative!
Management

45,000,000%

01 IDEA!

40,000,000%
35,000,000%

02 HYPOTHESIS

30,000,000%
25,000,000%

Revenue%
Expense%

20,000,000%

EBITDA%

15,000,000%
10,000,000%

04 EXPERIMENTATION

5,000,000%
0%
!5,000,000%

6.a PIVOT
experiments
03 EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN
disprove
hypothesis

2012%

2013%

2014%

2015%

2016%

2017%

2018%

2019%

2020%

05 PIVOT OR PERSEVERE?

6.b PERSEVERE


PLANNING
45,000,000%
40,000,000%
35,000,000%
30,000,000%
25,000,000%

Revenue%
Expense%

20,000,000%

EBITDA%

15,000,000%
10,000,000%
5,000,000%
0%

2012%

2013%

2014%

2015%

2016%

2017%

2018%

2019%

2020%

!5,000,000%


PLANNING
Do I have real evidence from my buyer that
this is compelling?

01 IDEA!

What are the key assumptions
required to make this business work?

02 HYPOTHESIS

How do I definitely prove or disprove
the assumptions with a minimum of
time and effort?


Am I reacting or am I focused on
validating my pivotal assumptions?

04 EXPERIMENTATION

‘Pivot or persevere?’


PLANNING
Priority

Key Assumption

Needs Proving?

Experimentation

1

[A key assumption about [Whether it needs
proving
the business]

[Experiment to
prove or disprove]

1

Parents want to better
organize the distribution
of allowances

Yes

* Post the proposition in ads
online
* Measure sign-up’s on a landing
page

2

Parents have smart
phones

No

n/a


PLANNING


PLANNING

$

ORGANIZATION
Then

Aping
==

Now

Customer
Development

ORGANIZATION

≠

ORGANIZATION


ORGANIZATION
X: < Odds at Lotto

5 Year Plan == "
10x Returns!

X: Too much  
too soon
VC-Encouraged
Menagerie

X: Lack of Experience
in Hands-on Discovery
Big Company
Recipes Applied

X: New Theories to
Explain Plan v. Actual
Time to Face the Music

+

"

Founders

New Idea!

Investors

Expanded Team

It Works!

Working 5 Year Plan

  Board
Revisions to Plan
== Edgy Board

X: Want Lots of
Capital at Work

X: Better Luck with
the Lottery

X: Fun and ProfitUnlikely

"

New Hires

+


ORGANIZATION
Validated Learning
Answers Shared
Questions

Lower Risk &
Clear Focus in
Capital Requirement Hiring & Contracting
Key Assumptions
ID’ed, Validated

Resources
As Needed

Time to Face
the Music

+

"

Founders

New Idea!

" Investors

Investors?
Advisors?
Option for  
Non-Traditional
Funding Strategies

New
" Hires

Focus on Validated
Learning
Roles and Success
Criteria Clear

"

+

Expanded Team
Full Tilt at a ‘Pivot or
Persevere’ Moment
Progress is Quick
and Measurable

"Board

Is approach
working or not?
Fun & Profit


DEVELOPMENT
Then

Waterfall

Now

Agile


DEVELOPMENT
Individuals!

Interactions

>

Processes"
Tools

Working
software

> Documentation

Customer
collaboration

> negotiation

Responding
to change

> Following

Comprehensive
Contract

a plan


DEVELOPMENT

Past

Present

validate feature
relevance with
customers

collaborate with
development
team

Future

observe and
envision what’s
next

personas!
problem scenarios!
user stories

LEAN
DESIGN
THINKING STARTUP
working product

AGILE

hypothesis
(assumptions)!
experimental design

CUSTOMER
DEV.

roles & team!
objectives


2007
2008
2010
2011
2013

went out on my own
profitable,
productized
consulting business
software business
scaling!
keep learning,
keep innovating


A LEAN PROGRESSION
Customer empathymore scope, detail on
problem scenarios

CONSULTING

Validated problem
scenarios with
substantial detail

‘PRODUCTIZED’
CONSULTING

PRODUCTS


UNDERSTANDING THE MARKET

50-70% of
Enterprise
Software
Implementations
Fail

IDEATION

IDEATION
Help me integrate and
NETWORK
standardize the
PRINCIPALS  
infrastructure. And show
my OF OPERATION
people how to use it.

SERVICE
How do we improve
service quality? How
DESIGN
do we verify that?

Creating
SERVICE accounts is
taking a lot of time/
STANDARDIZATION  
money. And there are a
lot of mistakes.
& WORKFLOW

PROCESSdo this
How do we
more efficiently? Are  
AUDIT,
we implementing best
DESIGN
practices?


IDEATION
PERSONA!

Rhonda the Receptionist

PROBLEM SCENARIO!

‘I want a good out-of-the-box experience.  
And to change the display on my phone.’

USER STORIES!

“As a receptionist, I want to receive an out
of the box set up that’s created against
best practices so I don’t have to set it all
up by myself.”"
“As a receptionist, I want to change the
buttons on my phone so they do what I
want.”


IDEATION

EPIC STORY
“As a receptionist, I want a custom configuration on my phone so that I can manage calls in the way I’ve
come to expect.”
STORY

“As a receptionist, I want to receive an out of the box phone
set up that’s created against best practices so I don’t have
to set it all up by myself.”

TEST CASE
Make sure the available templates are
editable in a visual environment usable by
a Product Manager"
Make sure it’s possible to update the
template at install time"

" sure the template designation is
Make

available in all Loki provisioning interfaces
Make sure it’s possible for the user to reset
to the default template
“As a receptionist, I want to change the buttons on my
phone so they do what I want.”

Make sure the available functions are
filtered by the services assigned to the user
Make sure available functions are filtered
based on the capabilities of the phone key

1. List at least 3 personas!
2. Describe as much as you can
MARY THE MOM
About: Mary the mom. . . [Describe like your friend or the beginning
of a short story. What kind of shoes does she wear?]. . .
Thinks: . . .
Sees: . . .
Feels: . . .
Does: . . .


END USER PERSONAS
Rita  
the Reseller

Rhonda  
the Receptionist

Amy  
the Assistant

Esteban  
the Executive

Orson  
the Ofﬁce Mgr.

Susan the  
Small Bus. Owner

Simone  
the Standard User

Mikuko  
the Mobile User

Ignatius  
the IT Guy

Keith  
the Key System User

Chuck  
the Call Center Agent

Cindy  
the Call Center Manager


ENTERPRISE PERSONAS
Bruce  
the Business Owner

Sidney  
the Sys. Admin.

Anthony  
the Applications Eng.

Sam  
the Support Eng.

Paola  
the Provisioner

Percival the  
Product Manager

Itzhak  
the IT Developer

Saul  
the Site Developer

Nietzsche  
the Network Eng.

Sven  
the Salesperson

Frank  
the Field Eng.

Fritz  
the Field Eng. Manager


PLANNING

PLANNING
Visual device management emerged from
general industry activity and follow-on work
at Leonid

01 IDEA!

Leonid can create a compelling,
useful, supportable visual device
management solution.

02 HYPOTHESIS

Lab work followed by limited
commercial release.


Did we validate the ‘existential’
propositions? Was it supportable?
Bankable?

04 EXPERIMENTATION

‘Pivot or persevere?’


1. List at least 3 assumptions!
2. Note as much as you can on experiments
“Parents want to better organize the distribution of allowances”
Priority: [1 for existential; 2+ for others]
Needs Proving?: [yes or no]
Experimentation: [how will most quickly, cheaply prove or disprove]
* Bonus Question: How do these relate to your personas?


PLANNING
PRIORITY

KEY ASSUMPTIONS

NEEDS
PROVING?

EXPERIMENTATION

1

End users at large want a visual tool
No
to manage their phones

- Already proven by prototypes from
partner

1

Giving the capability to end user
admin’s will do more good than
harm

Yes

- Beta testing with customers

1

The design and architecture are
supportable in current customer
environments

Yes

- Lab testing with customers...but really..."
- Field testing at scale

1

The target price point is bearable by
Yes
the market

- Initial sales negotiations"
- Mainline (post beta) sales

2

The capability makes sense with
end users (vs. admin’s)

Yes

2

(Various makes and models of
phones are worth investing in)

- Some proxy data on overall activity by
user type"
- Customer interviews"
- Beta testing

Yes

- Advanced orders

ONLINE SELF-CARE

PERSONA
Percival  
Bruce  
&
the  
the  
Business Owner Product Mgr.
Orson the
Ofﬁce Manager

PROBLEM SCENARIO

IMPLEMENTATION

‘This thing should increase
satisfaction & involvement;  
and reduce support calls.’

Focus on
customer admin
experience

‘I still don’t get it.’

One click access
via ‘Dashboard’


ASSUMPTIONS ON SELF-CARE
Priority

Key Assumption

Needs Proving?

1

End users want to log in
Yes!
and do self-care

Instrument adequate reporting,
create awareness, "
see if they nibble

1

Reducing the portals
clicks to destination
from 4-6 to 2-3 is good
enough

- Log and analyze navigation"
- Do support calls go down?

Yes

Experimentation


Take II- DASHBOARDS


ASSUMPTIONS ON SELF-CARE
Priority

Key Assumption

Needs Proving?

1

Customer admin’s will
do self-care with training Yes!
and awareness

Focus on training customer
admin’s, "
see if they nibble

1

Presenting all the users
of interest on the 1st
page will engage these
admin’s

- Log and analyze navigation"
- Do support calls go down?

Yes

Experimentation


DASHBOARD


PLANNING

Good ≠ Viral


PLANNING
BroadSoft
Other resellers
Integrators
Other network system
vendors

Product development Reduced time & risk to
Large account mgmt.
get to market
Consulting
Reduced cost
Custom Dev.
Implementation of
learned best practices

Actionable insight
on cloud UC
Best practice recipes
Dev. Team

Dedicated personal
assistance

Large/incumbent
Medium/competitive
Small/niche

BroadSoft
SIPhon Networks
Direct

Fixed: product development, G&A
Variable: field teams, support

The templates here are made available on the same CC license terms as the original canvas.

Licensing
Maintenance & Support
Consulting
Custom Development
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.


PLANNING
Reduced time & risk to
get to market
Reduced cost
Implementation of
learned best practices

Dedicated personal
assistance

Large/incumbent
Medium/competitive
Small/niche

BroadSoft
SIPhon Networks
Direct

Licensing
Maintenance & Support
Consulting
Custom Development



PLANNING
BroadSoft
Other resellers
Integrators
Other network system
vendors

Product development
Large account mgmt.
Consulting
Custom Dev.

Actionable insight
on cloud UC
Best practice recipes
Dev. Team

Fixed: product development, G&A
Variable: field teams, support




PLANNING
operations begin

2007

2008

2009

2010
(scaling
software)

Revenue

(consulting)

(+some
software)

(50%
software)

Expenses

(small/me+)

(variable)

Financing

2012

(++fixed
costs)

(n/a)

2011

Earnings
Visibility

(bank-based
financing)

(n/a)

(profitable)
(moderate)

(small debt
offer- family)

(low/
moderate)

see alexandercowan.com/finplan

(low/
moderate)

(high)

(high)

(current products:
high"

"

new products:
moderate)

PLANNING

Hypotheses
Theses

Does anyone want this?"
Are we the people to do it?"
Pivot or persevere?
Growth?"
Retention?"
Supportability?"
Ongoing investment?"
Competition?


ORGANIZATION

ORGANIZATION
Feasibility
(me)

(dev
contractors)

Customer
Development

(dev & ops (dev & operations
team)
(me) mgmt.)
(me)

Scaling
(expanded
sr. mgmt.)

(dev &
operations team)


What would a concierge product test
look like?
Who’s the audience? What’s the problem scenario?
How will it help you sharpen your personas? Problem scenarios?
How will it help you validate or invalidate pivotal assumptions?
What would be the next steps?


DEVELOPMENT

DEVELOPMENT
ITERATION 01

LOKI
PORTALS

ITERATION 04

ITERATION 05

Adaptive
Content

Adaptive
Content

Adaptive
Content

Adaptive
Content

Predictive
Content

Predictive
Content

Predictive
Content

Predictive
Content

ITERATION 02

ITERATION 03

ITERATION 04

ITERATION 05

D

LOKI
PROVISIONING

DOC’S &
INFRASTRUCTURE

ITERATION 03

C

A
B

LOKI BPM

ITERATION 02

E

F

G

ITERATION 01


Problem Scenarios for the Undergrad

PERSONA

PROBLEM SCENARIO

Uma  
the  
Undergrad

How to create & describe deep
customer understanding?

Uma the
Undergrad

How to manage in an
environment of scarcity and
uncertainty?

Uma the
Undergrad

IMPLEMENTATION

How do I participate in a lean
environment? Do I need to
learn how to code?



What would
Jefferson do?



PERSONA

PROBLEM SCENARIO

IMPLEMENTATION

Uma  
the  
Undergrad

How to create & describe deep
customer understanding?

Design Thinking
(Applied)

Uma the
Undergrad

How to manage in an
environment of scarcity and
uncertainty?

Lean Startup
(Applied)

Uma the
Undergrad

How do I participate in a lean
environment? Do I need to
learn how to code?

Foundation
Concept  
(Stack)


Collaboration
Basic
Technical
Literacy

...

(VARIOUS) MGMT.

...

ANALYTICS

SEO

(VARIOUS) DESIGN

...

...

...

PHP

JAVA

PYTON

RUBY

Specialties

UNIX SYSADMIN

ORGANIZATION

AGILE
As Product Owner

SOFTWARE
FUNDAMENTALS
Model-View-Controller

ARCHITECTURE
FUNDAMENTALS
App. & Platform Integration

"

ROLES & SYSTEMS
In a Technical Team

Personas

Stories

Foundation
Concepts

Development

DESIGN
THINKING

ITERATIVE
MANAGEMENT

CUSTOMER
DEVELOPMENT

Discussion

AGILE


If not a traditional business plan, then what?
OPERATIONAL STACK
Who is the
buyer? User?
What problem(s)

Personas 
Problem Scenarios 
User Stories 
Positioning Statement,"

PRESENTATION STACK
I need a compact
overview

Pitch Deck 

Business Model
Canvas

I’m going to a
bank, traditional
investor

Business Plan

Lean Startup-Style
Assumptions

I need to articulate
the business
internally

Business Model
Canvas

What economics
and requirement
for cash?

Lean Financial
Model

I need to create
empathy (internally) Personas & Problem
for our users.
Scenarios

What’s the
operating
environment like?

Five Forces Analysis

What’s the
business?
What has to
happen?

Assumptions"


MAKING PROGRESS

Ideation & Design

Draft
Prototype

Field Work & Analytics
Product Development

Yes?
Quicky
Prototype?

IDEA!

Customer
Definition

Field
Discovery

Still Learning?

Positioning
Statement?

Pivotal
Assumptions?

General Management
No?

Field
Validation

Confident?

Create
User
Stories

Define
MVP

CUSTOMER
VALIDATION

Done?

Personas?
Problem Scenarios?
New Learning?


www.alexandercowan.com/resources

@cowanSF

www.alexandercowan.com/blog

www.alexandercowan.com/speaking

acowan@alexandercowan.com

UVA- Jefferson Entrepreneurs Program

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