Teaching a ' Lean Startup ' Strategy

Abstract

Most startups fail because they waste too much time and money building the wrong product before realizing too late what the right product should have been, says HBS entrepreneurial management professor Thomas R. Eisenmann. In his new MBA course, Launching Technology Ventures, Eisenmann introduces students to the idea of the lean startupa methodology that has proven successful for many young high-tech companies. Key concepts include: Rather than spending months in stealth mode, a lean startup launches as quickly as possible with a "minimum viable product" (MVP), a bare-bones product that includes just enough features to allow useful feedback from early adopters. The company then continues hypothesis testing with a succession of incrementally refined product versions. Lean startup executives do not invest in scaling the company until they have achieved product market fit (PMF); that is, the knowledge that they have developed a solution that matches the problem. In lean startup lingo, "pivoting" refers to a major change in a company's direction based on user feedback. Eisenmann's students discuss how entrepreneurs can stay true to their vision while still maintaining the flexibility to pivot. Adhering to a lean startup strategy is especially challenging for companies that require a great deal of time to launch a workable product, such as clean-tech or biotech companies.