What is the most valuable work you aren’t doing? Product discovery.

There is a lot of data around the failure of ERP programs and large projects in general. Whether its Gartner publishing a study or someone else, I’ve seen numbers as high as 90% failure rate. This is a significant waste of financial and human capital. This failure rate is very much in line with what Venture Capital investments made in startups. Risky.

Most startups are one tricky ponies - companies with a single product. So the startup failure rate is highly correlated with product failure. Everyone is talking about Product/Market fit, those that make it should have a better chance at being successful. Those that don’t make it become another statistic.

How can we improve our chances of success? Product Discovery. Instead of startup companies hiring a bunch of engineers, they should invest in product discovery activities such as design sprints, lean user research etc. On the surface, velocity is pretty poor, relative to hiring a bunch of engineers to build something. Actually, this approach attacks velocity from a different perspective: the focus is on building the right things.

You can actually validate a concept with prototypes and your potential customer segment - buyer and user personas - faster than having a mass of engineers building your product. A product that in the best case scenario will need to pivot (no one gets it right the first time), a pivot with significant technical debt that slows your future velocity. The worst case scenario? The product isn’t successful or marketable, and needs to be scrapped.