Starting a new business always has 50/50 chance to succeed; it either does or it does not. For this blog post, I read “Why the Lean Start-Up Changes Everything” by Steve Blank from the Harvard Business Review. In this post, I will comment on what resonated with me after reading it and how does the lean method make sense.
The piece talks about how the lean start-up and how it helps the businesses that use it. It emphasizes on how business owners should listen to what their customers want and feel, which is a big factor nowadays. It also touches on how the creators that use the lean start-ups do not begin with plans and “to-do lists;” they go out of their way and find a business plan that will work with their idea and work from that.
I liked reading about this because it made me think about how my father started his own business and how it has succeeded over the years. The journalist part of me could not keep quiet, so I asked him about his start and how he did everything. It was interesting to hear that when developing a startup idea he chose the Agile way. He began by selling products of other companies, and as he started to gain success, he decided to create some products of his own and see what his clientele thought. His clients were happy with his products, so he kept selling them.
I then asked him if he also used the Lean Start-up plan, and he told me that it did not exist 28 years ago. However, he started using it once he learned about it. He says that the lean start-up plan is his favorite one. He says he likes to motivate his clients with new things, see their reactions, the results they get and their satisfaction.
It was intriguing to see that in “Entrepreneurial Journalism” by Mark Briggs, it says the same thing about starting a business; we should believe in ourselves, take risks, make innovations, listen to others and work hard for what we want; without all these things mentioned, I think that nobody could be able to create their own company, this is why it makes sense to have a lean start-up plan. To me, it also makes sense because my parents have always taught me to work with these principles, I just learned that it has a name.
Reading the book and this piece, and hearing my father talk about his business has made me think a lot about the decisions I have to make if I want to create one of my own. I have come to the conclusion that the lean start-up plan does change everything. Even though my father did not have the lean start-up plan when he first started his business, he still used it after it was created and it made huge differences within his company. I think that it is essential to have all the principles that this plan has. Something that I will always take with me from these readings, and my father, is that it is crucial to hear what customers want, because in the end, without them the company will not succeed.
Thank you for reading!
Virginia Rodriguez 