Building Startup Operations
BUILD ONLY WHAT YOU MUST BUILD with William Eastman artwork
Building Startup Operations

BUILD ONLY WHAT YOU MUST BUILD with William Eastman

  • S8E5
  • 12:58
  • February 1st 2022

Last week in Show 1 we covered the concept of the MVO or Minimally Viable Offer; what is the minimum we can build and sell as our first offer. The idea was to create a well researched but quick to market offer to initiate sales and gain customer usage to improve the offer.

This week we are taking the same minimalist approach only instead of the offer, it is the processes required to build the offer and support systems to ensure the first sale is successful.

EPISODE 5: BUILD ONLY WHAT YOU MUST BUILD As we discussed in Show 1, all startups are really experiments and not businesses. Therefore your goal is the keep everything simple and easy to test: limited variables, simple processes, quick production & testing, easily improved.

Topics: Minimum process possible to 'produce' the offer Minimum processes possible to service the account

Building Startup Operations

2022 has arrived and we are starting a new season, number 8 since our start in January 2020. It is always exciting to begin a new season and a new year at the same time. 

If I could leave you with one thought about this series - it is taozen.

EPISODE 1: HOW MUST YOU THINK TO BUILD THE OPERATIONAL FUNCTIONS OF A STARTUP BUSINESS

Today's show is using the concept of MVO to introduce what is really required to build a startup - constant experimentation to test assumptions, build quick and test ideas to get it right.

Minimize the risk for the first offer by reducing the initial development investment while providing just the core features needed to make the sale. 


​The challenge with the first offer is the number of critical assumptions that must be made and how those can be tested or minimized. 


Building the MVO is never a finished product or service, it is a process to build right enough the first time and improve from there. Identifying the bare minimum features and functionality to engage the target market that is upgraded with each successive upgrade.

  • Show 1: What Is The Minimum You Must Build to Make the First Sale - MVO
  • Show 2: How Do Operations Look Like In A Startup?