In yesterday’s article I talked about how you can use a product development approach called Set Based Concurrent Design (SBCD) to avoid some of the risks associated with developing a disruptive design regardless of how integrated or modular a given technology and its platforms are. Before that I had written about a concept called Lean Canvas to include questions associated with disruption to help push the initial design into a more disruptive place to maximize the likelihood of success.

In “Running Lean” the author, either knowingly or unknowingly emulated the benefits of SBCD whenever he fully described his approach for creating Lean Canvases. Ash Maurya recommended that for any given startup to initially start with multiple different views of the initial Lean Canvas which could represent different solutions, problems, customer sets, and metrics. Each one of these is to be discussed with potential customers in interviews.

However, once you understand your customer, you’ll need to begin developing your solution. In the case of a piece of software it may be easiest to simply caret multiple wireframe mock ups that emulate the SBCD. While with physical products, you’ll need to start with several mock ups and ideally multiple different specifications for components within the design. This is important as you may need to mix and match components of your physical design based on the niche customer set that you are targeting. The best result may end up forcing you to create a product that might be difficult to make if you don’t plan for the different specification interactions from the beginning.

While building your product as  you look at each different iteration it is important to continue asking if the actual solution continues to be disruptive or if it has slid into a less disruptive niche in the market. It is also vital that you still are aware if the interaction between the changes in your product and how it impacts your customers. If your potential customer decide that there are too many features you may have pushed yourself out of the initial niches  you were striving for. This will also mean you’re moving into a market space that will force you to compete head on with your competitors.

Using these three tools, questions for disruptions, lean canvas, and setbased concurrent design, will help speed the decision to continue pursuing a specific product, problem, and customer set. The point of this early process is to speed learning as quickly as possible and the B-M-L approach coupled with a set of Lean Cavnases and Products will help rapidly increase that knowledge set. Especially when using tools to help determine the trade-offs between your choices.

Finally, with continual engagement with your customers and products that are narrowing down towards a completed solution, you may find that your sets of products could become a family of products. This means that your learning may even be more valuable than before.