How to turn your risky assumptions into Experiments
Once you have filled in your NEXT C
1. Determine the impact and evidence of each assumption
There are a couple of tools that can help you prioritize and create order in the chaos. One that is really helpful is the Hi-Lo matrix. In a guest post on Tristan Kromer’s blog, Dan Toma is writing about how this has been helping teams prioritize risks in a very easy way.
Once you have written down all of your assumptions on stickies you can use this visual method to decide which things need derisking the most. First, you order your assumptions based on the knowledge you have on that subject. Do you know the facts, the mindset, the problems, etc., or not at all? Order your stickies along a horizontal axis from left to right. From ‘I know a lot about it’ to ‘I know nothing about it’. Once you have ordered them, add a vertical axis. Going through the middle of the horizontal one, dividing everything into 4 squares. This axis is going from ‘Has
Using this tool to prioritize experiments works really well in combination with our NEXT Canvas. The NEXT canvas is using 8 building blocks and is ordered in such a way that the blocks form stages that correspond with the 4 basic phases in a startup’s journey:
2. Determine the stage of your startup
From left to right, it determines the order (or proposed order) in which it makes sense to test assumptions first. Moving along the canvas will show you the progress you are making towards product-market fit.
3. Pick the riskiest assumptions
Starting your experiments with assumptions marked in the top right quadrant of the Hi-Lo matrix AND are in the first step of the canvas is a perfect place to start. Testing risky assumptions on your solution make less sense if you haven’t proven the problem yet.
