Podcasts about business model generation

Van helemaal niks naar een miljoenenomzet. Monica Westerveld is de vrouw achter het succes van Notbranded, het sieradenmerk dat zonder bekende gezichten en dure marketingcampagnes de gevestigde orde uitdaagt.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Van hobby-project naar internationaal schaalbaar miljoenenbedrijf☑️ Notbranded schakelt de traditionele tussenhandel volledig uit ☑️ Het bijzondere foundersverhaal van Joyvie HealthDe sieradenwereld wordt al decennia gedomineerd door grote namen die de hoofdprijs vragen voor een logo. Monica Westerveld besloot dat het anders kon en richtte Notbranded op. In deze aflevering legt ze haarfijn uit hoe ze een gat in de markt vond door juist géén nadruk te leggen op de merknaam, maar op het product en de eerlijke prijs. We horen hoe een simpele frustratie over marges uitgroeide tot een serieuze business die de gevestigde orde zenuwachtig maakt door luxe 14-karaats goud eindelijk bereikbaar te maken voor een veel grotere groep vrouwen.

Het WK voetbal is losgebarsten. Bij Athvance Capital weten ze als geen ander hoe je van sport een echte beleving maakt, met entertainment, digitalisering en interactie met fans.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Hoe Athvance Capital van sport entertainment maakt☑️ Waarom deze investeerders kleinere voetbalclubs koopt☑️ Zo werkt het AI-shoppingplatform van Phia.Het bedrijf bouwt aan een Europees sportimperium met twee duidelijke pijlers, vertelt managing director Danny Menken. Zo ontwikkelt het eigen sport-IP, met nieuwe competities, formats en mediaplatforms rond snelgroeiende sporten als padel en beachvolleybal. Dit gaat om initiatieven als Queen & King of the Court en Padel Copa. Hier wordt sport gecombineerd met entertainment: kortere wedstrijden, snelle puntentellingen, spectaculaire locaties en veel interactie met fans. Die combinatie moet zorgen voor een aantrekkelijker format voor zowel publiek als streamingplatforms. Daarmee mikt Athvance Capital nadrukkelijk op een nieuwe generatie sportfans.

Today I'm pulling back the curtain on how I built a multiple six-figure product business — from launching Horacio Printing in 2014 with one dream planner to 11 years, 60,000+ planners sold, and a multi-million dollar brand. I'm walking through the Business Model Generation's Lean Canvas and showing you exactly how all the pieces fit together — and how yours can too.

Toen Ralph Hamers in 2013 aantrad als CEO van ING, trof hij een bank die nog aan het herstellen was van de kredietcrisis. Amper zeven jaar later was het bedrijf een digitale koploper in de sector. Hij deelt met ons de belangrijkste lessen uit die periode. Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Een transformatie is geen lineair plan, maar een grillige reis. ☑️ De paradox van standaardisatie en het slopen van interne koninkrijkjes. ☑️ Na kweekvlees komt er nu... kweekhoutWat is er nodig om een traditionele bank om te bouwen tot een digitale koploper? En hoe krijg je meer dan 50.000 medewerkers mee om te denken als startup, met de focus op executiekracht in plaats van dikke beleidsnota's en uitgebreide spreadsheets.In deze aflevering praten we uitgebreid met Ralph Hamers, voormalig CEO van ING en tegenwoordig actief bij Banking Circle Group. Aan de hand van zijn nieuwe boek Do Your Thing vertelt hij openhartig over de lessen, dilemma's en fouten tijdens een van de grootste digitale transformaties in de Europese bankensector.

Vergeet het eindeloos doorklikken op traditionele vergelijkingssites. Het Nederlandse RISK plugt als allereerste financiële instelling rechtstreeks in bij OpenAI. Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ RISK krijgt als eerste Nederlandse financiële club een officiële integratie binnen ChatGPT. ☑️ Autoverzekeringen en energiecontracten nu realtime vergelijken☑️ Het bijzondere (en zeer succesvolle) businessmodel van Bird BuddyDe financiële sector staat aan de vooravond van een revolutie en het Nederlandse RISK heeft de primeur in handen. Als allereerste financiële instelling in Nederland zijn zij officieel toegelaten tot het ecosysteem van OpenAI. Geen droge invullijstjes of ingewikkelde filters meer op traditionele websites, maar gewoon in duidelijke spreektaal aan ChatGPT vragen wat de goedkoopste autoverzekering is. Directeur Harmen Vollmuller neemt ons mee achter de schermen van deze technologische doorbraak en legt uit hoe hun omnichannel model van offline agenten en online labels hiermee een gigantische boost krijgt.

Twintig jaar lang hard groeien, vijftien FD Gazelles binnenslepen en dat met exact núl managers op de loonlijst. Maak kennis met het bijzondere groeiverhaal van Nmbrs.Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ Hoe Nmbrs al 20 jaar plust zonder middenkader☑️ Waarom diepe domeinkennis cruciaal is voor een succesvol SAAS-bedrijf ☑️ Remy Gieling over het businessmodel van TolarianMichiel Chevalier komt uit een echt ondernemersgezin. Via een rechtenstudie rolde hij het HR-vak in, eerst door letterlijk zelf de salarisstroken te vouwen. Nmbrs transformeerde hij van externe personeelsafdeling tot een modern SaaS-platform. Hij vertelt hoe verouderde HR- en salarissystemen, gebouwd door en voor salarisadministrateurs, de kiem leggen voor een radicaal andere aanpak: cloud, gebruiksgemak en samenwerking tussen medewerkers, managers en dienstverleners. AI verandert ondertussen het product van binnenuit. Nmbrs bouwt al sinds 2007 aan AI-toepassingen en voegt nu een slimme agent toe die repetitieve taken automatiseert, zoals het verwerken van verkeersboetes of het doorvoeren van salarisverhogingen voor hele organisaties.

Arko van Brakel was ooit internetpionier met Euronet en presenteert nu een nieuw boek over de opkomst van AI in het bedrijfsleven. Hierin vertelt hij hoe leiders hun teams veilig moeten laten experimenteren. Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ De lange ondernemersloopbaan van Arko van Brakel, van Euronet en tot Semco Style Institute☑️ Waarom zelfsturende teams sterk leiderschap en vaste ritmes vragen☑️ Nox, de Duitse mobility startup die de nachttrein opnieuw uitvindtIn deze aflevering duiken we in de ondernemerscarrière van Arko van Brakel. Hij vertelt hoe hij met Euronet als pionier internettoegang als softwarepakket in de winkel bracht. Minder goed liep het af met zijn streamingplatform Jamby. Ondanks een visionair idee mislukte dat project en dat had vooral te maken met timing. Hij was er simpelweg te vroeg mee. Ook deelt hij het schokkende verhaal over zijn vroegere compagnon Simon, die jarenlang onder een valse identiteit leefde. Hij vertelt hoe dat zijn kijk op vertrouwen, partnerschap en risico’s voorgoed heeft veranderd.

Het probleem van je bed opmaken. Dat is wat Willem van den Eertweg wil oplossen met HappyBed. Zijn bedrijf introduceerde in Nederland een nieuwe productcategorie.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Hoe Happybed een nieuwe productcategorie op de markt zette☑️ De uitdagingen van internationale groei☑️ Zelf video’s maken zonder camera of montageprogrammaWillem van den Eertwegh begon zijn ondernemerscarrière met het opkopen van restpartijen uit faillissementsverkopen. Uiteindelijk besloten hij en zijn compagnon Sierd Zijlstra om een merk te gaan bouwen met bedtextiel. Want: niet breekbaar, geen aparte maten en relatief weinig retour. Met HappyBed verkopen ze dekbedden zonder overtrek, een 2-in-1 dekbed dus. Je hoeft dus geen losse dekbedovertrekken meer te gebruiken of te verschonen, iets dat in de Verenigde Staten al veel langer gebruikelijk is. De dekbedden zijn volgens hem volledig wasbaar, sneldrogend en gericht op gemak, hygiëne en snel een bed opmaken.

In this episode, Jeff is joined by author JP Rindfleisch IX for a Joint with JP. They dive into the Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur. Jeff and JP walk through the classic entrepreneurial tool, "The Business Model Canvas" as authors. They talk about how each of the 9 boxes work, and how they view them as authors. They dive deep into risks and assumptions and how as author-prenuers we should be diagnosing those things.  For more on writing, check out DialogueDoctor.com

Van zwoegende pionier naar gestroomlijnde machine. Tenminste, dat is de bedoeling. Groeicoach Kees de Jong onthult waarom de meeste ondernemers nooit écht doorstoot.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ De psychologie achter het loslaten in de pioniersfase ☑️ Waarom delegeren de moeilijkste skill is voor een oprichter ☑️ Het geheim van schalen zonder je bedrijfscultuur te verliezenGroeien is een vak apart. Wist je bijvoorbeeld dat maar liefst 96% van de bedrijven altijd klein blijft? Hoe komt het dat de meeste bedrijven nooit verder dan een handvol werknemers? Het antwoord ligt vaak niet aan de markt of het product, maar aan de ondernemer zelf. Kees de Jong schetst in deze aflevering een confronterend beeld van de pioniersfase, waarin de eigenaar alles zelf doet en onbewust de rem op de groei zet. We duiken diep in de cijfers en ontdekken dat de overgang naar de organisatiefase (8 tot 25 fte) een compleet andere mindset vereist. Het draait niet meer om harder werken, maar om het bouwen van een systeem dat zonder jou draait.

De traditionele parfumerie drijft zwaar op marketing en bekende namen in het schap. Skins doet het net even anders, met kleine boutiques en niche-merken. En dat businessmodel slaat aan. Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ Hoe Skins het spel op een andere manier wil spelen☑️ Het geheim achter de curatie van 's werelds meest exclusieve geurmerken☑️ Britse startup werkt aan een duurzaam alternatief voor plasticPhilip Hillege begon ooit met een simpel idee: de saaie, eenvormige schappen van de grote parfumerieketens doorbreken. In deze aflevering legt hij uit hoe hij van Skins een bestemming maakte waar klanten niet alleen komen voor een product, maar voor een verhaal. We bespreken de beginjaren, waarin het niet altijd even makkelijk ging en mensen echt nog moesten wennen aan het concept. Maar uiteindelijk werd de groei ingezet. Nu telt Skins 32 vestigingen, is het bedrijf in meerdere landen actief en gaat de omzet dit jaar naar de 80 miljoen euro.

FitForMe liet een miljoenenbusiness varen om zich volledig te storten op een kleine medische niche. Met als resultaat? Een spectaculaire internationale expansie.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Radicale focus op kleine doelgroep leidt tot meer schaalbaarheid ☑️ Hoe een abonnementsmodel voor een loyale klantenbase zorgt☑️ Droppie maakt recyclen leuk en makkelijkStel je voor: je bedrijf groeit als kool, de cijfers kleuren diepgroen en de toekomst lacht je toe. Toch besluit je de stekker eruit te trekken. Waanzin? Niet volgens Robert Jan van Kranenburg van FitForMe. In deze aflevering vertelt hij waarom het bedrijf de brede consumentenmarkt de rug toekeerde. Ze kozen er voor een zeer specifieke groep: mensen die na een maagverkleining kampen met chronische vitaminetekorten. Het bleek een gouden greep. Door te kiezen voor diepgang in plaats van breedte, bouwden ze een model dat inmiddels wereldwijd tienduizenden mensen helpt.

FitForMe liet een miljoenenbusiness varen om zich volledig te storten op een kleine medische niche. Met als resultaat? Een spectaculaire internationale expansie. Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ Radicale focus op kleine doelgroep leidt tot meer schaalbaarheid ☑️ Hoe een abonnementsmodel voor een loyale klantenbase zorgt ☑️ Droppie maakt recyclen leuk en makkelijk Stel je voor: je bedrijf groeit als kool, de cijfers kleuren diepgroen en de toekomst lacht je toe. Toch besluit je de stekker eruit te trekken. Waanzin? Niet volgens Robert Jan van Kranenburg van FitForMe. In deze aflevering vertelt hij waarom het bedrijf de brede consumentenmarkt de rug toekeerde. Ze kozen er voor een zeer specifieke groep: mensen die na een maagverkleining kampen met chronische vitaminetekorten. Het bleek een gouden greep. Door te kiezen voor diepgang in plaats van breedte, bouwden ze een model dat inmiddels wereldwijd tienduizenden mensen helpt.

De AI-trein dendert door, maar hoe spring je erop zonder te vallen? Dit zijn de cruciale eerste stappen om je organisatie 'AI-ready' te maken. Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ Een stappenplan om je bedrijf AI-ready te maken☑️ Vijf concrete use-cases voor AI-toepassingen☑️ Het businessmodel van Boom & WolfIn deze aflevering duiken we in de wereld van AI-transformatie met Ebel Slijp, de oprichter van Refreshworks AI. Veel ondernemers zien kunstmatige intelligentie vooral nog als een leuk extraatje of een simpele chatbot. Volgens Slijp raakt de technologie de kern van elk bedrijfsproces, van productontwikkeling tot klantenservice. We bespreken waarom diverse businessmodellen eigenlijk al 'dood' zijn zonder dat ondernemers het door hebben. En… hoe je de chaos van AI vertaalt naar concrete winst en efficiënte werkprocessen.

De AI-trein dendert door, maar hoe spring je erop zonder te vallen? Dit zijn de cruciale eerste stappen om je organisatie 'AI-ready' te maken. Deze aflevering in het kort: ☑️ Een stappenplan om je bedrijf AI-ready te maken ☑️ Vijf concrete use-cases voor AI-toepassingen ☑️ Het businessmodel van Boom & Wolf In deze aflevering duiken we in de wereld van AI-transformatie met Ebel Slijp, de oprichter van Refreshworks AI. Veel ondernemers zien kunstmatige intelligentie vooral nog als een leuk extraatje of een simpele chatbot. Volgens Slijp raakt de technologie de kern van elk bedrijfsproces, van productontwikkeling tot klantenservice. We bespreken waarom diverse businessmodellen eigenlijk al 'dood' zijn zonder dat ondernemers het door hebben. En… hoe je de chaos van AI vertaalt naar concrete winst en efficiënte werkprocessen.

In een wereld die razendsnel verandert, is wendbaarheid je enige reddingsboei. Rini van Solingen legt uit hoe je van een logge tanker een zeilboot maakt die snel van koers kan veranderen.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Wat het betekent om echt wendbaar te worden☑️ Traditionele meerjarenplannen stokken innovatie☑️ Vinted breidt uit met nieuwe productcategorieënVeel ondernemers dromen van een bedrijf dat moeiteloos meebeweegt met de markt. Maar de realiteit is vaak een moeras van stroperige processen en eindeloze vergaderingen. Rini van Solingen houdt ons in deze aflevering een spiegel voor: wie niet wendbaar is, graaft zijn eigen graf. Het gaat niet om een hippe term uit de IT-sector, maar om een fundamentele herziening van hoe je waarde creëert. Van Solingen deelt inzichten over het slopen van silo's en het bouwen van een cultuur waarin experimenteren belangrijker is dan blindelings een vooraf vastgesteld plan volgen.

Een duidelijke planning en heldere communicatie. Daar ontbreekt het nog weleens aan wanneer je thuis gaat verbouwen. Stukadoorsclub lost die problemen op, met de inzet van technologie die in andere branches al langer de norm zijn.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Hoe track-and-trace technologie de stress uit een verbouwing haalt. ☑️ De strategie achter het schalen naar 125 vakmensen in twee jaar tijd. ☑️ Automatisch camerabeelden analyseren met AI KeyVan track-en-trace tot een automatische sms, als de ploeg wat later arriveert bijvoorbeeld. Stukadoorsclub laat zien dat je een traditionele sector als de bouw kunt transformeren door te kijken naar wat in andere industrieën al gebruikelijk is. Jelle Kies en Hugo Kuijer vertellen hoe zij hun bedrijf zijn gestart en wisten uit te bouwen. De kern van hun model? Een eigen softwareplatform dat de klant precies vertelt waar hij aan toe is. Zo hoeven vaklui zich niet meer om dat deel van het werk te bekommeren en kunnen ze vooral doen waar ze goed in zijn.

Martijn Verspeek transformeerde zijn traditionele installatiebedrijf tot een onderneming waarin alles draait om klantgeluk. Zet je schrap voor een aflevering vol met inspirerende ondernemerslessen en concrete tips waar je morgen al mee aan de slag kunt.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Waarom Martijn na jaren besloot het roer volledig om te gooien. ☑️ Normaal doen, als de belangrijkste motor van die verandering☑️ Hemi Health biedt hybride zorgmodel voor migraine en hoofdpijnToen Martijn Verspeek in 1999 het installatiebedrijf van zijn vader overnam, was hij een ondernemer zoals zovelen. Maar de chaos van de groei dwong hem tot een radicale herbezinning op zijn businessmodel. Hij besloot de strijd aan te gaan met de klassieke irritaties in de technieksector. In deze aflevering deelt hij hoe hij 'klantgeluk' bombardeerde tot zijn belangrijkste KPI en hoe dat leidde tot een vliegwiel-effect. Hij schreef er zelfs een boek over: Goeiegast. Zijn belangrijkste tip? Doe gewoon normaal!

Miljarden euro's zijn nodig om de energietransitie te laten slagen. Meewind laat burgers meedoen, door ze te laten investeren in windparken, zonnevelden en batterijprojecten.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Het businessmodel achter Meewind en duurzame energieprojecten☑️ Nieuw investeringsfonds samen met energieleverancier Greenchoice☑️ Een Airbnb voor hondenparken in de Verenigde StatenOp deze manier wil Meewind de energietransitie democratiseren. Die is dan namelijk niet enkel voorbehouden aan institutionele beleggers en mensen met diepe zakken. Vanaf 250 euro al kun je instappen in duurzame energieprojecten. Denk aan windparken op zee, zonneparken, laadstations en grootschalige batterijen. De deelnemers leggen gezamenlijk kapitaal in en delen in de opbrengsten uit energieverkoop en langlopende contracten.

Daan Hoek en Thijs Kea ontwikkelden met UV-Smart een revolutionaire technologie die medische apparaten veel sneller reinigt. Ze hebben net een FDA-ticket voor de Amerikaanse markt in handen gekregen.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ De weg naar goedkeuring voor de Amerikaanse markt. ☑️ Hoe je een hardware-scale-up financiert en internationaal uitrolt.☑️ Nieuwe tool van Antrophic disrupt hele beroepsgroepenDe zorgsector staat wereldwijd onder enorme druk door personeelstekorten en stijgende kosten. Daan Hoek en Thijs Kea van UV Smart bedachten een nieuwe manier om gebruikte instrumenten te reinigen. Hun D60-systeem desinfecteert medische apparatuur negen keer sneller dan de traditionele methoden en dat zonder het gebruik van chemicaliën. Ze maken hiervoor gebruik van UV-licht. Dit licht dringt door in de cellen van bacteriën, virussen en schimmels en vernietigt hun DNA of RNA. Hierdoor kunnen ze zich niet meer vermenigvuldigen en gaan ze dood.

Nigel Baker: When Teams Slowly Decay by Anointing a Hidden Dictator Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Agile and Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.   "The world won't end with a bang, but with a whimper. My great fear is not teams exploding like a bomb—that shows they care. The big thing for me is teams that decay slowly." - Nigel Baker   Nigel shares a pattern he has witnessed repeatedly: teams that self-destruct not through dramatic conflict, but through a slow, quiet decay. Referencing The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni, he points to something even more insidious than inattention to results—teams that avoid taking responsibility for decision-making.  When teams struggle with self-organization, they often try to "self-organize themselves out of self-organization" by anointing a hidden dictator: the big brain, the big mouth, the tech lead, or the project manager who everyone secretly defers to. Nigel offers two practical tools to counter this pattern.  First, the "yes and" technique from improv comedy—instead of taking ownership away from team members, you accept their idea and add to it, keeping the ownership where it belongs.  Second, Socratic questioning, where instead of passing knowledge from you to them, you help them pass knowledge from themselves to themselves. But Nigel adds an important caution: the Agile community has swung too far into pure coaching mode. Sometimes people genuinely need help, not therapy—they need to know which server the files are on, not a deep coaching question about their feelings.   In this segment, we talk about Paul Goddard's work on improv comedy in Agile, and the power of the "yes and" technique for keeping ownership with teams.   Self-reflection Question: Is your team quietly deferring all decisions to one person, and if so, what practical steps can you take to redistribute that ownership? Featured Book of the Week: Leading Self-Directed Work Teams by Kimball Fisher Nigel's book recommendations reflect his belief that the most inspiring ideas come from adjacent fields rather than Agile literature itself. Leading Self-Directed Work Teams by Kimball Fisher stands out because it explores similar principles to the Scrum Master role but without any Agile jargon—showing how a completely different industry arrived at the same insights about empowered teams. Nigel also recommends the Strategyzer books by Alex Osterwalder, including Business Model Generation and Testing Business Ideas, for the business thinking that coaches need but rarely pick up at work. Scrum Mastery by Geoff Watts remains his go-to foundational text for new Scrum Masters. And the book he waited 4.5 years for—until Amazon cancelled the pre-order—is the latest edition of The Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision Making by Sam Kaner, a deeply practical reference guide that gives real people real tools for real situations.   [The Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends]

Stëlz is niet meer weg te denken uit de schappen van supermarkten en horeca-koelkasten. Met dank aan de inzet van een bekende influencer. Het merk verwacht dat jaar meer dan 100 miljoen blikjes te verkopen.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Hoe Stëlz een merk heeft gebouwd rondom de community☑️ Waarom Heineken is ingestapt als minderheidsaandeelhouder☑️ Aardmetalen lokaal raffineren met de Argentijnse startup Alkemio Een combinatie van bruiswater, een klein beetje fruitaroma en 4,5% alcohol. Dat is Stëlz. Het hard seltzer-merk richt zich met een suiker- en glutenvrij aanbod specifiek op een nieuwe generatie afnemers die op zoek is naar een lichter alternatief voor bier, wijn of mierzoete mixdrankjes. Door een brutale marketingstrategie en een sterke focus op lifestyle groeide Stëlz in korte tijd uit tot een serieuze speler in de drankenwereld. Bij Heineken zagen ze dat ook, het biermerk nam al snel een minderheidsbelang in het Nederlandse drankmerk.

Papieren vrachtbrieven, faxen en eindeloze e-mails. Zo werkte de wereldhandel jarenlang. Sanne Manders zag het anders en bouwde met Flexport een digitaal alternatief. Zijn bedrijf is inmiddels miljarden euro’s waard.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ Het businessmodel van Flexport☑️ Hoe het bedrijf met AI nu een nieuwe waardepropositie heeft☑️ Remedy Health vindt de vitaminesupplement opnieuw uitIn deze aflevering duiken we in de wereld achter zeecontainers, douanedocumenten en wereldwijde handelsstromen. Flexport is voor het grote publiek relatief onbekend, maar draaide het afgelopen jaar wel zo’n 2 miljard omzet. Welk probleem lossen zij voor klanten op? En hoe werkt het platform voor gebruikers? Aan de hand van een voorbeeld van een Nederlandse webshop die containers uit China en Vietnam importeert, ontleden we stap voor stap hoe Flexport transport boekt, tarieven onderhandelt, douane regelt en realtime inzicht geeft via één digitaal platform.

Hoe werkt het als je je bedrijf organiseert in een groepsstructuur? En komt er eigenlijk iets terecht van die beoogde synergievoordelen? Jerry Remmers is de CEO van Loyals Groep en legt van A tot Z uit hoe zij dit proces aanpakken.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ De strategie achter een succesvolle buy-and-build machine ☑️ Synergie creëren tussen autonome bedrijven ☑️ Billy Grace lost gedoe met online marketing opIn de dynamische wereld van marketing en tech is 'groot, groter, grootst' vaak hét devies om te overleven. Klanten vragen om hyperspecialisme. Jerry Remmers begreep dit als geen ander en stampte met twee partners Loyals Groep uit de grond. Dit bedrijvencollectief telt inmiddels zes labels die actief zijn op het gebied van AI, branding, digital marketing, e-commerce en operational excellence. In deze aflevering legt hij uit hoe dat ecosysteem is georganiseerd. In deze aflevering hoor je hoe deze buy-and-build strategie uitpakt en hoe ze bij Loyal Groep de ondernemersvrijheid bij hun labels waarborgen.

Iedereen wil een platform bouwen. Want die schalen, zijn sticky en lijken de snelste weg naar succes. Maar de realiteit is weerbarstig. Want een platform is geen product, het is een ecosysteem met vertrouwen als de echte valuta.Deze aflevering in het kort:☑️ De cruciale voorwaarden voor een schaalbaar platformmodel☑️ Strategieën om het beruchte kip-ei probleem bij de start op te lossen. ☑️ De nieuwste AI-sensatie OpenclawHet bouwen van een platform lijkt vaak de snelste weg naar rijkdom, maar schijn bedreigt. Martijn Arets is dé platformbusinessmodel-expert van Nederland en hij legt haarscherp uit hoe dat komt. Het platform blijkt vaak een complex ecosysteem waar vertrouwen de belangrijkste munteenheid is. We bespreken hoe je als ondernemer de frictie uit de markt haalt en waarom het soms slim is om je eerste gebruikers persoonlijk 'met de hand' binnen te halen voordat je de algoritmes het werk laat doen.

Whether you're a business leader, entrepreneur, or someone reinventing yourself, the way you think about innovation will shape your future. Innovation isn't about guessing or chasing shiny ideas. It's about having a process, the right tools, and the discipline to test, learn, and scale what creates value. In this episode, I sit down with Alex Osterwalder—one of the world's most influential strategy and innovation thinkers, inventor of the Business Model Canvas, bestselling author, and CEO of Strategyzer. Alex has changed how the world approaches business design. Millions of entrepreneurs and leaders use his tools to innovate with clarity instead of chaos. We dive deep into the fundamental mistakes both large corporations and startups make: falling in love with ideas, building too much too fast, and only later discovering customers don't care.  Perhaps most valuable is Alex's framework for balancing core business operations ("exploit") with future-focused innovation ("explore"). This practical approach helps organizations avoid the common trap of applying existing business rules to innovation projects—a mistake that almost guarantees failure. Whether you're leading a Fortune 500 company, building a startup, or reinventing your own career, this episode offers actionable insights to make innovation less of a gamble and more of a repeatable process. What You'll Learn From Volleyball to Strategy: How Alex's unlikely journey shaped his obsession with creating and simplifying tools for business. Why Business Plans Fail: The origin of the Business Model Canvas and why structure beats guesswork. AI & Innovation: What AI changes (everything) and what it doesn't (the fundamentals). Portfolio Thinking: Why great companies run many small bets, kill weak ones fast, and scale the winners. Avoiding Zombie Projects: How to spot and stop initiatives that drain resources but deliver no evidence of value. Systems, Not Slogans: Why excitement isn't enough—innovation needs the right structures, incentives, and processes to thrive. Personal Success Strategy: Alex's reflections on what success means beyond growth and money, and why defining your own metrics of success is essential. 

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at: OLDPodcast.com. Episode 1729: Dr. Jeff Cornwall explores how shifting from a faculty-centered to a customer-centered model in higher education could restore financial sustainability and relevance. He argues that colleges must adapt to student needs and preferences or risk becoming obsolete in an increasingly competitive and dynamic educational landscape. Read along with the original article(s) here: https://drjeffcornwall.com/2018/06/16/customer-higher-education/ Quotes to ponder: "The financial model for higher education is broken." "If colleges and universities want to survive, they must begin to treat students and their families as customers." "A customer-centered business model starts with understanding the needs of the customer, and then designing everything the business does around meeting those needs." Episode references: The Innovator's Dilemma: https://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Technologies-Management-Innovation/dp/1633691780 The Lean Startup: https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898 Business Model Generation: https://www.strategyzer.com/books/business-model-generation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at: OLDPodcast.com. Episode 1729: Dr. Jeff Cornwall explores how shifting from a faculty-centered to a customer-centered model in higher education could restore financial sustainability and relevance. He argues that colleges must adapt to student needs and preferences or risk becoming obsolete in an increasingly competitive and dynamic educational landscape. Read along with the original article(s) here: https://drjeffcornwall.com/2018/06/16/customer-higher-education/ Quotes to ponder: "The financial model for higher education is broken." "If colleges and universities want to survive, they must begin to treat students and their families as customers." "A customer-centered business model starts with understanding the needs of the customer, and then designing everything the business does around meeting those needs." Episode references: The Innovator's Dilemma: https://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Technologies-Management-Innovation/dp/1633691780 The Lean Startup: https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898 Business Model Generation: https://www.strategyzer.com/books/business-model-generation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ruud Hendriks en Richard Bross praten met Patrick van der Pijl. Patrick van der Pijl is strategisch ontwerper, ondernemer en CEO van Business Model Ink. Hij is medeproducent van de bestseller Business Model Generation en reist de wereld rond als innovatie-expert. In deze aflevering bespreken zij hoe Patrick de kracht van visuele strategie ontdekte, het belang van businessmodellen en hoe hij zijn bedrijf door moeilijke tijden leidde. In deze aflevering: Hoe Patrick zijn bedrijf opnieuw uitvond na de coronacrisis De kracht van het Business Model Canvas Waarom relevantie als ondernemer een continu werkwoord is Het persoonlijke verhaal achter Patrick's moeilijkste periode Hoe innovatie bedrijven helpt te overleven in een snel veranderende wereld Hashtags: #Doorzetters #PatrickVanDerPijl #Ondernemerschap #BusinessModel #BusinessModelGeneration #Podcast Contact Doorzetters: Feedback: bo@doorzetters.net  Contact: www.doorzetters.net/contact  Episode links Patrick van der Pijl: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/patrickpijl/ en https://www.instagram.com/businessmodelsinc/  X: https://x.com/BusModInc  Website: https://www.businessmodelsinc.com/en  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ppijl/ en https://www.linkedin.com/company/business-models-inc/  Sponsors: Amdax: https://amdax.com/nl - Veilig in crypto met de vertrouwde bewaarpartner van Nederland. Owow: https://owow.io/ - Innovatieve websites voor doorzetters. Sprints and Sneakers: https://www.sprintsandsneakers.com/ - Growth hacking voor jouw succes.   Timestamps: 0:00 – Introductie 4:00 – Hoe Patrick zijn bedrijf weer op de rails kreeg na de coronacrisis 10:30 – Het belang van visuele strategie in innovatie 20:15 – Hoe blijf je relevant als ondernemer? 30:45 – Patrick's moeilijkste periode: verlies en herstel 40:00 – De kracht van het Business Model Canvas Tips van deze aflevering: Tip van Richard: Blijf altijd innoveren en wees niet bang om te pivoteren. Tip van Patrick: Wees niet bang om hulp te vragen, zelfs op de moeilijkste momenten. Tip van Ruud: Relevantie blijft het belangrijkste. Blijf altijd werken aan je eigen innovatie. Doorzetters links: Website: www.doorzetters.net  Spotify: https://ap.lc/KsUHP  Apple Podcast: https://ap.lc/doByt  DoorzettersGPT: https://chatgpt.com/g/g-677919e6e49481918873dff89bea49e2-doorzetters   Social Media links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/doorzetters-podcast/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doorzetters_podcast/   TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@doorzetters_podcast  X (Twitter): https://x.com/DoorzettersX  BlueSky: @doorzetters.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at:⁠ ⁠⁠OLDPodcast⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠. Episode 1679: Christine Comaford breaks down the essentials of crafting a business plan that truly drives growth, emphasizing clarity, purpose, and alignment across teams. Learn how to communicate your vision, set achievable objectives, and engage both logic and emotion to create buy-in from investors and stakeholders. Read along with the original article(s) here: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠smarttribesinstitute⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠how⁠⁠-⁠⁠to⁠⁠-⁠⁠create⁠⁠-⁠⁠a⁠⁠-⁠⁠killer⁠⁠-⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠plan⁠⁠/⁠ Quotes to ponder: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." "A business plan is a tool that communicates your vision, inspires others to join you, and keeps everyone on track." "Facts tell. Stories sell." Episode references: Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠strategyzer⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠books⁠⁠/⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠model⁠⁠-⁠⁠generation⁠ Start With Why by Simon Sinek: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠amazon⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠Start⁠⁠-⁠⁠Why⁠⁠-⁠⁠Leaders⁠⁠-⁠⁠Inspire⁠⁠-⁠⁠Everyone⁠⁠/⁠⁠dp⁠⁠/1591846447⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at:⁠ ⁠⁠OLDPodcast⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠. Episode 1679: Christine Comaford breaks down the essentials of crafting a business plan that truly drives growth, emphasizing clarity, purpose, and alignment across teams. Learn how to communicate your vision, set achievable objectives, and engage both logic and emotion to create buy-in from investors and stakeholders. Read along with the original article(s) here: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠smarttribesinstitute⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠how⁠⁠-⁠⁠to⁠⁠-⁠⁠create⁠⁠-⁠⁠a⁠⁠-⁠⁠killer⁠⁠-⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠plan⁠⁠/⁠ Quotes to ponder: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." "A business plan is a tool that communicates your vision, inspires others to join you, and keeps everyone on track." "Facts tell. Stories sell." Episode references: Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠strategyzer⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠books⁠⁠/⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠model⁠⁠-⁠⁠generation⁠ Start With Why by Simon Sinek: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠amazon⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠Start⁠⁠-⁠⁠Why⁠⁠-⁠⁠Leaders⁠⁠-⁠⁠Inspire⁠⁠-⁠⁠Everyone⁠⁠/⁠⁠dp⁠⁠/1591846447⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at:⁠ ⁠⁠OLDPodcast⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠. Episode 1679: Christine Comaford breaks down the essentials of crafting a business plan that truly drives growth, emphasizing clarity, purpose, and alignment across teams. Learn how to communicate your vision, set achievable objectives, and engage both logic and emotion to create buy-in from investors and stakeholders. Read along with the original article(s) here: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠smarttribesinstitute⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠how⁠⁠-⁠⁠to⁠⁠-⁠⁠create⁠⁠-⁠⁠a⁠⁠-⁠⁠killer⁠⁠-⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠plan⁠⁠/⁠ Quotes to ponder: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." "A business plan is a tool that communicates your vision, inspires others to join you, and keeps everyone on track." "Facts tell. Stories sell." Episode references: Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠strategyzer⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠books⁠⁠/⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠model⁠⁠-⁠⁠generation⁠ Start With Why by Simon Sinek: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠amazon⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠Start⁠⁠-⁠⁠Why⁠⁠-⁠⁠Leaders⁠⁠-⁠⁠Inspire⁠⁠-⁠⁠Everyone⁠⁠/⁠⁠dp⁠⁠/1591846447⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at:⁠ ⁠⁠OLDPodcast⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠. Episode 1679: Christine Comaford breaks down the essentials of crafting a business plan that truly drives growth, emphasizing clarity, purpose, and alignment across teams. Learn how to communicate your vision, set achievable objectives, and engage both logic and emotion to create buy-in from investors and stakeholders. Read along with the original article(s) here: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠smarttribesinstitute⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠how⁠⁠-⁠⁠to⁠⁠-⁠⁠create⁠⁠-⁠⁠a⁠⁠-⁠⁠killer⁠⁠-⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠plan⁠⁠/⁠ Quotes to ponder: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it." "A business plan is a tool that communicates your vision, inspires others to join you, and keeps everyone on track." "Facts tell. Stories sell." Episode references: Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠strategyzer⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠books⁠⁠/⁠⁠business⁠⁠-⁠⁠model⁠⁠-⁠⁠generation⁠ Start With Why by Simon Sinek: ⁠https⁠⁠://⁠⁠www⁠⁠.⁠⁠amazon⁠⁠.⁠⁠com⁠⁠/⁠⁠Start⁠⁠-⁠⁠Why⁠⁠-⁠⁠Leaders⁠⁠-⁠⁠Inspire⁠⁠-⁠⁠Everyone⁠⁠/⁠⁠dp⁠⁠/1591846447⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In dieser Episode von Innovate or Cry diskutieren Manuel Kreutz und Babak Zeini die Bedeutung und die Methoden der Geschäftsmodellentwicklung. Sie beleuchten die Notwendigkeit neuer Geschäftsmodelle in der heutigen Zeit, die Rolle des Business Model Canvas als Strukturwerkzeug und die häufigsten Fehler, die bei der Entwicklung von Geschäftsmodellen gemacht werden. Wir geben Einblicke in die Anfänge unserer gemeinsamen Agentur und wie wir den Business Model Canvas eingesetzt haben. Zudem thematisieren wir erfolgreiche Beispiele und die Herausforderungen von Plattformgeschäftsmodellen. Zum Schluss kommen wir auf unser aktuelles Lieblingsthema (an dem wir nie vorbeikommen) und diskutieren zukünftige Trends und die Integration von KI in die Geschäftsmodellentwicklung.Kapitel00:00 Einführung in die Geschäftsmodellentwicklung03:02 Die Notwendigkeit neuer Geschäftsmodelle06:03 Innovationshöhen und Geschäftsmodelloptimierung08:57 Business Model Canvas als Strukturwerkzeug11:54 Praktische Anwendung des Business Model Canvas14:56 Marktanalyse und Rahmenbedingungen17:46 Iterativer Prozess der Geschäftsmodellentwicklung20:52 Fehler bei der Geschäftsmodellentwicklung24:13 Kardinalsfehler in der Geschäftsmodellentwicklung27:05 Plattformgeschäftsmodelle und deren Herausforderungen30:07 Beispiele erfolgreicher Geschäftsmodelle33:05 Fazit und Ausblick auf zukünftige Trends Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder is one of the world's most influential innovation experts, a leading author, entrepreneur and in-demand speaker whose work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started.Ranked No. 4 of the Thinkers50 list of the most influential management thinkers worldwide, Osterwalder is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual models. He invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map – practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies.Strategyzer, Osterwalder's company, provides online courses, applications, and technology-enabled services to help organizations effectively and systematically manage strategy, growth, and transformation.His books include the international bestseller Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want, Testing Business Ideas and The Invincible Company. The Profitable NutritionistMore clients, more money, more impact and more freedom without relying on social mediaListen on: Apple Podcasts SpotifySupport the Show.

SummaryThe conversation explores three main topics: business model resilience, AI, and environmental sustainability. The accessibility and democratisation of AI tools have made a significant impact on innovation and value creation. AI has the potential to propose better value propositions and even replace human managers. The integration of AI tools in consulting processes has resulted in faster results and improved efficiency. However, the development of better value propositions through the integration of different data sources is still a work in progress. In this conversation, Alex and Dominic discuss the potential of AI in innovation and business processes. They explore the idea of using AI to automate customer interviews and the impact it can have on the speed and efficiency of innovation. They also touch on the importance of environmental sustainability and the need for new business models that harmonize profit and impact. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the challenges and opportunities of AI and the importance of regulation.Keywordsbusiness model resilience, AI, environmental sustainability, accessibility, democratisation, innovation, value creation, value propositions, AI tools, consulting processes, data sources, AI, innovation, business processes, customer interviews, speed, efficiency, environmental sustainability, business models, profit, impact, regulationTakeawaysThe accessibility and democratization of AI tools have revolutionized innovation and value creation.AI has the potential to propose better value propositions and even replace human managers.The integration of AI tools in consulting processes has resulted in faster results and improved efficiency.The development of better value propositions through the integration of different data sources is still a work in progress. AI can greatly speed up the innovation process by automating tasks like customer interviews.Businesses need to embrace environmental sustainability and find new business models that harmonise profit and impact.Financial sustainability and resilient revenue models are crucial for the success of a business.Experimentation with pricing and revenue streams is essential for business growth.The rapid pace of change in AI presents both challenges and opportunities for entrepreneurs and innovators.Regulation is necessary to ensure the responsible and ethical use of AI.About Alex OsterwalderAlex Osterwalder is ranked in the top 10 on the Thinkers50 list of management thinkers worldwide. He is passionate about simplifying the complex challenges that today's leaders face. Along with Yves Pigneur, he invented the Business Model Canvas and other practical tools, which are now used by millions of practitioners around the globe.Strategyzer, the company Alex co-founded, provides technology-enabled innovation services to leading organisations, including Colgate-Palmolive, MasterCard and Merck. Alex spends most of his time advising leaders on how to scale their innovation efforts and get results. They already have the assets but lack the organisational design and innovation culture.His books include Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design, Testing Business Ideas, The Invincible Company, and High-Impact Tools for Teams. Together with his children he created Biz4Kids, a comic book to promote entrepreneurship.Chapters02:22 The Impact of AI on Innovation and Value Creation05:10 The Potential of AI in Proposing Value Propositions10:42 Challenges in Developing Better Value Propositions with AI30:30 Harmonising Profit and Impact: The Future of Business...

Bio   David is known for his ability to deliver inspiring and thought-provoking presentations that challenge audiences to think differently about innovation and product development. His keynotes and workshops are engaging and interactive, with a focus on real-world examples and case studies. David's message is relevant for entrepreneurs, executives, and organizations of all sizes and industries, and he illustrates concepts live on stage to leave attendees with concrete tools and techniques they can use to drive innovation and growth in their own business.   Interview Highlights 02:00 Early Startups 02:45 Dealing with uncertainty 04:25 Testing Business Ideas 07:35 Shifting mindsets 11:00 Transformational leadership 13:00 Desirable, viable, feasible 14:50 Sustainability 17:00 AI 22:50 Jobs, pains and gains 26:30 Extracting your assumptions 27:30 Mapping and prioritisation 28:10 Running experiments   Social Media   LinkedIn:  David Bland on LinkedIn Website:  davidjbland.com Company Website: Precoil YouTube: David Bland on YouTube     Books & Resources   ·         Testing Business Ideas: A Field Guide for Rapid Experimentation (The Strategyzer Series): David J. Bland, Alex Osterwalder ·         Assumptions Mapping Fundamentals Course: https://precoil.teachable.com/p/assumptions-mapping-fundamentals/ ·         The Invincible Company: How to Constantly Reinvent Your Organization with Inspiration From the World's Best Business Models (The Strategyzer Series): Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Alan Smith, Frederic Etiemble ·         Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want (The Strategyzer Series): Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Gregory Bernarda, Alan Smith, Trish Papadakos ·         The Lean Startup: How Constant Innovation Creates Radically Successful Businesses: Eric Ries ·         Interviewing Users: How to Uncover Compelling Insights- 2nd Edition, Steve Portigal ·         The Mom Test: How to Talk to Customers & Learn If Your Business Is a Good Idea When Everyone Is Lying to You, Rob Fitzpatrick ·         Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers (The Strategyzer Series): Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur ·         The Four Steps to the Epiphany: Successful Strategies for Products that Win: Steve Blank   Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I'm Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku   Hello everyone. I'm really honoured and pleased to introduce David Bland as my guest for this episode. He is the best-selling author of the book, Testing Business Ideas, and he's also the Founder of Precoil, an organisation that's focused on helping companies to find product market fits using Lean Start-up, Design Thinking and Business Model Innovation. He's not a newcomer to the world of Agile as well. So, David, it's an honour to have you on the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast. Thank you so much for making the time. David Bland   Yeah, thanks for inviting me on, I'm excited to be here. Ula Ojiaku   Right. So, where I usually start with all my guests, because personally, I am interested in the story behind the person - are there any happenings or experiences that have shaped you into who you are today? David Bland   Yeah, I think through childhood, dealing with a lot of uncertainty and then ended up going to school for design. I thought I was going to go a different career path and then at the last moment I was like, I want to really dig into design and I think people were sort of shocked by that, with the people around me, and so I really dove into that and then I came out of school thinking, oh, I might join a startup and retire in my mid 20s, because this is a .com craze, everyone was making all this money. Obviously, that didn't happen, but I learned a lot at the startups and I was introduced to Agile really early on in my career at startups because we had to go really fast and we were in a heavily regulated industry so we couldn't break stuff and we had to have kind of processes and everything. I did that for a while and then I realised, wow, there were some people that could learn from my mistakes, and so we kind of switched coasts. So we were near Washington DC for a while, and then we moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, and I started working with companies there, and I was like, well, let me see if I can just really dig in, help people learn how to apply stuff and coach them through it, and that was around 2010 or 2011 or so, and I've been doing it ever since, and I think why I love it so much is that it kind of helps people deal with uncertainty, gives them a process to deal with uncertainty, and at the same time, I have a hard time with uncertainty. So maybe it's kind of a little bit therapeutic for me to help others deal with uncertainty as well. So yeah, I just love what I do. Ula Ojiaku   And so you mentioned you don't like uncertainty, but helping other people deal with uncertainty helps you, that's interesting. Do you want to expand on that? David Bland   I mean, I very much like my routines and everything, and I feel like I come at it from a process point of view. So when I'm dealing with uncertainties, like, oh, what kind of process can I apply to that? So I feel a little better about things, even though there's a lot of stuff outside my control, at least I can have kind of a process. So I feel as if, when I'm dealing with people, I feel all of this anxiety, they're working on a new idea, they're not sure if it's going to be any good or not, giving them a process to work through it together, I don't really tell them if their idea is going to be good or not because who am I to judge their ideas most of the time? It's more about, well, here's a process you can apply to all that stuff you're working through and maybe you can come up to some sort of investment decision on whether or not you should go forward with that idea. So I feel as if my demeanour and everything comes off as someone that you're like, oh, I can talk to this guy and he's actually going to respect me, and so I feel like my style plus the uncertainty bit fits together really well. So I have a style where I come into orgs and say, you have a lot of uncertainty, here's a process, you're going to be fine, we're going to work through it together and it tends to work out pretty well. Ula Ojiaku   What comes across to me is that you give them tools or a process to help them hopefully come to an evidence-based conclusion without you having to share your opinion, or hopefully they don't have to have personal opinions imposing on whatever conclusion that is.   David Bland   Yeah, it's just a process.   Ula Ojiaku   And so what put you on the path to writing the book Testing Business Ideas, I was one of your students at the masterclass you and Alex Osterwalder ran during the covid lockdown, and you mentioned during that session, I don't know if you remember, that you probably went for a retreat somewhere, or you went on a hike as part of the writing process and that Alex gave you a hard time or something, so can you share your version of the story? David Bland   Oh yeah, I mean it was a joy writing with him. I think one of the difficult times for me writing that book…So first Alex approached me writing it and eventually, I mean initially it was just going to be me and then I mean he needed to be involved and so he played a big role strategically in helping me kind of think about the book writing process because I've never written a book like this and then also had it published and also did the whole four colour landscape style, very visual book. It's not that you just write an outline and then you start putting in words, it's a very different process. So yeah, he pushed me a little bit during that process, I would say, he would challenge some of my ideas and say like, are you explaining this in a way that where people can understand, you know? And so I feel as if it was a very productive process writing the book with him. It took about a year I would say. I think the way it came about was it was pretty much from my coaching, born out of my coaching, because I was helping companies with a lot of uncertainty, early stage ideas and they would say well we're now going to have interviews and we're going to do surveys and we're to build the whole thing. And it's like, well, there's other things you could do that are beyond interviews and surveys. And so he and I were continuously talking about this, and it's like, well, if people are only comfortable doing interviews and surveys they're not going to address all their risk, they're going to address a part of their risk, but not, you know, there's so much more they can do. And so, we started thinking about, well, is there a book that we could put that together and give people a resource guide? So, it's more like a textbook or almost something you would read in a university. My editor, I just spoke to him a couple weeks ago, he's like, this is required reading at Stanford now, and some other places in the university programs. And so it's very much like a textbook, you know, but the reason we wrote it was, you know, to help people find a path forward, to find a way to go and de-risk what they're working on. And so I felt it was very ambitious to put that all into a book, and of course, it has some flaws, but I think for the most part, it does the job, and that's why it's been really successful.   Ula Ojiaku   It is, in my experience, very well laid out. It takes a lot of work to distill these ideas into something that seems simple and easy to follow. So I do concur, it's been very helpful to me as well and the ideas. In your book, in the flap, it says, okay, the number one job as an innovator, entrepreneur, a corporation, is to test your business ideas to reduce the risk of failure. And I think you've alluded it, you've kind of touched on that in explaining how your career has gotten you where you are today. But what, in your experience, do you find leaders and organisations missing the most when it comes to testing ideas? David Bland   I think it's hard to unwind it all, because it goes back to how do you become a leader. And so, at least in Western, in the United States anyway, where I do some of my work, I feel as if it's very egocentric, it's very about what I can do and what I know. So there's a progression of becoming a leader where you grow up in an organisation because you have the answers, or at least you're able to convince people you know the answers, and then you're promoted and keep being promoted. And so when I'm coming in and saying, well, we might not know the answers, or we might need to test our way through and find the answers, it almost goes against that whole kind of almost like worldview you've built up or someone has built up over the years where it's about me. It has to be more than just about you as a person. It's like how do you enable leaders around you and how do you create more leaders around you and all that. And so I think where there's contradiction is this idea of, okay, I'm promoted to where I am because I have the answers, but now I want to enable people to test their way through things and find answers, and you almost need a feedback loop there of somebody that's willing to say, look, do you understand how you've unravelled some of this or how you've undermined things by saying, well, I know this is a good idea, so build it anyway. Or, that's not the test I would have ran, I would have done this other thing. You give people almost the benefit of your opinion, but they take it as marching orders, whether you realise it or not, and then it becomes this core of, why am I running tests at all because my leader is essentially going to tell me what to build. And so I think there's just some unpacking a bit of, well, I searched for the right answer in school and I was rewarded for that, and I went into business and I was rewarded for the right answer, and now we're telling you, there might not be a right answer, there are multiple right answers, and different paths and choices. And I think sometimes leaders have a hard time with that because it almost contradicts everything they've done in the past to be successful. Ula Ojiaku   So, what I'm hearing you say David is that in terms of, even before we get testing the ideas, please correct me if I'm wrong, it's that there needs to be a mindset shift, a paradigm shift of, you know, what leadership is all about, it's no longer going to be about the person who knows the way, who knows all the answers and tells people what to do, but moving from that to saying, hey, I recognise I have limits and I may not have all the answers and I empower you all for us to work together to test our way to find what the right path or direction would be. David Bland   Yeah, it's more about your leadership style and accountability. I think you severely limit what an organisation could do if everyone's relying on you for the answers. It's going to be really tough to scale that because if all answers have to come through you, then how do you scale? But also, it goes from transactional to transformational in a way. So transactional is, it's very much like, well, I want you to do something by this date on time, on budget, and on scope, and then basically hold you accountable to doing that, and then there's a very transactional level of leadership there. It's like, I asked you to do this thing, or told you to do this thing, you did this thing, so therefore I trust you. Where I'm trying get a bit deeper is, you know, well can you say, well, how do I empower a team to go find out what needs to be built, or if there's a real problem there, and then have them give me an account of, oh, we're making progress towards that, or you know what, we shouldn't go forward with this because this isn't worth pursuing, nobody has this problem, et cetera, and respecting their wishes or at least having a conversation about that. And so I think it does require a little bit of leadership. Looking at your style, looking at the words you use, looking at how you lead teams through uncertainty, which could be a little different than ‘I need this thing by this date and keep it under this cost and this scope' It's more about, well, we have an idea, we're not sure there's a market for it, can we go test that and see if there is and if it's viable for us and if we can actually do it? And it's a little different leadership style, and I think if you apply a transactional leadership style to trying to lead people through uncertainty, it just backfires, because it's very much like, run these experiments by this date, it doesn't empower the teams to be able to give an account of how they're addressing the risks. It's sort of a learning moment for leaders to say, oh, this leadership style that's worked really well for me in the past may not actually work really well for me here, it may work against me here in trying to drive out the uncertainty of this thing that we're trying to do. Ula Ojiaku   So if I may just build on your response to the question. What, in your experience, has helped, or could help, a leader who's used to, and has been in the past up until now rewarded for that transactional leadership, to make the switch to a transformational leadership? David Bland   I think asking them what they're worried about. I know people try to project confidence like they have the answers, but they don't, and so being able to be open, even if it's just a one-on-one, to say hey we have this thing where we think it might be a new business line or something that we're working on that's relatively new that we haven't done before, which is a lot of my clients, they're trying to do something that they haven't quite done before. It may not be too far away from what they're good at, but far enough away that they're worried, they're worried that it's not going to work. And so I try to get them and talk about what's keeping you up at night, what is worrying you about this, and then usually in the back of my head I'm saying, okay, what can I map that to? So I love the desirable, viable, feasible framing. I use it a lot from design thinking, user centre design. So if they're worried about the customer or there's not enough, you know, there's not really a job to be done there, I map that back to, okay, he's worried about desirability or she's worried about desirability. And if they're talking about, oh, we don't know if people will pay enough for this, or if we can keep costs low enough, you know, that's like I map it back to viability, right? And then if it's more about, I actually don't know if we're organised well enough as a company to do this and really execute on it and I map it back to feasibility. And then from there, it's more like, well how will we go test that since you're worried about it, rather than just build the whole thing and launch and see what happens. And so I try to kind of, I'd be really careful of the words I'm using and I'm trying to coach them into a moment where it's okay, just let's be open and transparent that it's not just about executing a bunch of things and then we're okay. It's more about, you know, what are we worried about and then how do we go address those worries sooner versus later. And so I try not to come at them with a bunch of canvases and a bunch of mapping tools and a bunch of stuff that would make them feel defensive because one, they probably have not had experience with those, and two, it's like, oh, this consultant's more interested in the tools than helping me, you know. So I try to use words that really kind of get at, what are you worried about and then how can we go test that and then kind of back away into the process from there? Ula Ojiaku   Well, it does seem like you apply quite some psychology to the whole approach, because it's really about meeting people where they're at. And I am, just back to your point about viability, desirability and feasibility. There is a school of knowledge, I mean, you are the expert here, so I'm deferring, but there's a school of knowledge that would add also like the sustainability parts to it. Or do you think it's separate from those attributes when you're looking at ideas? David Bland   Yeah. Well, I work on a lot of sustainable projects at the moment. Well, even over the last several years I've been working on companies trying to be more sustainable. So companies are manufacturing phones, they want their phones to be all recyclable materials, they want fully recyclable phones let's say. So I'm working on very cutting edge sustainability projects, but I still don't introduce it as another circle because I'm trying to keep it very simple. And so I know there are different flavours of it. I know some people add sustainability, some people add adaptability, some people add ethics, usability. Before I know it, it's just, you end up with seven circles and different themes, so I really try to keep it very simple. Even Alex and I talk about adaptability, because that was a theme that didn't quite make it into the book, but he talks about it in The Invincible Company, which is the book he wrote immediately after the one we wrote together. So I have ways of addressing those things, but I don't necessarily want to add a bunch of extra themes, because I feel like it's already challenging people with a bunch of ‘ility' words. I noticed they get confused even with the three. No matter how well I explain it, I'll see things like, things that are about building it, and reframed as desirability, and I'm like no, no, that isn't about the customer. I mean yes, of course we have to build what they need, but building it is more about feasibility. So even with the three I see people get confused so I just try to stick to the three as best I can, but basically we go into sustainability projects, still using those three, with sustainability top of mind. So I don't really call it out as a separate theme but I certainly take it into consideration when we're working on those projects.   Ula Ojiaku   Okay, just keeping it simple. Okay, thanks for that, David. So there are some instances where the people will consider probably are outliers to the known proven principles of design thinking, of product development, customer discovery. And I can't remember, I mean, I would have attributed it to the person, but I was just reading a tweet from someone who is known in the product development world and he was saying that if, he wouldn't have guessed that with the advent of or the popularity of Generative AI, that ChatGPT, according to his books, you know, broke all the rules of products, discovery products, development in the sense that there, and I wasn't aware that they were, Open AI was doing lots of market research to say, hey, what do you want from an AI assistant or Generative AI? But within months of releasing it to the public, they gained millions of users. So what's your thought on this? Would you say it was an outlier or is it that there were some principles working in the background that we are not aware of? David Bland   I imagine there's a lot going on we're not aware of. It reminds me of the older conversations about the iPhone. There was this air of, Steve Jobs had this single brilliant idea about the iPhone and then willed it into being and then everyone, it was wildly successful, right? But I look at, even like the first iPhone as, in a way it was kind of a minimum viable product. I mean, the hardware was pretty solid, but the software, the OS was not. I mean, it didn't have really basic stuff that we would expect that we had on other things like Blackberries at the time. You couldn't copy and paste, there were some things that were missing and people viewed it as a toy and they kind of laughed at it, you know, and then they iterated on it. I would say it was about iPhone three or four, by the time they really started to get market fit with it, and then you see, you know, people you wouldn't expect with iPhones with their iPhone. You're like, wait a second, that person has an iPhone. But that took a while, you know. And I think with Open AI, it's kind of a, we're still in the early stages of a lot of this, I feel, and I'm not really sure how it's going to shake out, but I imagine, you know, they seem to be very iterative about how they're going about it, you know. So I don't know how they went about the creation of it at first, but I feel as if at least now they're taking feedback. They're not just building stuff people are asking for, but they're looking at, well these people are asking for this, but why are they asking for it and what are they trying to achieve and how might we achieve that by releasing something that solves for that. And that's kind of your job, right? It's not just to build what people ask for. It's more about getting to the need behind what they're asking for, and there might be a more elegant way to solve for what they're asking for. But there's also some backlash with AI. So I see some things happening where a lot of my corporate clients have just banned it at the firewall, they don't want their employees even accessing it. They want to keep it within the company walls, so to speak, which is going to be kind of challenging to do, although there are some solutions they're employing to do that. I also see people taking it and, you know, interviewing fake users and saying, I can validate my idea because they asked OpenAI and it said it was a good idea, so I don't have to talk to customers. And it's like, okay, so they're taking some kind of persona from people and kind of building up a thing where you interact with it, and it seems very confident in it. It seems very confident in its statements. Like, that's the thing that I've noticed with OpenAI and a lot of this ChatGPT stuff is that it can be like really confidently wrong, but you find security in that confidence, right? And so I do see people saying, well I don't have to talk to customers, I just typed in ChatGPT and asked them. And I said, this is the kind of customer, what would that customer want? And it can literally generate personas that can generate canvases. It can do a lot that makes you seem like they are good answers. You could also just click regenerate and then it'll come up with really confident, completely different answers. So I think there's still a way where we can use it to augment what we do, I'm still a big believer in that, because I think it's really hard to scale research sometimes, especially if they have a small team, you're in a Startup. I think we can use AI to help scale it in some ways, but I think we just have to be careful about using it as the single source of truth for things because in the end it's still people and we're still, find all the tech problems, still people problems. And so I think we have to be careful of how we use AI in Agile and research and product development in general. Ula Ojiaku   Completely agree, and the thing about being careful, because the AI or the model is still trained at the end of the day by humans who have their blind spots and conscious or unconscious biases. So the output you're going to get is going to be as good as whatever information or data the person or persons who trained the model would have. So what I'm still hearing from you if I may use Steve Blank's words would be still get out of the building and speak to real customers. I mean, that could be a starting point or that could be something you augment with, but the real validation is in the conversation with the people who use or consume your products. David Bland   I think the conversations are still important. I think where it gets misconstrued a bit is that, well people don't know what they want, so we shouldn't talk to them. I think that's an excuse, you should still talk to them. The teams that I work with talk to customers every week quite often, and so we want that constant contact with customers and we want to understand their world, we want to find new insights, we want to find out what they're trying to do and trying to achieve, because sometimes that can unlock completely new ideas and new ways to make money and new ways to help them. I think this idea of, well, we can't talk to customers because we don't have a solution ready or we can't talk to customers because they don't know what they want, I feel as if those aren't really the reasons you should be talking to customers. With discovery, you're trying to figure out the jobs, pains and gains, test value prop with them, continue to understand them better. And if you pay attention to your customers, there's this great Bezos quote, right. If you pay attention to your customers and your competitors are paying attention to you, you're going to be fine because you are, they're getting lagging information, right? You're really deeply connected to your customers, and so I just think we've somehow built this culture over time where we can't bother customers, we can't confuse them, we can't come to them unless we have a polished solution and I think that's becoming less and less relevant as we go to co-creation. We go more to really deeply understanding them. I think we have to be careful of this culture of we can't bother them unless we have a polished solution to put in front of them, I don't think that's where we're headed with modern product management. Ula Ojiaku   And someone might be saying, listening to, whilst I've gone through your masterclass, I've read your book, but someone might say, well, do you mean by jobs, pains and gains with respect to customers? Could you just expand on those, please? David Bland   Yeah, if you look at the, so my co-author Alex Osterwalder, if you go back to the book before Testing Business Ideas, there's a Value Proposition Design book where we have the value prop canvas. If you look at the circle in that book, so the tool kind of has a square and a circle, and we usually start with a circle side, which is a customer profile. And with the profile, you're really trying to think of a role or even a person, you're not trying to do it at the org level, you're trying to think of an actual human being. And in that, we kind of break it down into three sections. One is customer jobs to be done. So you can think about, you know, one of the functional, usually functional jobs that tasks are trying to do, you could also weave in, you know, social jobs, emotional supporting, it can get really complicated, but I try to keep it simple. But one way to find out those jobs is by talking to customers, right? Then next are the pain points. So what are the pain points that customers are experiencing, usually related to the jobs they're trying to do. So if they're trying to do a task, here's all the stuff that's making it really hard to do that task. Some of it's directly related, some of it's tangential, it's there, it's like these impediments that are really, you know, these pains that they're experiencing. And then the third one is gains. So we're looking for what are the gains that can be created if they're able to either do this task really well, or we're able to remove these pains, like what are some things that they would get out of it. And it's not always a one to one to one kind of relationship. Sometimes it's, oh, I want peer recognition, or I want a promotion, or, you know, there are some things that are tangential that are related to gains, so I love that model because when we go and we start doing discovery with customers, we can start to understand, even in Agile right. If we're doing discovery on our stories, you know, we're trying to figure out what are they trying to achieve? And then is this thing we're about to build going to help them achieve that? You know, what are the pains we're experiencing? Can we have characteristics or features that address these big pain points they're experiencing? And then let's just not solely focus on the pains, let's also think about delighters and gains and things we could do that like kind of make them smile and make them have a good day, right? And so what are some things that we could do to help them with that? And so I love that framing because it kind of checks a lot of the boxes of can they do the task, but also, can we move the pains that they're experiencing trying to do it and then can we can we help create these aha moments, these gains for them? Ula Ojiaku   Thank you, and thanks for going into that and the definitions of those terms. Now, let's just look at designing experiments and of course for the listeners or people if you're watching on YouTube, please get the book, Testing Business Ideas, there's a wealth of information there. But at a high level, David, can you share with us what's the process you would advise for one to go through in designing, OK yes, we have an idea, it's going to change the world, but what's the process you would recommend at a high level for testing this out? David Bland   At a high level, it's really three steps. The first is extracting your assumptions. So that's why I like the desirable, viable, feasible framing. If you have other things you want to use, that's fine, but I use desirable, viable, feasible and I extract. So, what's your risk around the market, the customer, their jobs to be done, the value prop, all that. Viability is what's your risk around revenue, cost, can you keep cost low enough, can you make money with this in some way, make it sustained? And then feasibility is much more, can you do it, can you execute it, are there things that prevent you from just executing on it and delivering it? So that step one is just extracting those, because this stuff is usually inside your head, you're worried about it, some of them might be written down, some of them might not be. If you're in a team, it's good to have perspectives, get people that can talk to each theme together and compromise and come together. The second part of the process is mapping and prioritisation. So we want to map and focus on the assumptions that we've extracted that are the most important, where we have the least amount of evidence. So if we're going to focus experimentation, I want to focus on things that make a big difference and not necessarily play in a space that's kind of fun to play in and we can do a bunch of experiments, but it doesn't really pay down our risk. And so I like focusing on what would be called like a leap of faith assumption, which I know Eric Ries uses in Lean Startup, it also goes back to probably like Kierkegaard or something, and then Riskiest Assumption is another way you can frame it, like what are the Riskiest Assumptions, but basically you're trying to say what are the things that are most important, where we have least amount of evidence. So that's step two, prioritisation with mapping. And then step three is running experiments. And so we choose the top right, because we've extracted using the themes, we have desirable, viable, feasible. We can use that to help match experiments that will help us pay down the risk, and so I always look for mismatch things. Like you're not going to pay down your feasibility risk by running customer interviews, that doesn't help you whether or not you can deliver it. So making sure that you're matching your risk, and that's kind of where the book plays in mostly because we have 44 experiments that are all organised by desirable, viable, feasible, and then we have like cost, setup time, runtime, evidence, strength, capabilities. There's like a bunch of kind of information radiators on there to help you choose, and so we basically run experiments to then go and find out, you know, are these things that have to be true, that we don't have a lot of evidence to prove them out, are they true or not? And so we start then using this process to find out and then we come back and update our maps and update our artefacts, but that's kind of the three step process would be extract, map and then test.   Ula Ojiaku   Thank you. Would you say that there is a time when the testing stops? David Bland   I would say it never completely stops, or at least hopefully it doesn't completely stop. Even if you're using discovery and delivery, I find that usually in the beginning there's a lot of discovery and maybe a little bit of delivery or almost no delivery, and then as you de-risk you have kind of like more delivery and then a little bit less discovery. And then maybe if you're in a kind of repeatable mode where you're trying to scale something there's a lot of delivery and a little bit of discovery, but where I get really nervous are teams that kind of have a phase or a switch and they say, okay, we've done all the discovery now we're just going to build and deliver. I feel as if that constant contact with customers, being able to constantly understand them, their needs are going to change over time as you scale, it's going to change things, and so I get really nervous when teams want to just kind of act like it's a phase and we're done with our testing, right, we're done with our discovery. And I feel great organisations are always discovering to an extent. So it's just really finding the balance with your teams and with your orgs, like how much delivery do you have to do? How much discovery do you need to kind of inform that delivery? So ideally it doesn't stop, but the percentage of discovery you're doing in testing will most likely change over time. Ula Ojiaku   So in the world of Agile, Agile with a capital A in terms of the frameworks that originated from software development, the role of the Product Owner/Product Manager is typically associated with ensuring that this sort of continuous exploration and discovery is carried out throughout the product's lifecycle. Do you have any thoughts on this notion or idea? David Bland   I think there's always some level of risk and uncertainty in your backlog and in your roadmaps. So people in charge of product should be helping reduce that uncertainty. Now, it's usually not on their own, they'll pair with a researcher, maybe a designer. They might even be pairing with software developers to take notes during interviews and things like that to socialise how they're paying down the risk. But I think if you look at your backlog, you're kind of looking at middle to bottom and saying, oh, there's a lot of uncertainty here, I'm not really sure if you should even be working on these. So part of that process should be running discovery on it, and so I try to socialise it. So if you're in your Standups, talk about some of the discovery work you're doing, if you're in planning, plan out some of the discovery work you're doing, it's just going to help you build this overall cohesive idea of, well, I'm seeing something come in that I have to work on, but it's not the first time I've seen it, and I kind of understand the why, I understand that we did discovery on it to better understand and inform this thing and shape what I'm about to work on, and so I think it helps create those like touch points with your team. Ula Ojiaku   Thank you for that, David. So let's go on. There is, of course, your really, really helpful book,  personally I have used it and I've taken, I've not done all the experiments there, but definitely some of the experiments I have coached teams or leaders and organisations on how to use that. But apart from Testing Business Ideas, are there other books that you have found yourself recommending to people on this topic? David Bland   Yeah, I think there's some that go deeper, right, on a specific subject. So for example, interviews, that can be a tool book itself, right, and so there's some great books out there. Steve Portigal has some great books on understanding how to conduct interviews. I also like The Mom Test, well I don't like the title of the book, the content is pretty good, which is basically how to really do a customer interview well and not ask like, closed-ended leading bias questions that just get the answers you want so you can just jump to build, you know. So there are some books I keep coming back to as well. And then there's still some older books that, you know, we built on, foundationally as part of Testing Business Ideas, right? So if you look at Business Model Generation from Alex Osterwalder, Value Prop Design, the Testing Business Ideas book fits really well in that framework. And while I reference Business Model Canvas and Value Prop Canvas in Testing Business Ideas, I don't deep dive on it because there's literally two books that dive into that. A lot of the work we've built upon is Steve Blank's work from Four Steps to the Epiphany and I think people think that that book's dated for some reason now, but it's very applicable, especially B2B discovery. And so I constantly with my B2B startups and B2B corporations, I'm constantly referring them back to that book as a model for looking at how you go about this process from customer discovery to customer validation. So yeah, there are some ones I keep coming back to. Some of the newer ones, there are some books on scaling because I don't, I'm usually working up until product market fit, you know, and I don't have a lot of growth experiments in there. So there are some books now starting to come out about scaling, but I think if you're looking at Testing Business Ideas and saying, oh, there's something here and it kind of covers it, but I want to go a lot deeper, then it's finding complimentary books that help you go deeper on a specific thing, because Testing Business Ideas are more like a library and a reference guide and a process of how to go through it. It would have been like two or three times in length if we'd gone really, really deep on everything, so I think 200 pages of experiments was a pretty good quantity there. And so I'm often, I'm referring books that go deeper on a specific thing where people want to learn more.   Ula Ojiaku   Thank you for that. So if the audience, they've listened to what you have to say and they're like, I think I need to speak with David, how can they reach you? David Bland   Yeah, I mean, davidjbland.com is a great place to go, that's me, you can read about me, you can watch videos on me presenting. I have, you know, videos of me presenting at conferences, but also, there's a YouTube channel you can go to where I have some of my webinars that are free to watch as well, and just little coaching videos I make where I'm like, hey, I have a team that's really struggling with this concept and I just kind of make a quick YouTube video helping people out to say this is how I'm addressing this with, you know, with a team. Also Precoil, P-R-E-C-O-I-L, that's my company, and so there's a lot of great content there as well. And then just in general social media, although I have to say I'm pulling back on social media a little bit. So, I would say for the most part LinkedIn is a great place to find me, I'm usually posting memes about customer discovery and videos and things just trying to help people, like make you laugh and educate you, and so LinkedIn, surprisingly, I don't think I'd ever say like, oh, come check me out on LinkedIn, you know, five or ten years ago, but now that's where I spend a lot of my time, and I feel like that's where my customers are and that's where I can help them, so yeah, I end up spending a lot of time on LinkedIn too.   Ula Ojiaku   Yeah, some of your memes there like, I mean, how do I put it, just gets me up in stitches. Yeah, I don't know how you find them or do you commission actors to do some of them, but yeah, it's good. So yeah, so LinkedIn, social media is the main place, and your websites, those would be in the show notes. I also heard you do have a course, an online course. Can you tell us about that? David Bland   Yeah, this summer, I finally found some space to put together my thoughts into an Assumptions Mapping Course. So that is on Teachable. I'm going to be building it out with more courses, but I've just had enough people look at that two by two and read the book and say, I think I know how to facilitate this, but I'm not sure, and so I literally just went like step by step with a with a case study and it has some exercises as well where you can see how to set up the agenda, how to do the pre work for it, who you need in the room for it, how to facilitate it, what traps to look out for because sometimes, you know, you're trying to facilitate this priority sort of exercise and then things go wry. So I talked about some of the things I've learned over the years facilitating it and then what to do a little bit after. So yeah, it's a pretty just like bite-sized hands-on oh, I want to learn this and I want to go try with the team or do it myself. So yeah, I do have a new course that I launched that just walks people step by step like I would be coaching them. Ula Ojiaku OK, and do you mind mentioning out loud the website, is it precoil.teachable.com and they can find your Assumptions Mapping Fundamentals Course there?   David Bland   Correct. It's on precoil.teachable.com   Ula Ojiaku   OK, and search for Assumptions Mapping Fundamentals by David Bland. Right, so are there any final words of wisdom that you have for the audience, David. David Bland   Try to keen an open mind when you're going through a lot of this work. I feel as if the mindset is so important, you know. So if you're taking this checkbox mentality, you're not going to get the results out of following any of these processes, right. So, I think being able this idea of, oh, I'm opening myself to the idea that there's some assumptions here that may not be true, that I should probably test. It shouldn't be an exercise where you're just checking the box saying, yep, I wrote down my assumption and then, yeah, I ran an experiment that validated that and then move on, you know. It's more about the process of trying to, because your uncertainty and risk kind of move around. So, this idea of mindset, I can't stress enough that try and keep an open mind and then be willing to learn things that maybe you weren't expected to learn, and I think all these great businesses we look at over the years, they started off as something else, or some form of something else, and then they happened upon something that was an aha moment during the process, and I think that's, we have to be careful of rewriting history and saying it was somebody, it was a genius and he had a single brilliant idea, and then just built the thing and made millions. Very rarely does that ever occur. And so I think when you start really unwinding and it's about having an open mind, being willing to learn things that maybe you didn't anticipate, and I think just that mindset is so important. Ula Ojiaku   Thanks. I don't mean to detract from what you've said, but what I'm hearing from you as well is that it's not a linear process. So whilst you might have, in the book and the ideas you've shared, you know, kind of simplifying it, there are steps, but sometimes there might be loops to it too, so having an open mind to know that's something that worked today or something you got a positive result from, might not necessarily work tomorrow, it's, there's always more and it's an iterative journey.   David Bland   It's quite iterative.   Ula Ojiaku   Yeah. Well thank you so much David for this, making the time for this conversation. I really learned a lot and I enjoyed the conversation. Many thanks.   David Bland   Thanks for having me. Ula Ojiaku   My pleasure. That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com or your favourite podcast provider. Also share with friends and do leave a review on iTunes. This would help others find this show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com Take care and God bless!   

Bio Luke Hohmann is Chief Innovation Officer of Applied Frameworks. Applied Frameworks helps companies create more profitable software-enabled solutions. A serial entrepreneur, Luke founded, bootstrapped, and sold the SaaS B2B collaboration software company Conteneo to Scaled Agile, Inc. Conteneo's Weave platform is now part of SAFe Studio. A SAFe® Fellow, prolific author, and trailblazing innovator, Luke's contributions to the global agile community include contributing to SAFe, five books, Profit Streams™, Innovation Games®, Participatory Budgeting at enterprise scale, and a pattern language for market-driven roadmapping. Luke is also co-founder of Every Voice Engaged Foundation, where he partnered with The Kettering Foundation to create Common Ground for Action, the world's first scalable platform for deliberative decision-making. Luke is a former National Junior Pairs Figure Skating Champion and has an M.S.E. in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Michigan. Luke loves his wife and four kids, his wife's cooking, and long runs in the California sunshine and Santa Cruz mountains.    Interview Highlights 01:30 Organisational Behaviour & Cognitive Psychology 06:10 Serendipity 09:30 Entrepreneurship 16:15 Applied Frameworks 20:00 Sustainability 20:45 Software Profit Streams 23:00 Business Model Canvas 24:00 Value Proposition Canvas 24:45 Setting the Price 28:45 Customer Benefit Analysis 34:00 Participatory Budgeting 36:00 Value Stream Funding 37:30 The Color of Money 42:00 Private v Public Sector 49:00 ROI Analysis 51:00 Innovation Accounting    Connecting   LinkedIn: Luke Hohmann on LinkedIn Company Website: Applied Frameworks    Books & Resources   ·         Software Profit Streams(TM): A Guide to Designing a Sustainably Profitable Business: Jason Tanner, Luke Hohmann, Federico González ·         Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers (The Strategyzer series): Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur ·         Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want (The Strategyzer Series): Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Gregory Bernarda, Alan Smith, Trish Papadakos ·         Innovation Games: Creating Breakthrough Products Through Collaborative Play: Luke Hohmann ·         The ‘Color of Money' Problem: Additional Guidance on Participatory Budgeting - Scaled Agile Framework ·         The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses, Eric Ries ·         Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change 2, Kent Beck, Cynthia Andres ·         The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering: Brooks, Frederick Phillips ·         Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, Scott McCloud ·         Ponyboy: A Novel, Eliot Duncan ·         Lessons in Chemistry: A Novel, Bonnie Garmus, Miranda Raison, Bonnie Garmus, Pandora Sykes ·         What Happened to You?: Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing, Oprah Winfrey, Bruce D. Perry ·         Training | Applied Frameworks   Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I'm Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener.  Ula Ojiaku   So I have with me Luke Hohmann, who is a four time author, three time founder, serial entrepreneur if I say, a SAFe fellow, so that's a Skilled Agile Framework fellow, keynote speaker and an internationally recognised expert in Agile software development. He is also a proud husband and a father of four. So, Luke, I am very honoured to have you on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. Thank you for making the time. Luke Hohmann Thank you so much for having me, I'm very happy to be here, and hi everyone who's listening. Ula Ojiaku Yes, I'm sure they're waving back at you as well. I always start my conversations with my guests to find out about them as individuals, you know, so who is Luke? You have a BSc in Computer Science and an MSc in Computer Science and Engineering, but you also studied Cognitive Psychology and Organisational Behaviour in addition to Data Structures and Artificial Intelligence. AI is now making waves and is kind of at the forefront, which is interesting, you had the foresight to also look into these. So my question is, what took you down this path? Luke Hohmann Sure. I had a humble beginning in the world of technology. I worked for a large company, Electronic Data Systems, and it was founded in the mid 60s by a gentleman named Ross Perot, and it became a very, very large company. So my first job at Electronic Data Systems was working in a data centre, and we know what data centres are, but back then, data centres were different because they were predominantly mainframe-based data centres, and I would crawl underneath the floor, cabling the computers and cabling networking equipment. Now, when we think networking, we're really thinking one of two kinds of networking. We think of wireless networking or we think of some form of internet networking, but back in those days, there were varieties of network protocols, literally the standards that we use now weren't invented yet. So it was mainframe networking protocols and dial ups and other forms of networking protocols. From there, I worked my way from beneath the ground up. I had some great managers who saw someone who was worthy of opportunity and they gave me opportunity and it was great. And then eventually I started working in electronic data systems and there was, the first wave of AI came in the mid 80s and that's when we were doing things like building expert systems, and I managed to create with a colleague of mine, who's emerged as my best friend, a very successful implementation of an expert system, an AI-based expert system at EDS, and that motivated me to finish off my college degree, I didn't have my college degree at the time. So EDS supported me in going to the University of Michigan, where as you said, I picked up my Bachelor's and Master's degree, and my advisor at the time was Elliot Soloway, and he was doing research in how programmers program, what are the knowledge structures, what are the ways in which we think when we're programming, and I picked up that research and built programming environments, along with educational material, trying to understand how programmers program and trying to build educational material to teach programming more effectively. That's important because it ignited a lifelong passion for developing education materials, etc. Now the cognitive psychology part was handled through that vein of work, the organisational behaviour work came as I was a student at Michigan. As many of us are when we're in college, we don't make a lot of money, or at university we're not wealthy and I needed a job and so the School of Organisational Behaviour had published some job postings and they needed programmers to program software for their organisational behaviour research, and I answered those ads and I became friends and did the research for many ground-breaking aspects of organisational behaviour and I programmed, and in the process of programming for the professors who were in the School of Organisational Behaviour they would teach me about organisational behaviour and I learned many things that at the time were not entirely clear to me, but then when I graduated from university and I became a manager and I also became more involved in the Agile movement, I had a very deep foundation that has served me very well in terms of what do we mean when we say culture, or what do we mean when we talk about organisational structures, both in the small and in the large, how do we organise effectively, when should we scale, when should we not scale, etc. So that's a bit about my history that I think in terms of the early days helped inform who I am today. Ula Ojiaku Wow, who would have thought, it just reminds me of the word serendipity, you know, I guess a happy coincidence, quote unquote, and would there be examples of where the cognitive psychology part of it also helped you work-wise? Luke Hohmann Yeah, a way to think about cognitive psychology and the branch that, I mean there's, psychology is a huge branch of study, right? So cognitive psychology tends to relate to how do we solve problems, and it tends to focus on problem solving where n = 1 and what I mean by n is the number of participants, and where n is just me as an individual, how do I solve the problems that I'm facing? How do I engage in de-compositional activities or refinement or sense making? Organisational behaviour deals with n > 1. So it can deal with a team of, a para-bond, two people solving problems. It can deal with a small team, and we know through many, many, many decades of research that optimal team structures are eight people or less. I mean, we've known this for, when I say decades I mean millennia. When you look at military structure and military strategy, we know that people need to be organised into much smaller groups to be effective in problem solving and to move quickly. And then in any organisational structure, there's some notion of a team of teams or team engagement. So cognitive psychology, I think, helps leaders understand individuals and their place within the team. And now we talk about, you know, in the Agile community, we talk about things like, I want T-shaped people, I want people with common skills and their area of expertise and by organising enough of the T's, I can create a whole and complete team. I often say I don't want my database designer designing my user interface and I don't want my user interface designer optimising my back end database queries, they're different skills. They're very educated people, they're very sophisticated, but there's also the natural feeling that you and I have about how do I gain a sense of self, how do I gain a sense of accomplishment, a sense of mastery? Part of gaining a sense of mastery is understanding who you are as a person, what you're good at. In Japanese, they would call that Ikigai, right, what are the intersections of, you know, what do I love, what am I good at, what can I make a living at and what do people need, right? All of these intersections occur on an individual level, and then by understanding that we can create more effective teams. Ula Ojiaku Thank you. I've really learned something key here, the relationship between cognitive psychology and organisational behaviour, so thanks for breaking it down. Now, can we go quickly to your entrepreneurship? So there must be three times you started three times a company and you've been successful in that area. What exactly drives you when it comes to establishing businesses and then knowing when to move on? Luke Hohmann Sure. I think it's a combination of reflecting on my childhood and then looking at how that informs someone when they're older, and then opportunities, like you said, serendipity, I think that's a really powerful word that you introduced and it's a really powerful concept because sometimes the serendipity is associated with just allowing yourself to pursue something that presents itself. But when I was young, my father died and my mum had to raise six kids on her own, so my dad died when I was four, my mum raised six kids on her own. We were not a wealthy family, and she was a school teacher and one of the things that happened was, even though she was a very skilled school teacher, there were budget cuts and it was a unionised structure, and even though she was ranked very highly, she lost her job because she was low on the hiring totem pole in terms of how the union worked. It was very hard and of course, it's always hard to make budget cuts and firing but I remember when I was very young making one of those choices saying, I want to work in a field where we are more oriented towards someone's performance and not oriented on when they were hired, or the colour of their skin, or their gender or other things that to me didn't make sense that people were making decisions against. And while it's not a perfect field for sure, and we've got lots of improvement, engineering in general, and of course software engineering and software development spoke to me because I could meet people who were diverse or more diverse than in other fields and I thought that was really good. In terms of being an entrepreneur, that happened serendipitously. I was at the time, before I became an entrepreneur in my last job, was working for an Israeli security firm, and years and years ago, I used to do software anti-piracy and software security through physical dongles. This was made by a company called Aladdin Knowledge Systems in Israel, and I was the head of Engineering and Product Management for the dongle group and then I moved into a role of Business Development for the company. I had a couple of great bosses, but I also learned how to do international management because I had development teams in Israel, I had development teams in Munich, I had development teams in Portland, Oregon, and in the Bay Area, and this was in the 2000s. This is kind of pre-Agile, pre-Salt Lake City, pre-Agile Manifesto, but we were figuring things out and blending and working together. I thought things were going pretty well and I enjoyed working for the Israelis and what we were doing, but then we had the first Gulf War and my wife and I felt that maybe traveling as I was, we weren't sure what was going to happen in the war, I should choose something different. Unfortunately, by that time, we had been through the dot-bomb crisis in Silicon Valley. So it's about 2002 at the time that this was going on, and there really weren't jobs, it was a very weird time in Silicon Valley. So in late 2002, I sent an email to a bunch of friends and I said, hey, I'm going to be a consultant, who wants to hire me, that was my marketing plan, not very clever, and someone called me and said, hey, I've got a problem and this is the kind of thing that you can fix, come consult with us. And I said, great. So I did that, and that started the cleverly named Luke Hohmann Consulting, but then one thing led to another and consulting led to opportunities and growth and I've never looked back. So I think that there is a myth about people who start companies where sometimes you have a plan and you go execute your plan. Sometimes you find the problem and you're solving a problem. Sometimes the problem is your own problem, as in my case I had two small kids and a mortgage and I needed to provide for my family, and so the best way to do that at the time was to become a consultant. Since then I have engaged in building companies, sometimes some with more planning, some with more business tools and of course as you grow as an entrepreneur you learn skills that they didn't teach you in school, like marketing and pricing and business planning etc. And so that's kind of how I got started, and now I have kind of come full circle. The last company, the second last company I started was Conteneo and we ended up selling that to Scaled Agile, and that's how I joined the Scaled Agile team and that was lovely, moving from a position of being a CEO and being responsible for certain things, to being able to be part of a team again, joining the framework team, working with Dean Leffingwell and other members of the framework team to evolve the SAFe framework, that was really lovely. And then of course you get this entrepreneurial itch and you want to do something else, and so I think it comes and goes and you kind of allow yourself those opportunities. Ula Ojiaku Wow, yours is an inspiring story. And so what are you now, so you've talked about your first two Startups which you sold, what are you doing now? Luke Hohmann Yeah, so where I'm at right now is I am the Chief Innovation Officer for a company, Applied Frameworks. Applied Frameworks is a boutique consulting firm that's in a transition to a product company. So if this arm represents our product revenue and this arm represents our services revenue, we're expanding our product and eventually we'll become a product company. And so then the question is, well, what is the product that we're working on? Well, if you look at the Agile community, we've spent a lot of time creating and delivering value, and that's really great. We have had, if you look at the Agile community, we've had amazing support from our business counterparts. They've shovelled literally millions and millions of dollars into Agile training and Agile tooling and Agile transformations, and we've seen a lot of benefit from the Agile community. And when I say Agile, I don't mean SAFe or Scrum or some particular flavour of Agile, I just mean Agile in general. There's been hundreds of millions of dollars to billions of dollars shoved into Agile and we've created a lot of value for that investment. We've got fewer bugs in our software because we've got so many teams doing XP driven practices like Test Driven Development, we've got faster response times because we've learned that we can create smaller releases and we've created infrastructure that lets us do deployments automatically, even if you're doing embedded systems, we figured out how to do over the air updates, we've figured out how to create infrastructure where the cars we're driving are now getting software updates. So we've created for our business leaders lots of value, but there's a problem in that value. Our business leaders now need us to create a profit, and creating value and creating a profit are two different things. And so in the pursuit of value, we have allowed our Agile community to avoid and or atrophy on skills that are vital to product management, and I'm a classically trained Product Manager, so I've done market segmentation and market valuation and market sizing, I've done pricing, I've done licensing, I've done acquisitions, I've done compliance. But when you look at the traditional definition of a Product Owner, it's a very small subset of that, especially in certain Agile methods where Product Owners are team centric, they're internal centric. That's okay, I'm not criticising that structure, but what's happened is we've got people who no longer know how to price, how to package, how to license products, and we're seeing companies fail, investor money wasted, too much time trying to figure things out when if we had simply approached the problem with an analysis of not just what am I providing to you in terms of value, but what is that value worth, and how do I structure an exchange where I give you value and you give me money? And that's how businesses survive, and I think what's really interesting about this in terms of Agile is Agile is very intimately tied to sustainability. One of the drivers of the Agile Movement was way back in the 2000s, we were having very unsustainable practices. People would be working 60, 80, death march weeks of grinding out programmers and grinding out people, and part of the Agile Movement was saying, wait a minute, this isn't sustainable, and even the notion of what is a sustainable pace is really vital, but a company cannot sustain itself without a profit, and if we don't actually evolve the Agile community from value streams into profit streams, we can't help our businesses survive. I sometimes ask developers, I say, raise your hand if you're really embracing the idea that your job is to make more money for your company than they pay you, that's called a profit, and if that's not happening, your company's going to fail. Ula Ojiaku They'll be out of a job. Luke Hohmann You'll be out of a job. So if you want to be self-interested about your future, help your company be successful, help them make a profit, and so where I'm at right now is Applied Frameworks has, with my co-author, Jason Tanner, we have published a bold and breakthrough new book called Software Profit Streams, and it's a book that describes how to do pricing and packaging for software enabled solutions. When we say software enabled solution, we mean a solution that has software in it somehow, could be embedded software in your microwave oven, it could be a hosted solution, it could be an API for a payment processor, it could be the software in your car that I talked about earlier. So software enabled solutions are the foundation, the fabric of our modern lives. As Mark Andreessen says software is eating the world, software is going to be in everything, and we need to know how to take the value that we are creating as engineers, as developers, and convert that into pricing and licensing choices that create sustainable profits. Ula Ojiaku Wow. It's as if you read my mind because I was going to ask you about your book, Software Profit Streams, A Guide to Designing a Sustainably Profitable Business. I also noticed that, you know, there is the Profit Stream Canvas that you and your co-author created. So let's assume I am a Product Manager and I've used this, let's assume I went down the path of using the Business Model Canvas and there is the Customer Value Proposition. So how do they complement? Luke Hohmann How do they all work together? I'm glad you asked that, I think that's a very insightful question and the reason it's so helpful is because, well partly because I'm also friends with Alex Osterwalder, I think he's a dear, he's a wonderful human, he's a dear friend. So let's look at the different elements of the different canvases, if you will, and why we think that this is needed. The Business Model Canvas is kind of how am I structuring my business itself, like what are my partners, my suppliers, my relationships, my channel strategy, my brand strategy with respect to my customer segments, and it includes elements of cost, which we're pretty good at. We're pretty good at knowing our costs and elements of revenue, but the key assumption of revenue, of course, is the selling price and the number of units sold. So, but if you look at the book, Business Model Generation, where the Business Model Canvas comes from, it doesn't actually talk about how to set the price. Is the video game going to be $49? Is it going to be $59, or £49 or £59? Well, there's a lot of thought that goes into that. Then we have the Value Proposition Canvas, which highlights what are the pains the customer is facing? What are the gains that the customer is facing? What are the jobs to be done of the customer? How does my solution relate to the jobs? How does it help solve the pain the customer is feeling? How does it create gain for the customer? But if you read those books, and both of those books are on my shelf because they're fantastic books, it doesn't talk about pricing. So let's say I create a gain for you. Well, how much can I charge you for the gain that I've created? How do I structure that relationship? And how do I know, going back to my Business Model Canvas, that I've got the right market segment, I've got the right investment strategy, I might need to make an investment in the first one or two releases of my software or my product before I start to make a per unit profit because I'm evolving, it's called the J curve and the J curve is how much money am I investing before I well, I have to be able to forecast that, I have to be able to model that, but the key input to that is what is the price, what is the mechanism of packaging that you're using, is it, for example, is it per user in a SAS environment or is it per company in a SAS environment? Is it a meter? Is it like an API transaction using Stripe or a payment processor, Adyen or Stripe or Paypal or any of the others that are out there? Or is it an API call where I'm charging a fraction of a penny for any API call? All of those elements have to be put into an economic model and a forecast has to be created. Now, what's missing about this is that the Business Model Canvas and the Value Proposition Canvas don't give you the insight on how to set the price, they just say there is a price and we're going to use it in our equations. So what we've done is we've said, look, setting the price is itself a complex system, and what I mean by a complex system is that, let's say that I wanted to do an annual license for a new SAS offering, but I offer that in Europe and now my solution is influenced or governed by GDPR compliance, where I have data retention and data privacy laws. So my technical architecture that has to enforce the license, also has to comply with something in terms of the market in which I'm selling. This complex system needs to be organised, and so what canvases do is in all of these cases, they let us take a complex system and put some structure behind the choices that we're making in that complex system so that we can make better choices in terms of system design. I know how I want this to work, I know how I want this to be structured, and therefore I can make system choices so the system is working in a way that benefits the stakeholders. Not just me, right, I'm not the only stakeholder, my customers are in this system, my suppliers are in this system, society itself might be in the system, depending on the system I'm building or the solution I'm building. So the canvases enable us to make system level choices that are hopefully more effective in achieving our goals. And like I said, the Business Model Canvas, the Value Proposition Canvas are fantastic, highly recommended, but they don't cover pricing. So we needed something to cover the actual pricing and packaging and licensing. Ula Ojiaku Well, that's awesome. So it's really more about going, taking a deeper dive into thoughtfully and structurally, if I may use that word, assessing the pricing. Luke Hohmann Yeah, absolutely. Ula Ojiaku Would you say that in doing this there would be some elements of, you know, testing and getting feedback from actual customers to know what price point makes sense? Luke Hohmann Absolutely. There's a number of ways in which customer engagement or customer testing is involved. The very first step that we advocate is a Customer Benefit Analysis, which is what are the actual benefits you're creating and how are your customers experiencing those benefits. Those experiences are both tangible and intangible and that's another one of the challenges that we face in the Agile community. In general, the Agile community spends a little bit more time on tangible or functional value than intangible value. So we, in terms of if I were to look at it in terms of a computer, we used to say speeds and feeds. How fast is the processor? How fast is the network? How much storage is on my disk space? Those are all functional elements. Over time as our computers have become plenty fast or plenty storage wise for most of our personal computing needs, we see elements of design come into play, elements of usability, elements of brand, and we see this in other areas. Cars have improved in quality so much that many of us, the durability of the car is no longer a significant attribute because all cars are pretty durable, they're pretty good, they're pretty well made. So now we look at brand, we look at style, we look at aesthetics, we look at even paying more for a car that aligns with our values in terms of the environment. I want to get an EV, why, because I want to be more environmentally conscious. That's a value driven, that's an intangible factor. And so our first step starts with Customer Benefit Analysis looking at both functional or tangible value and intangible value, and you can't do that, as you can imagine, you can't do that without having customer interaction and awareness with your stakeholders and your customers, and that also feeds throughout the whole pricing process. Eventually, you're going to put your product in a market, and that's a form itself of market research. Did customers buy, and if they didn't buy, why did they not buy? Is it poorly packaged or is it poorly priced? These are all elements that involve customers throughout the process. Ula Ojiaku If I may, I know we've been on the topic of your latest book Software Profit Streams. I'm just wondering, because I can't help but try to connect the dots and I'm wondering if there might be a connection to one of your books, Innovation Games: Creating Breakthrough Products Through Collaborative Play, something like buy a feature in your book, that kind of came to mind, could there be a way of using that as part of the engagement with customers in setting a pricing strategy? I may be wrong, I'm just asking a question. Luke Hohmann I think you're making a great connection. There's two forms of relationship that Innovation Games and the Innovation Games book have with Software Profit Streams. One is, as you correctly noted, just the basics of market research, where do key people have pains or gains and what it might be worth. That work is also included in Alex Osterwalder's books, Value Proposition Design for example, when I've been doing Value Proposition Design and I'm trying to figure out the customer pains, you can use the Innovation Games Speed Boat. And when I want to figure out the gains, I can use the Innovation Game Product Box. Similarly, when I'm figuring out pricing and licensing, a way, and it's a very astute idea, a way to understand price points of individual features is to do certain kinds of market research. One form of market research you can do is Buy-a-Feature, which gives a gauge of what people are willing or might be willing to pay for a feature. It can be a little tricky because the normal construction of Buy-a-Feature is based on cost. However, your insight is correct, you can extend Buy-a-Feature such that you're testing value as opposed to cost, and seeing what, if you take a feature that costs X, but inflate that cost by Y and a Buy-a-Feature game, if people still buy it, it's a strong signal strength that first they want it, and second it may be a feature that you can, when delivered, would motivate you to raise the price of your offering and create a better profit for your company. Ula Ojiaku Okay, well, thank you. I wasn't sure if I was on the right lines. Luke Hohmann It's a great connection. Ula Ojiaku Thanks again. I mean, it's not original. I'm just piggybacking on your ideas. So with respect to, if we, if you don't mind, let's shift gears a bit because I know that, or I'm aware that whilst you were with Scaled Agile Incorporated, you know, you played a key part in developing some of their courses, like the Product POPM, and I think the Portfolio Management, and there was the concept about Participatory Budgeting. Can we talk about that, please? Luke Hohmann I'd love to talk about that, I mean it's a huge passion of mine, absolutely. So in February of 2018, I started working with the framework team and in December of 2018, we talked about the possibility of what an acquisition might look like and the benefits it would create, which would be many. That closed in May of 2019, and in that timeframe, we were working on SAFe 5.0 and so there were a couple of areas in which I was able to make some contributions. One was in Agile product delivery competency, the other was in lean portfolio management. I had a significant hand in restructuring or adding the POPM, APM, and LPM courses, adding things like solutions by horizons to SAFe, taking the existing content on guardrails, expanding it a little bit, and of course, adding Participatory Budgeting, which is just a huge passion of mine. I've done Participatory Budgeting now for 20 years, I've helped organisations make more than five billions of dollars of investment spending choices at all levels of companies, myself and my colleagues at Applied Frameworks, and it just is a better way to make a shared decision. If you think about one of the examples they use about Participatory Budgeting, is my preferred form of fitness is I'm a runner and so, and my wife is also a fit person. So if she goes and buys a new pair of shoes or trainers and I go and buy a new pair of trainers, we don't care, because it's a small purchase. It's frequently made and it's within the pattern of our normal behaviour. However, if I were to go out and buy a new car without involving her, that feels different, right, it's a significant purchase, it requires budgeting and care, and is this car going to meet our needs? Our kids are older than your kids, so we have different needs and different requirements, and so I would be losing trust in my pair bond with my wife if I made a substantial purchase without her involvement. Well, corporations work the same way, because we're still people. So if I'm funding a value stream, I'm funding the consistent and reliable flow of valuable items, that's what value stream funding is supposed to do. However, if there is a significant investment to be made, even if the value stream can afford it, it should be introduced to the portfolio for no other reason than the social structure of healthy organisations says that we do better when we're talking about these things, that we don't go off on our own and make significant decisions without the input of others. That lowers transparency, that lowers trust. So I am a huge advocate of Participatory Budgeting, I'm very happy that it's included in SAFe as a recommended practice, both for market research and Buy-a-Feature in APM, but also more significantly, if you will, at the portfolio level for making investment decisions. And I'm really excited to share that we've just published an article a few weeks ago about Participatory Budgeting and what's called The Color of Money, and The Color of Money is sometimes when you have constraints on how you can spend money, and an example of a constraint is let's say that a government raised taxes to improve transportation infrastructure. Well, the money that they took in is constrained in a certain way. You can't spend it, for example, on education, and so we have to show how Participatory Budgeting can be adapted to have relationships between items like this item requires this item as a precedent or The Color of Money, constraints of funding items, but I'm a big believer, we just published that article and you can get that at the Scaled Agile website, I'm a big believer in the social power of making these financial decisions and the benefits that accrue to people and organisations when they collaborate in this manner. Ula Ojiaku Thanks for going into that, Luke. So, would there be, in your experience, any type of organisation that's participatory? It's not a leading question, it's just genuine, there are typically outliers and I'm wondering in your experience, and in your opinion, if there would be organisations that it might not work for? Luke Hohmann Surprisingly, no, but I want to add a few qualifications to the effective design of a Participatory Budgeting session. When people hear Participatory Budgeting, there's different ways that you would apply Participatory Budgeting in the public and private sector. So I've done citywide Participatory Budgeting in cities and if you're a citizen of a city and you meet the qualifications for voting within that jurisdiction, in the United States, it's typically that you're 18 years old, in some places you have to be a little older, in some places you might have other qualifications, but if you're qualified to participate as a citizen in democratic processes, then you should be able to participate in Participatory Budgeting sessions that are associated with things like how do we spend taxes or how do we make certain investments. In corporations it's not quite the same way. Just because you work at a company doesn't mean you should be included in portfolio management decisions that affect the entire company. You may not have the background, you may not have the training, you may be what my friends sometimes call a fresher. So I do a lot of work overseas, so freshers, they just may not have the experience to participate. So one thing that we look at in Participatory Budgeting and SAFe is who should be involved in the sessions, and that doesn't mean that every single employee should always be included, because their background, I mean, they may be a technical topic and maybe they don't have the right technical background. So we work a little bit harder in corporations to make sure the right people are there. Now, of course, if we're going to make a mistake, we tend to make the mistake of including more people than excluding, partly because in SAFe Participatory Budgeting, it's a group of people who are making a decision, not a one person, one vote, and that's really profoundly important because in a corporation, just like in a para-bond, your opinion matters to me, I want to know what you're thinking. If I'm looking in, I'll use SAFe terminology, if I'm looking at three epics that could advance our portfolio, and I'm a little unsure about two of those epics, like one of those epics, I'm like, yeah, this is a really good thing, I know a little bit about it, this matters, I'm going to fund this, but the other two I'm not so sure about, well, there's no way I can learn through reading alone what the opinions of other people are, because, again, there's these intangible factors. There's these elements that may not be included in an ROI analysis, it's kind of hard to talk about brand and an ROI analysis - we can, but it's hard, so I want to listen to how other people are talking about things, and through that, I can go, yeah, I can see the value, I didn't see it before, I'm going to join you in funding this. So that's among the ways in which Participatory Budgeting is a little different within the private sector and the public sector and within a company. The only other element that I would add is that Participatory Budgeting gives people the permission to stop funding items that are no longer likely to meet the investment or objectives of the company, or to change minds, and so one of the, again, this is a bit of an overhang in the Agile community, Agile teams are optimised for doing things that are small, things that can fit within a two or three week Sprint. That's great, no criticism there, but our customers and our stakeholders want big things that move the market needle, and the big things that move the market needle don't get done in two or three weeks, in general, and they rarely, like they require multiple teams working multiple weeks to create a really profoundly new important thing. And so what happens though, is that we need to make in a sense funding commitments for these big things, but we also have to have a way to change our mind, and so traditional funding processes, they let us make this big commitment, but they're not good at letting us change our mind, meaning they're not Agile. Participatory Budgeting gives us the best of both worlds. I can sit at the table with you and with our colleagues, we can commit to funding something that's big, but six months later, which is the recommended cadence from SAFe, I can come back to that table and reassess and we can all look at each other, because you know those moments, right, you've had that experience in visiting, because you're like looking around the table and you're like, yeah, this isn't working. And then in traditional funding, we keep funding what's not working because there's no built-in mechanism to easily change it, but in SAFe Participatory Budgeting, you and I can sit at the table and we can look at each other with our colleagues and say, yeah, you know, that initiative just, it's not working, well, let's change our mind, okay, what is the new thing that we can fund? What is the new epic? And that permission is so powerful within a corporation. Ula Ojiaku Thanks for sharing that, and whilst you were speaking, because again, me trying to connect the dots and thinking, for an organisation that has adopted SAFe or it's trying to scale Agility, because like you mentioned, Agile teams are optimised to iteratively develop or deliver, you know, small chunks over time, usually two to three weeks, but, like you said, there is a longer time horizon spanning months, even years into the future, sometimes for those worthwhile, meaty things to be delivered that moves the strategic needle if I may use that buzzword. So, let's say we at that lean portfolio level, we're looking at epics, right, and Participatory Budgeting, we are looking at initiatives on an epic to epic basis per se, where would the Lean Startup Cycle come in here? So is it that Participatory Budgeting could be a mechanism that is used for assessing, okay, this is the MVP features that have been developed and all that, the leading indicators we've gotten, that's presented to the group, and on that basis, we make that pivot or persevere or stop decision, would that fit in? Luke Hohmann Yeah, so let's, I mean, you're close, but let me make a few turns and then it'll click better. First, let's acknowledge that the SAFe approach to the Lean Startup Cycle is not the Eric Ries approach, there are some differences, but let's separate how I fund something from how I evaluate something. So if I'm going to engage in the SAFe Lean Startup Cycle, part of that engagement is to fund an MVP, which is going to prove or disprove a given hypothesis. So that's an expenditure of money. Now there's, if you think about the expenditure of money, there's minimally two steps in this process - there's spending enough money to conduct the experiments, and if those experiments are true, making another commitment to spend money again, that I want to spend it. The reason this is important is, let's say I had three experiments running in parallel and I'm going to use easy round numbers for a large corporation. Let's say I want to run three experiments in parallel, and each experiment costs me a million pounds. Okay. So now let's say that the commercialisation of each of those is an additional amount of money. So the portfolio team sits around the table and says, we have the money, we're going to fund all three. Okay, great. Well, it's an unlikely circumstance, but let's say all three are successful. Well, this is like a venture capitalist, and I have a talk that I give that relates the funding cycle of a venture capitalist to the funding cycle of an LPM team. While it's unlikely, you could have all three become successful, and this is what I call an oversubscribed portfolio. I've got three great initiatives, but I can still only fund one or two of them, I still have to make the choice. Now, of course, I'm going to look at my economics and let's say out of the three initiatives that were successfully proven through their hypothesis, let's say one of them is just clearly not as economically attractive, for whatever reason. Okay, we get rid of that one, now, I've got two, and if I can only fund one of them, and the ROI, the hard ROI is roughly the same, that's when Participatory Budgeting really shines, because we can have those leaders come back into the room, and they can say, which choice do we want to make now? So the evaluative aspect of the MVP is the leading indicators and the results of the proving or disproving of the hypotheses. We separate that from the funding choices, which is where Participatory Budgeting and LPM kick in. Ula Ojiaku Okay. So you've separated the proving or disproving the hypothesis of the feature, some of the features that will probably make up an epic. And you're saying the funding, the decision to fund the epic in the first place is a different conversation. And you've likened it to Venture Capital funding rounds. Where do they connect? Because if they're separate, what's the connecting thread between the two? Luke Hohmann The connected thread is the portfolio process, right? The actual process is the mechanism where we're connecting these things. Ula Ojiaku OK, no, thanks for the portfolio process. But there is something you mentioned, ROI - Return On Investment. And sometimes when you're developing new products, you don't know, you have assumptions. And any ROI, sorry to put it this way, but you're really plucking figures from the air, you know, you're modelling, but there is no certainty because you could hit the mark or you could go way off the mark. So where does that innovation accounting coming into place, especially if it's a product that's yet to make contact with, you know, real life users, the customers. Luke Hohmann Well, let's go back to something you said earlier, and what you talked earlier about was the relationship that you have in market researching customer interaction. In making a forecast, let's go ahead and look at the notion of building a new product within a company, and this is again where the Agile community sometimes doesn't want to look at numbers or quote, unquote get dirty, but we have to, because if I'm going to look at building a new idea, or taking a new idea into a product, I have to have a forecast of its viability. Is it economically viable? Is it a good choice? So innovation accounting is a way to look at certain data, but before, I'm going to steal a page, a quote, from one of my friends, Jeff Patton. The most expensive way to figure this out is to actually build the product. So what can I do that's less expensive than building the product itself? I can still do market research, but maybe I wouldn't do an innovation game, maybe I'd do a formal survey and I use a price point testing mechanism like Van Westendorp Price Point Analysis, which is a series of questions that you ask to triangulate on acceptable price ranges. I can do competitive benchmarking for similar products and services. What are people offering right now in the market? Now that again, if the product is completely novel, doing competitive benchmarking can be really hard. Right now, there's so many people doing streaming that we look at the competitive market, but when Netflix first offered streaming and it was the first one, their best approach was what we call reference pricing, which is, I have a reference price for how much I pay for my DVDs that I'm getting in the mail, I'm going to base my streaming service kind of on the reference pricing of entertainment, although that's not entirely clear that that was the best way to go, because you could also base the reference price on what you're paying for a movie ticket and how many, but then you look at consumption, right, because movie tickets are expensive, so I only go to a movie maybe once every other month, whereas streaming is cheap and so I can change my demand curve by lowering my price. But this is why it's such a hard science is because we have this notion of these swirling factors. Getting specifically back to your question about the price point, I do have to do some market research before I go into the market to get some forecasting and some confidence, and research gives me more confidence, and of course, once I'm in the market, I'll know how effective my research matched the market reality. Maybe my research was misleading, and of course, there's some skill in designing research, as you know, to get answers that have high quality signal strength. Ula Ojiaku Thanks for clarifying. That makes perfect sense to me. Luke Hohmann It's kind of like a forecast saying, like there's a group of Agile people who will say, like, you shouldn't make forecasts. Well, I don't understand that because that's like saying, and people will say, well, I can't predict the future. Well, okay, I can't predict when I'm going to retire, but I'm planning to retire. I don't know the date of my exact retirement, but my wife and I are planning our retirement, and we're saving, we're making certain investment choices for our future, because we expect to have a future together. Now our kids are older than yours. My kids are now in university, and so we're closer to retirement. So what I dislike about the Agile community is people will sometimes say, well, I don't know the certainty of the event, therefore, I can't plan for it. But that's really daft, because there are many places in like, you may not for the listeners, her daughter is a little younger than my kids, but they will be going to university one day, and depending on where they go, that's a financial choice. So you could say, well, I don't know when she's going to university, and I can't predict what university she's going to go to, therefore I'm not going to save any money. Really? That doesn't make no sense. So I really get very upset when you have people in the agile community will say things like road mapping or forecasting is not Agile. It's entirely Agile. How you treat it is Agile or not Agile. Like when my child comes up to me and says, hey, you know about that going to university thing, I was thinking of taking a gap year. Okay, wait a minute, that's a change. That doesn't mean no, it means you're laughing, right? But that's a change. And so we respond to change, but we still have a plan. Ula Ojiaku It makes sense. So the reason, and I completely resonate with everything you said, the reason I raised that ROI and it not being known is that in some situations, people might be tempted to use it to game the budget allocation decision making process. That's why I said you would pluck the ROI. Luke Hohmann Okay, let's talk about that. We actually address this in our recent paper, but I'll give you my personal experience. You are vastly more likely to get bad behaviour on ROI analysis when you do not do Participatory Budgeting, because there's no social construct to prevent bad behaviour. If I'm sitting down at a table and that's virtual or physical, it doesn't matter, but let's take a perfect optimum size for a Participatory Budgeting group. Six people, let's say I'm a Director or a Senior Director in a company, and I'm sitting at a table and there's another Senior Director who's a peer, maybe there's a VP, maybe there's a person from engineering, maybe there's a person from sales and we've got this mix of people and I'm sitting at that table. I am not incented to come in with an inflated ROI because those people are really intelligent and given enough time, they're not going to support my initiative because I'm fibbing, I'm lying. And I have a phrase for this, it's when ROI becomes RO-lie that it's dangerous. And so when I'm sitting at that table, what we find consistently, and one of the clients that we did a fair amount of Participatory Budgeting for years ago with Cisco, what we found was the leaders at Cisco were creating tighter, more believable, and more defensible economic projections, precisely because they knew that they were going to be sitting with their peers, and it didn't matter. It can go both ways. Sometimes people will overestimate the ROI or they underestimate the cost. Same outcome, right? I'm going to overestimate the benefit, and people would be like, yeah, I don't think you can build that product with three teams. You're going to need five or six teams and people go, oh, I can get it done with, you know, 20 people. Yeah, I don't think so, because two years ago, we built this product. It's very similar, and, you know, we thought we could get it done with 20 people and we couldn't. We really needed, you know, a bigger group. So you see the social construct creating a more believable set of results because people come to the Participatory Budgeting session knowing that their peers are in the room. And of course, we think we're smart, so our peers are as smart as we are, we're all smart people, and therefore, the social construct of Participatory Budgeting quite literally creates a better input, which creates a better output. Ula Ojiaku That makes sense, definitely. Thanks for sharing that. I've found that very, very insightful and something I can easily apply. The reasoning behind it, the social pressure, quote unquote, knowing that you're not just going to put the paper forward but you'd have to defend it in a credible, believable way make sense. So just to wrap up now, what books have you found yourself recommending to people the most, and why? Luke Hohmann It's so funny, I get yelled at by my wife for how many books I buy. She'll go like “It's Amazon again. Another book. You know, there's this thing called the library.” Ula Ojiaku You should do Participatory Budgeting for your books then sounds like, sorry. Luke Hohmann No, no, I don't, I'd lose. Gosh, I love so many books. So there's a few books that I consider to be my go-to references and my go-to classics, but I also recommend that people re-read books and sometimes I recommend re-reading books is because you're a different person, and as you age and as you grow and you see things differently and in fact, I'm right now re-reading and of course it goes faster, but I'm re-reading the original Extreme Programming Explained by Kent Beck, a fantastic book. I just finished reading a few new books, but let me let me give you a couple of classics that I think everyone in our field should read and why they should read them. I think everyone should read The Mythical Man-Month by Fred Brooks because he really covers some very profound truths that haven't changed, things like Brooks Law, which is adding programmers to a late project, makes it later. He talks about the structure of teams and how to scale before scaling was big and important and cool. He talks about communication and conceptual integrity and the role of the architect. The other book that I'm going to give, which I hope is different than any book that anyone has ever given you, because it's one of my absolute favourite books and I give them away, is a book called Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud. Comics or graphic novels are an important medium for communication, and when we talk about storytelling and we talk about how to frame information and how to present information, understanding comics is profoundly insightful in terms of how to present, share, show information. A lot of times I think we make things harder than they should be. So when I'm working with executives and some of the clients that I work with personally, when we talk about our epics, we actually will tell stories about the hero's journey and we actually hire comic book artists to help the executives tell their story in a comic form or in a graphic novel form. So I absolutely love understanding comics. I think that that's really a profound book. Of course you mentioned Alex Osterwalder's books, Business Model Generation, Business Model Canvas. Those are fantastic books for Product Managers. I also, just looking at my own bookshelves, of course, Innovation Games for PMs, of course Software Profit Streams because we have to figure out how to create sustainability, but in reality there's so many books that we love and that we share and that we grow together when we're sharing books and I'll add one thing. Please don't only limit your books to technical books. We're humans too. I recently, this week and what I mean recent I mean literally this weekend I was visiting one of my kids in Vermont all the way across the country, and so on the plane ride I finished two books, one was a very profound and deeply written book called Ponyboy. And then another one was a very famous book on a woman protagonist who's successful in the 60s, Lessons in Chemistry, which is a new book that's out, and it was a super fun light read, some interesting lessons of course, because there's always lessons in books, and now if it's okay if I'm not overstepping my boundaries, what would be a book that you'd like me to read? I love to add books to my list. Ula Ojiaku Oh my gosh, I didn't know. You are the first guest ever who's twisted this on me, but I tend to read multiple books at a time. Luke Hohmann Only two. Ula Ojiaku Yeah, so, and I kind of switch, maybe put some on my bedside and you know there's some on my Kindle and in the car, just depending. So I'm reading multiple books at a time, but based on what you've said the one that comes to mind is the new book by Oprah Winfrey and it's titled What Happened to You? Understanding Trauma, because like you said, it's not just about reading technical books and we're human beings and we find out that people behave probably sometimes in ways that are different to us, and it's not about saying what's wrong with you, because there is a story that we might not have been privy to, you know, in terms of their childhood, how they grew up, which affected their worldview and how they are acting, so things don't just suddenly happen. And the question that we have been asked and we sometimes ask of people, and for me, I'm reading it from a parent's perspective because I understand that even more so that my actions, my choices, they play a huge, you know, part in shaping my children. So it's not saying what's wrong with you? You say, you know, what happened to you? And it traces back to, based on research, because she wrote it with a renowned psychologist, I don't know his field but a renowned psychologist, so neuroscience-based psychological research on human beings, attachment theory and all that, just showing how early childhood experiences, even as early as maybe a few months old, tend to affect people well into adulthood. So that would be my recommendation. Luke Hohmann Thank you so much. That's a gift. Ula Ojiaku Thank you. You're the first person to ask me. So, my pleasure. So, before we go to the final words, where can the audience find you, because you have a wealth of knowledge, a wealth of experience, and I am sure that people would want to get in touch with you, so how can they do this please? Luke Hohmann Yeah, well, they can get me on LinkedIn and they can find me at Applied Frameworks. I tell you, I teach classes that are known to be very profound because we always reserve, myself and the instructors at Applied Frameworks, we have very strong commitments to reserving class time for what we call the parking lot or the ask me anything question, which are many times after I've covered the core material in the class, having the opportunity to really frame how to apply something is really important. So I would definitely encourage people to take one of my classes because you'll not get the material, you'll get the reasons behind the material, which means you can apply it, but you'll also be able to ask us questions and our commitment as a company is you can ask us anything and if we don't know the answer, we'll help you find it. We'll help you find the expert or the person that you need talk to, to help you out and be successful. And then, and I think in terms of final words, I will simply ask people to remember that we get to work in the most amazing field building things for other people and it's joyful work, and we, one of my phrases is you're not doing Agile, if you're not having fun at work, there's something really wrong, there's something missing, yeah we need to retrospect and we need to improve and we need to reflect and all those important things, absolutely, but we should allow ourselves to experience the joy of serving others and being of service and building things that matter. Ula Ojiaku I love the concept of joyful Agile and getting joy in building things that matter, serving people and may I add also working together with amazing people, and for me it's been a joyful conversation with you, Luke, I really appreciate you making the time, I am definitely richer and more enlightened as a result of this conversation, so thank you so much once more. Luke Hohmann Thank you so much for having me here, thank you everyone for listening with us. Ula Ojiaku  My pleasure. That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com or your favourite podcast provider. Also share with friends and do leave a review on iTunes. This would help others find this show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com Take care and God bless!   

What makes a company invincible? How do you know if a company takes innovation seriously? Alexander Osterwalder has the answers.  Alex is an entrepreneur, leading author, and in-demand speaker, and one of the world's most influential strategy and innovation experts. Ranked no. 4 of the top 50 management thinkers worldwide, his work has changed how established companies do business and how new ventures get started. His books include the international bestsellers «Business Model Generation», «Value Proposition Design», and «The Invincible Company.» Together with Yves Pigneur, he invented the Business Model Canvas and the Value Proposition Canvas – practical tools that are trusted by millions.  He explains what makes a company invincible, what companies get right and wrong about innovation, how you can create a value proposition for your business that customers love.  We also discuss how storytelling helps your businesses suspend disbelief in the unfamiliar.  Enjoy this episode with one of the world's foremost strategy and innovation thinkers! Would you like to receive weekly tips from me on how you can join the top 1% of business communicators? Try the Speak Like a CEO newsletter. It is highly actionable and provides a ton of insights that you can immediately apply to your own career or business.  https://www.eoipsocommunications.com/newsletter/ --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/likeaceo/message

Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder, founder & CEO of Strategyzer, is one of the world's most influential strategy and innovation experts. A leading author, entrepreneur, and in-demand speaker, his work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started. In this episode of Leadership NOW with Dan Pontefract, Alex lays out his nfluential ideas on modern business models, emphasizing the need for innovative strategies and a shift away from traditional business thinking. Continuously ranked in the top 50 management thinkers worldwide by Thinkers50 and a visiting professor at IMD, Osterwalder is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual models. Together with Yves Pigneur, he invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map – practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies, including Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Mastercard, Sony, Fujitsu, 3M, Intel, Roche, Colgate-Palmolive, and many more. Strategyzer is an innovation powerhouse, providing online courses, applications, and technology-enabled services to help organizations effectively and systematically manage strategy, growth, and transformation. Osterwalder's books include the international bestseller «Business Model Generation», «Value Proposition Design», «Testing Business Ideas», «High-Impact Tools for Teams» and «The Invincible Company,» A frequent and popular keynote speaker, Osterwalder travels the world discussing his ideas and strategies at Fortune 500 companies, premiere innovation conferences, and leading universities. He holds a doctorate from HEC Lausanne/Switzerland and is a founding member of The Constellation, a global not-for-profit organization connecting local responses to global issues around the world.

"A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers"

This episode is with Alex Osterwalder - Author of best-selling books Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design, and his latest book, The Invincible Company. He's been ranked No.4 of the top 50 management thinkers globally, and he's the co-founder of Strategyzer, which helps companies expand existing business lines, build new growth enginges, de-risk innovation ideas, and up-skill teams. In this episode we talk about how to build an invincible company through business model innovation.

Interview video available here: https://youtu.be/F3X1BC_HQws  Bio Bruno Pešec helps business leaders innovate profitably. He is the rare innovator who can claim that he's worked on a regulation-defying freight train and an award-winning board game. In addition to his corporate experience with brands like DNV, DNB, and Kongsberg Group, Bruno runs a community of entrepreneurs of several thousand members. Longer version of bio available at https://www.pesec.no/about/ Websites/ Social Media Bruno's website: pesec.no Playing Lean site: https://www.playinglean.com/ LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pesec/ Books The 9 Big Don'ts of Corporate Innovation by Bruno Pešec https://www.pesec.no/9-big-donts-of-corporate-innovation/ The Corporate Startup by Tendayi Viki https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corporate-Startup-Established-Successful-Innovation/dp/9462761507 The Game Changing Strategy by Constantinos Markides https://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Changing-Strategies-Established-Industries-Breaking/dp/0470276878    To Better Thinking by Linda Elder https://www.amazon.co.uk/Better-Thinking-Living-Through-Critical/dp/0133092569 The Halo Effect by Phil Rosenzweig https://www.amazon.co.uk/Effect-Business-Delusions-Deceive-Managers/dp/1476784035 Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel Pink https://www.amazon.co.uk/Drive-Surprising-Truth-about-Motivates/dp/B004N74VBK   Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I'm Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Guest Intro: Hello everyone, thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast. My guest today is Bruno Pešec. He is one of those rare innovators and coaches whose focus is on helping business leaders innovate profitably. I had lots of learning moments and ‘aha' moments speaking with Bruno and I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation. I learnt a lot as well. I have no doubt that you will also get some useful nuggets from this episode, so enjoy. Ula Ojiaku:  I have with me here, Bruno Pešec. And, Bruno, welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast, it's a great pleasure and honour to have you here on the show. Bruno Pešec:  Thank you very much, Ula. And I also want to give my special gratitude and thanks for perfectly pronouncing my surname. Ula Ojiaku:  Oh, well, I am very happy about that. I actually wrote it out, you know, phonetically on a piece of paper. But thanks, you taught me well, great. Now let's go straight into the questions we have for you today. So, who is Bruno Pešec? Bruno Pešec:  So, Bruno Pešec is, I will describe an Innovator, Martial Artist and Engineer, that probably sums up like parts of my life that I'm proudest, and that I engage with the most. So, I started my studies as a young engineer, and what I was really fascinated with are problems, wicked problems. Usually wicked problems are described as a collection of problems that don't really have a clear cause, clear root cause, and there is no clear-cut solution, the only thing you can try to do is tame them a little bit, and I was fascinated with that as engineer. That's why I studied industrial engineering, which is a combination of systems and humans. I started my career in defense, and I had the good fortune of working on some very, very difficult products. And one of the projects that I was working on was an innovation completely based on product and technology. We made such a product that was by far the best in the whole world, it was so good, no one believed us. And it was ridiculous, but for me, it was a great learning experience, because, you know, we were a young group of engineers that said, like, hey, let's just do everything we can to make the best product we can, and we succeeded, and nobody on the market believed us. So, what happened, our sales department had to send our product on a tour across the globe. And with a lot of engineering products and solutions, they can be copied by sufficiently proficient engineers, and that is what happened after a few years. It wasn't such a leading product anymore. But for me, it was a very important learning lesson, because I realised that innovation isn't just about this technical side, but also about the human side, you must understand how to talk about innovation, you must understand how narratives form, how stories form and how people interact. And that is kind of how I started to slowly expand my own knowledge beyond just being an engineer, to also invest in a lot of time and effort to understand psychology, human nature, emotions, not just to reading, but also to try to be different myself, whatever that might mean. And it wasn't always pleasant. Ula Ojiaku:  I totally empathise - wow! Could you tell us a bit more about the product? What was the product all about? Bruno Pešec:  So, since I was working in industry, that's, you know, very limited with NDAs. So unfortunately, I can't really go into great specifics, but let's say that innovations were based on the physical properties. And I can say, you know, people expect that the products made out of steel have a specific weight, what we were able to do is, through a lot of engineering trades, using numerical simulations, very advanced computation, a lot of testing in actual manufacturing whole, we were able to make a product that has varying thickness of steel panels, and that reduce the weight of the product and increase the functionality of the product. And that's why I say, when a smart engineer sees the solution, they can easily copy it, but the challenge is seeing the solution, coming to see that. So, we did the heavy working of finding the new improvement, and then it was easy to take over. And if we connect it to what a lot of companies and startups mess up, when they spend their time and effort to educate the market and then somebody else comes and actually picks up the market. So that is, you know, when you have the whole discussion, is it good to be first to the market? Yes, if you can afford to capture it. Ula Ojiaku: Yes. Yes. Very true, because you have the fast followers who just sit back, let you do the heavy lifting and then they, because they have maybe a wide range of resources and deep pockets, are able to mass manufacture what you spent years to put together. Wow! Bruno Pešec: Exactly. Ula Ojiaku: So, what were the key lessons, because you said you now realise that it's not just about having a fantastic product, you also had to focus on the human psychology. So, what's different between then and now? Bruno Pešec: So, one of the things, reflecting here in the moment, one of the very important lessons, for me personally, was that alignment is much more important and valuable than being the most correct person in the room, or following the perfect or the ideal process. So for myself, you know, I have a decade of experience innovating and inventing, not just in defense, but also in transportation in oil and gas, in entertainment, you know, in different industries. And without trying to sound arrogant, I have a good grasp of what it takes to, you know, develop, invent something and take it to the market, which is not necessarily always true. So, when I work, you know, with clients or different teams, I'm usually the person who knows the innovation process, but that doesn't matter a lot if I cannot help those people in the room to actually get from A to B. And that sometimes includes, I don't want to say compromises, but negotiations, both internal implicit, but also external, you know, when do you stop focusing on just the theory and when do you move to, okay, in practice being pragmatic, and moving on. And I would say that Agile and Innovation and Lean and Lean Startup and a lot of these fields, they're guilty of being extremely dogmatic and paradigmatic, and then you have this whole conversation around, okay, when is it about dogma and when is it about flow, customer, value, outcomes? So, that, to me was part of my learning journey, like, sometimes harsh lessons. Ula Ojiaku: I totally am nodding because I experienced this every day, as you know, as an Agile Coach, it's really about, you might know things, you know, but it's also about working with people, because finally, at the end of the day, it's all about people and you need to work with people, you need to establish the relationship, the trust. And for me, a policy is I want to work with people in a way that they would want to work with me over and over again. And sometimes this may be about losing a battle so that you know, everyone can together win the greater war, you know, from time to time. One statement you made now that really stood out to me is that; “Alignment is more valuable than being the most correct person in a room”. That's a great quote. Okay, so can you tell us about your game Playing Lean? I understand you developed the game, how did it come about and what do you currently use it for? Bruno Pešec: So yes, it's called Playing Lean, and I'd be happy to tell you a bit more. So, it's funny, it came through part of this learning experience as well. So, I'm not the only one, it was also Simen Fure Jørgensen, he is the guy that actually started it as well. So, the starting point was very simple. You have a group of people, and you want to introduce a new concept. In this case, it was Lean Startup. And you know how it will go, if you tell two groups of people where here's a book, read it, let's talk in a week. So, maybe there's one person that reads it, the rest might skim it, and the, you know, the other third won't even open it. And what we were inspired with was using games. We were actually inspired with Get Kanban if you know the game for teaching Kanban in software development. And back in that time, Simen just tried to find a similar game for teaching Lean Startup Innovation, entrepreneurship, and there was none, and that was the trigger. So, it was scratching our own need, and what I love and what I'm the proudest was that we used the Lean Startup principles to develop the game itself. That was very important to us, and to the listeners that maybe have heard about Lean Startup but aren't as familiar. So, Lean Startup is a methodology for developing businesses through experimentation, iterative development, and it basically relies on Agile body of knowledge, customer development and business modeling. So, in our case, we decided after we have iterated a lot on the functionality and the desirability of the game, we decided to go down a crowdfunding route. And what happened, it was a big failure. So, we didn't manage to reach our goal, but when we were reviewing, so it wasn't zero, but it was not enough money to actually take us, so, we used Kickstarter as a platform, which is all or nothing, you must reach the goal, otherwise, you receive no funds, but you can see the data. And what we noticed is that the people that were supporting the campaign actually weren't who we thought the players are, but who would use the game to teach Lean Startup. And that is when we realised, hey, our customer segment isn't really the people that will play the game to learn lean startup, but our customer segment is actually people like you and me, Ula, that consult and coach and help others. Now when we realised that, we started focusing, okay, what do these people need? What are their jobs to be done, what is important to them? And then tweak the product, what we learned is to them, what's really important is that the product is extremely polished, they need to be proud of it, it shouldn't look like you know, Microsoft clipboard, or clipart, whatever, it needs to look very professional. So, we partnered with Holger who is one of the best illustrators in the world, he illustrated Business Model Generation and other things like that. So, we partnered with him, the game looks spectacular. Okay, then we said it needs to be reputable. So, we partnered with Ash Maurya who wrote Running Lean, we partnered with Alexander Osterwalder who wrote Business Model Generation and few other books in the series, that was important. And then what was also the thing is the facilitators and coaches and consultants, they're not buying the game, they're buying a new product for their coaching or consulting portfolio. So, our value proposition is the game, plus the facilitating materials, plus the marketing materials, plus everything. So, a lot of learning happened, you know, in that one failed campaign. And then we kept iterating on that, and they usually say the rest is history, I hope it's still not history. But you know, we won awards, first game was completely sold out, we made a new one, that one is also almost sold out, we have a global community of 200 Facilitators. So, it's been going pretty well. And all of this, you know, learning, learning, learning, adjusting, learning, adjusting, learning, adjusting, learning, adjusting. Ula Ojiaku:  You're basically applying the, you know, the Lean Startup cycle as well, because you're adjusting, you learn, you take the learning you're adjusting, and you make an improvement on what's existing. Congratulations. Now, that's an amazing story. And the fact that you said, you know, the Kickstarter failed, it wasn't a failure, it was more of a redirection, because you now got to focus on the right customer, the person who needs the product. Yeah and so, I also understand from your website that you sort of run, Train the Trainer sessions on Playing Lean, is that correct? Bruno Pešec: That's correct. That's correct. Ula Ojiaku: Okay, and when is your next one? Do you have any scheduled in the near future, or, you know, should listeners just go to the website and register? Bruno Pešec: So, listeners can go to playinglean.com. And what we decided to do because of COVID, obviously, and the global situation, so we have a completely self-paced part. So, you can take it any time, and then when you complete it, we schedule, so we have batches of people. So, let's say that you immediately go, you hear this show, and you go, you can take it, you can listen to all the theory or the facilitation, Playing Lean facilitator training. And then when there's four or six, we schedule a private session where we play the game together, and you know, let's say, finish the training, and we came to that because it's pretty flexible for people. And as I said, our customer segments are consultants and coaches, and the thing that they really don't want is to lose their precious billable time. Ula Ojiaku: Yes, yes. And will the follow up sessions, will they have to be in person or have you devised a way of doing it virtually? Bruno Pešec: So, everything is completely virtual for the time being. So, we're using Mural, but any of these can work. And what we basically did is we took and we recreated the whole game in that setup, and I was a bit skeptical at first. I wasn't 100% sure that, you know, it would work in such a setting because it is a board game, Playing Lean is a physical board game, and we purposefully designed it to be physical. Before all this happened, we rejected to make it digital, because there's a special connection when you're doing that together. And so I wasn't sure if we go with, we move it online, but people were asking so much, like, they want to play, they want to attend it. So, we said okay, let's give it a try. What we actually found out was that it works in some cases better, and in some worse. So, one thing that you lose is people cannot talk at the same time.  I'm sure that everybody noticed that now with all zoom and Teams and all the meetings is, it's very difficult, you cannot talk at the same time, which does happen in physical meetings, you might have small groups of people either whispering or saying something. Here, that doesn't work, so, you must facilitate and arrange everything differently. You can have breakouts, but again, you cannot see it as a facilitator. When you coach team, you know, if you tell two of them have a discussion, you can slightly overhear. Yeah, now, you lose that. So, there are some challenges in this. But I'm pleasantly surprised, you know, thinking back 10 years ago, how many digital tools we have today and they're good. They work. Ula Ojiaku: True, true, I mean, that's why we're speaking although we're in different geographical locations. So yeah, definitely. Right, so, I know that you also recently published the book, an E-book, “Nine Big Don'ts of Corporate Innovation: How to Spot and Avoid Costly Innovation Mistakes”, can you tell us a bit more about this? Bruno Pešec: I'd love to. So, the starting point for this, were something that's usually called survivor bias. And I'll just share two stories to kind of illustrate the survivor bias. And funnily, both include aviation. So, in one case is Aeroplane Inspectors, so whatever is their formal title, were investigating plane crashes, and survivals. And what they noticed was that it wasn't the most important, how physically prepared people in the plane were, it didn't matter if they are obese, or if they're healthy, unhealthy, or whatnot, the only thing that mattered, was if people stopped to take their belongings before evacuating the plane. So, everybody who stopped to try to get their, you know, things from the overhead department perished. And that is why you always hear that boring message, back in the time when we were flying much more often, you know, take oxygen first in case of evacuation, ignore your belongings, go out. So, and they discovered it by focusing on all those that perished, not those that actually did manage to run out and escape before the plane caught fire. A similar story, but from wartime, was when they were looking into reinforcing fighter crafts. So, they were looking, they were charting, when the crafts returned, they were charting all the holes on the body of the plane. And then their initial idea was to focus on all the parts where the holes were. But one guy observed and said, “No, that's wrong. Because those planes return, let's take look where there are no holes, because where there are no holes, those planes did not return”. And then they reinforced that and that increased the survivability of the plane. So, this is, it's almost like inversion of thinking. And that survivor bias at the core is, hey, sometimes there is value in looking at all those that failed, and understanding why did that fail, and avoiding the things that they were doing? And that was the logic, that was something that started me here. So, I worked with hundreds of innovators with, I don't, I can't say hundreds of companies, but when you work with a large company, you know, it's easily several hundred people. And I continue to see the same mistakes again, and again and again. And I said, you know, it's not about trying to copy Amazon, or Google or whoever you think is the most innovative company in the world. Stop, pause and take a look at all the failed innovations. And that was kind of the trigger that is, so from experience and observation, I decided to share mine. I will not go into great details of all mine, because everybody who listens to this can get the e-book for free in your show notes, they will be able to find it. If not, they can reach out to you, to me, whoever, we're going to help them. But one that I want to share with your listeners is one of maybe a little bit shocking ones that I say is don't invest in orphans, orphan ideas, and what do I mean by that is ideas by themselves are worthless. We keep hearing that, but we don't take action on that. So, an idea doesn't come out of nowhere, someone must have recommended it, and on the management level, a common mistake is when, let's say there's a group or strategy retreat, and they hire some consultant, they come up with brilliant ideas, but they don't execute on it, they give it to someone else to do it. So, there is a discrepancy, there is this idea, it came from Ula, but suddenly it was thrown to Bruno, go do it. I never met Ula in my life, I'm supposed to be passionate about this? Ula Ojiaku: Exactly. You don't know the context behind the whole idea? How did it come about? But, no, these things happen and I'm thinking of a recent example. Bruno Pešec: But it is, it you know, it is something that resonates, and people are aware of it, but they don't think about it this way, and then they don't realise how damaging this is. And especially, so I don't want to sugarcoat it. Innovation, in a large company, is a very painful process, it is very punishing on people, it's very rarely rewarding, and people that do deal with innovation in companies, they don't do it to get tapped on the back, they do it because they derive pleasure from it, they derive joy from it. But that does not mean that they shouldn't be rewarded, but those people that are like that, they're rare. So usually, you know, I see that happen again, and again, a company decides ‘we want to be innovative'. Everybody, you know, there's a training for everybody in the company, and we will have like, big company meeting from today on, you must be innovative, and, you know, it's forced down the throat. And suddenly, people, you must work on this project, it's very difficult. It's difficult to force people to go through such pain for nothing. Ula Ojiaku: Like you said, innovation is not something you force down people's throats, it has to align with their intrinsic motivation, I believe it was Daniel Pink that wrote the book Drive about what motivates people. And, at the very least, they have to know what's in it for them, which goes back to, you know, your earlier statement about, you're dealing with human beings, you need to understand the psychology, how do you get people's buy in? How do you make sure that they want to do it, even if you're not there watching them? Yeah. Right. So, you've shared one of the don'ts, which is don't invest in orphans, do you want to share maybe one or two more of those ‘don'ts' in corporate innovation? Bruno Pešec: So, the last one, don't make how much time, effort and money you have spent so far, guide your decision. That is also a very common one, it happens to all of us in private life, in business life, I'm sure you experienced this, well, you know, when you're sitting there, the project isn't going as it should be going. And then somebody says, well, we've been going at this for two years, we spent, you know, so much money, we hired people for this, you know, let's keep on doing it, and if that is your only reason to keep on doing it, I'm sorry, this probably doesn't have a very bright future. And the same goes for innovation projects and companies, you know, after some time, you should just cut the losses. It's kind of if you've spent two years and there is no traction in the market, it's just not attracting attention. It's better, you know, to stop leaking more funds, and even worse than that is people's time, like, as far as we know, time goes in only one direction, we can make money again. But to me, especially in large companies, what every leader has is additional responsibility for the time of their employees. The most disrespectful thing you can do is waste somebody's time. It happens, unfortunately, often because people don't understand that it's happening. But when you walk into a room, and you tell someone that they've spent two years on something that's at a dead end, what you did, you threw away two years of their life, they could have been doing something else. Ula Ojiaku: True, true. And there's nothing more demoralising than you know, you're going on a road that's a dead end, and everybody knows it, but nobody wants to say, you know, “are we actually headed in the right direction?” And there's a phrase, I mean, this is in in the scaled agile framework, which is one of the, you know, popular scaling agile frameworks. One of the principles there is to ignore sunk costs. And you know, that's basically, you don't base decisions for the future based on how much time, money, effort, resources, that you've put into it. You have to evaluate it based on the results you're getting - are you getting the outcomes? I mean, if you had if you had made a hypothesis, has the hypothesis been validated or not, if it's not been validated, and you're getting, your indications are contrary to what you expected, it's either you pivot or you kill it. You don't just go on for sentimental reasons. So, no, great one. Yeah. Do you want to add anything else about your e-book? Is there anything else you'd like to share with the audience? Bruno Pešec: Well, we could probably go for several hours discussing everything in it. But what I can just say is that, besides just discussing these different don'ts, I also offer specific countermeasures. So, that is something for example, for the sunk cost I completely agree with what you shared. Unfortunately, the side effect is, if you run into someone that doesn't want to see exactly how you describe it, so like, no, no, no, no, that experiment wasn't done correctly, or I wasn't involved in that hypothesis, then one easy countermeasure is to immediately agree on the spot, okay, I see, I understand that you're very involved in that you, you know, your ego is in this. So, let's make an agreement right here, right now. What is it? What terms are we giving to this? What terms are we giving to this to continue? So, we, for example, this is a real one, but I'm removing the details, because of confidentiality. With one executive, he had exactly that problem. He was working on something for three years and he was afraid that if he would stop this, that his career would suffer as well. So, we sat down with his management team, and we said, okay, we are not now ready to immediately kill it, even though we have spent so much, but we're going to give it exactly three more months, and A, B and C, if that happens, it continues. As clear as that, signed by everybody, not for legal reasons, but for psychological reasons. You know, I put my name on this, I commit to these terms. Three months later, they kill it, we didn't even discuss it for five minutes. It was, you know, this is what we said, it didn't happen. Bam! I was shocked, I was shocked how easy that went. So that is, you know, an easy one, because people need to own that, I cannot tell people go and kill it, they must see like, oh, we really should stop this. Ula Ojiaku: Exactly. And there's something about a public commitment as well, it kind of, you know, makes it easier for all parties involved. You know, there is a rational reason for killing it and a rational reason for stopping an initiative, if that makes sense. Now, I'm going to ask you a question as a, you know, you teach innovation and entrepreneurship. Have you ever been in a situation where you've been asked to coach, you know, maybe a team or a particular area, so you have like the leadership buy in, and you've been asked to coach the team, but the team are kind of a bit closed to getting input from you? If so, what have you, you know, could you share with the audience what you've done to win them over or, and get them to actually get to a point where they are seeking and actively drawing your input into what they're doing? Bruno Pešec: So, I had that happen both at the management level and at the team level. So, in one case, I walked in with a team, and the guy immediately told me as I walked through the door, Bruno, this is bull****, I'm here, just because I was commanded to be here. You know, you have three minutes. And I just completely ignored him, I just looked at him, I was like, okay, so, and started the discussion. Why are we here? What do we want to get? In my case, I usually try to avoid confrontation in that sense, because people are, they have the right to be frustrated. Like, if they have really been commanded and just said, "You be here”. You know, it's kind of, I might recognise that and say, okay, I understand that, I'm not here to do innovation theatre, so I don't, how could I say, I don't really do training. When I'm brought in, I do very specific things. So, in this case, I'm really relying a lot on my background as engineer because they can see that I'm one of them in most of the cases, so I'm not like a manager or a sales guy or something like that, I'm very curious. I'm curious about their work, and this is where we start. We start talking about their specific product or service. Understanding that, and I just let them talk, and that's the easiest one, it's kind of, I'm not there to be smarter than them, I'm there because I'm good at the part of the process, and together, we're going to figure out what needs to be achieved, and sometimes they have very strong feelings. I know exactly what needs to be done, but no one in management is listening to me, and then I go, okay, I'm here, I'm listening to you, now share. And we just start from there. And people usually do have, and it is a great starting point, they will say, you know, this product sucks, because of A, B, and C, what needs to happen is X, Y, and Z. And then I start probing, it's like, okay, the things that you said that it sucks, why is that so? Okay, and you say that this will be a solution, why do you think so? And I ask them, we start to have a whiteboard, we start mapping it, if we don't know, we have this conversation, we start going to very specific things. Because what I strongly believe in is go harsh on problems, go harsh on issues, but be gentle with people. So, if you and I, you know, I will always have my utmost respect for Ula, but when we have a problem in front of us, when I go harsh, I'm not going to harsh on Ula, I'm going harsh on the problem. Ula Ojiaku: Don't take it personally. Bruno Pešec: Exactly. I want to rip the problem apart. That's our job as innovators, you have an idea, it's not about kissing that idea on the cheek, it's about breaking it seeing you know, what, if we do this, is it going to hold? What if we do this is it going to hold? What if we do that, is it still going to hold? If not, well maybe this is worth doing, it has nothing to do with you as a person. You and I, we are in a partnership about solving that problem, that issue, and for me, it works because it's genuine and people can feel that. So, I'm, you know, I'm being authentic, I'm being myself. And that is why I also say when people ask me, okay, Bruno, how can I coach like you? How can I, you know, repeat the same thing? I tell them, don't try to copy, you know, I am me, you are you, play to your strength. If you're a quiet person, if you're a gentle person, play to that, you know, be like water, be like river, wear them out, you know, wear them out with kindness, always go back to what you're discussing, be yourself. It's so tiring trying to be somebody else, it's so tiring trying to copy somebody else. It won't always work, but you will know that you were yourself, you did the best you could what's then there left to regret, even if it goes bad. Ula Ojiaku: True, true. I'm beginning to get suspicious that you've been eavesdropping on me, because I recently this week, gave a talk on being yourself and being that perfectly, so it's almost like, hmm, did Bruno eavesdrop on my speech? But hey, well said, well said. Now, let's just round up with a few more questions. This has been a fantastic conversation, I definitely have enjoyed speaking with you. Are there any books that you'd say you've drawn inspiration over the course of your career? You know, if so, what books are these? If you can share? Bruno Pešec:  Since the topics we have discussed today, were about innovation and a little bit of thinking better, I'll share three specific books. So, one for innovation. That is The Corporate Startup by Dan Toma, Esther Gons and Tendayi Viki, it is a great book, it's currently I would say one of the best books on both Innovation Practice and Innovation Management. So, I would definitely recommend it to everybody. It's a bit thick, but you know, you get actually two books in one. And another one, because to me, both Lean Agile Innovation, you know, they're all means to an end. If they become an end in itself, then that's when they become dogmatic. And what ties them all together is, you know, strategy. And the book I would heartily recommend, it's a, I would say, it's a bit underappreciated, is Game Changing Strategies from Constantinos Markides. It's a great book, so, he's a professor from London Business School, I think, or London School of Economics, I don't know, I keep mixing them. And he writes very well for an academic, you know, it's easy to consume a lot of examples. He makes business model innovation come to life. It's not just some theory, but it's specific examples, and for me, it's great because it shows you how to adapt. It doesn't have a lot of modules or anything, so it's more like looking at it and seeing okay, this worked, this didn't work, what's my case? And the third one, to better thinking. So, one great thing I read was that employees can make a bad CEO look great, so, employees can make anything work, bad decisions, bad management policies, you know, if they want to, they will make it work. At the same time, employees can also make the best strategies and policies go to nothing if they want to sabotage them. So, the last book is more on, I would say, for managers and leaders, and it's The Halo Effect from Phil Rosenzweig. What he talks about is exactly like what I mentioned with the survivor bias, but he talks about different views. Let's say that the gist of his book is by focusing on, you know, those perfect leaders with their halo, you become blinded, and leaders themselves become blinded, because they get confused, because they think that it is their ingenuity that created the result and not the employees and their skill. And you know, was Steve Jobs, the one who created everything? Ula Ojiaku: No Bruno Pešec: No, he definitely had some things that were good, he had some things that are horrible, but he had great people around him, they didn't come out of nowhere. Obviously, you could say the same for Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, or all the people that we consider, look at that that person, the halo around them. The risk for every leader and manager is to get deluded by their own success. And it's a lovely short book that will show you all these biases and delusions that can happen. I'll stop here. I think three books are enough. Ula Ojiaku:  I've had The Corporate Startup on my reading list, but the other ones, Game Changing Strategy, The Halo Effect definitely have gone onto my reading list now, which is already like this long. So, thanks for sharing those. Now, how can the audience reach you? How can the audience reach you, Bruno, are you online on social media? Bruno Pešec: So, I write a lot about innovation, strategy, experimentation, entrepreneurship, as well. You can find all of that on my website, www.pesec.no. It will be in your show note, as well, so you can find it there. I publish a lot of free resources, templates, sessions like this, webinars, writings, an E-book, etc. So, you can find everything there. I invite everybody who would like to connect on LinkedIn as well, but if you do then then please just drop in “Ula sends me.” Ula Ojiaku:  Well, more like “I listened to your episode on the podcast, and I'm reaching out.” Bruno Pešec: Right? They can make it as detailed as they wish. So, keeping it simple, that is where I share everything, and it's open and free. And I'm happy to share. You know, if you heard something in this conversation, please reach out to Ula or reach out to me if you would like any questions or any specific materials or whatever. Ula Ojiaku: Sounds great Bruno, thanks for that. Now, any final words for the audience before we wrap this up? Bruno Pešec:  Well, before the audience, for you, thank you very much. This has been a great conversation, very engaging. So thank you for creating this atmosphere and making this a very easy conversation. I believe, I mean, I enjoyed it so much, I would be surprised if the listeners don't take a little bit of our energy and conversationA and to the listeners, I just have one thing. So, you heard today a lot of stuff. There's a lot of great stuff to hear from Ula's other episodes, but the most important thing is start immediately, today, don't wait for the perfect moment. Take just one thing from today, and immediately discuss it tomorrow with the team or yourself, just one thing, it doesn't matter what, just immediately try it out. One step at a time. And, you know, a year from now we will look back and see what an amazing year you had. Don't wait for the perfect moment. Just start. Ula Ojiaku:  Fantastic. Well, that's very inspirational, I'm motivated to just go and conquer the world right now. Bruno it's been a pleasure speaking with you and I hope you would want to come back another time for us to have another conversation on this show. So, thank you so much Bruno. Bruno Pešec: Thank you, Ula, would be lovely. Ula Ojiaku: Great! Outro: That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com or your favourite podcast provider. Also share with friends and do leave a review on iTunes. This would help others find this show.  I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com Take care and God bless.  

Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder is one of the world's most influential innovation experts, a leading author, entrepreneur and in-demand speaker whose work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started.Ranked No. 4 of the Thinkers50 list of the most influential management thinkers worldwide, Osterwalder is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual models. He invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map – practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies.Strategyzer, Osterwalder's company, provides online courses, applications, and technology-enabled services to help organizations effectively and systematically manage strategy, growth, and transformation.His books include the international bestseller Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want, Testing Business Ideas and The Invincible Company.

Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder is one of the world's most influential innovation experts, a leading author, entrepreneur, and in-demand speaker whose work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started. Ranked No. 4 of the top 50 management thinkers worldwide, Alex is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual tools. Together with Yves Pigneur, he invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map—practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies. And they really introduced into the strategy dialogue the idea that business models can be intentionally—and creatively—designed. Strategyzer, Alex's company, is on a mission to evolve large established companies so that they inspire and activate and liberate their employees to be innovators. They do this using online courses, applications, and technology-enabled platforms. His books include the international bestseller Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design, Testing Business Ideas, The Invincible Company, and the recently launched High-Impact Tools for Teams.In this podcast he shares: Why innovation MUST begin with your culture Why if there were only ONE metric you should be tracking to unleash innovation, it should be your “innovation kill rate” Real-world examples of large enterprises who have been able to transform into agile, innovate organizations, proving it CAN be done __________________________________________________________________________________________"So there are now those outliers who have done exactly that. They invested in innovation, but it's not just the money, they gave innovation power and they created this ecosystem for exploration, with tons of failures. They hold up their failures—same thing as Amazon. They hold up their failures and say, "You can't succeed without failures, and the bigger you get, the bigger your failures. But you know that's the system you need to create for the winners to emerge. So, failure's never the goal, but it's an inevitable side consequence of exploration."-Alex Osterwalder__________________________________________________________________________________________Episode Timeline:00:00—Introducing Alex Osterwalder + The topic of today's episode2:05—What is your definition of strategy?3:01—What got you interested in strategy?4:01—Could you explain a "dual culture"?5:50—What are the drivers of culture?8:09—What are you most well-known for?11:16—What should a CEO be encouraging to engage innovative behavior?14:30—What is the key lesson people should take away from the case studies you've described?16:20—What do most companies get wrong?18:07—What's a belief that you've changed your mind about?19:54—What are you working on now, and how can people engage with you?__________________________________________________________________________________________Additional Resources:Personal website: https://www.alexosterwalder.com/Strategyzer Website: https://www.strategyzer.com/

Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder is one of the world's most influential innovation experts, a leading author, entrepreneur, and in-demand speaker whose work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started. Ranked No. 4 of the top 50 management thinkers worldwide, Alex is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual tools. Together with Yves Pigneur, he invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map—practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies. And they really introduced into the strategy dialogue the idea that business models can be intentionally—and creatively—designed. Strategyzer, Alex's company, is on a mission to evolve large established companies so that they inspire and activate and liberate their employees to be innovators. They do this using online courses, applications, and technology-enabled platforms. His books include the international bestseller Business Model Generation, Value Proposition Design, Testing Business Ideas, The Invincible Company, and the recently launched High-Impact Tools for Teams.In this podcast he shares: Why innovation MUST begin with your culture Why if there were only ONE metric you should be tracking to unleash innovation, it should be your “innovation kill rate” Real-world examples of large enterprises who have been able to transform into agile, innovate organizations, proving it CAN be done __________________________________________________________________________________________"So there are now those outliers who have done exactly that. They invested in innovation, but it's not just the money, they gave innovation power and they created this ecosystem for exploration, with tons of failures. They hold up their failures—same thing as Amazon. They hold up their failures and say, "You can't succeed without failures, and the bigger you get, the bigger your failures. But you know that's the system you need to create for the winners to emerge. So, failure's never the goal, but it's an inevitable side consequence of exploration."-Alex Osterwalder__________________________________________________________________________________________Episode Timeline:00:00—Introducing Alex Osterwalder + The topic of today's episode2:05—What is your definition of strategy?3:01—What got you interested in strategy?4:01—Could you explain a "dual culture"?5:50—What are the drivers of culture?8:09—What are you most well-known for?11:16—What should a CEO be encouraging to engage innovative behavior?14:30—What is the key lesson people should take away from the case studies you've described?16:20—What do most companies get wrong?18:07—What's a belief that you've changed your mind about?19:54—What are you working on now, and how can people engage with you?__________________________________________________________________________________________Additional Resources:Personal website: https://www.alexosterwalder.com/Strategyzer Website: https://www.strategyzer.com/

This is the tip of the iceberg. To dive into the details and support the author, order the https://geni.us/model-generation-book (book). Introductionhttps://geni.us/model-generation-book (Business Model Generation) is a guide to the highly influential business model canvas. This canvas was co-created by 470 practitioners from 45 countries. The book features practical innovation techniques used by leading consultants and companies worldwide. It is currently used by P&G, Amazon and Tesla to improve business efficiency. The book features a highly visual, 4-color design that simplifies powerful strategic ideas and tools. Business Model Building Blocks“A business model describes the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value” - Alexander Osterwalder The foundation of business models should always be what the authors call a Business Model Canvas. This canvas should provide a visual prompt for participants to focus on the crucial criteria. The aim of a business model canvas is to focus the discussion on strategic thinking rather than being distracted by small operational details. The building blocks that form this canvas make it dynamic. This means some options in certain sections will impose limits on or amplify other sections. The authors provide nine different building blocks that every business should incorporate into their business model canvas:   Key Partners - You can start to control more market share simply by working together with other businesses. This cooperation can lead to a superior product and better supplier links. Key Activities - Your company will have its own key activities that lead to profit.  Value Propositions - These are groups of benefits which incentivize clients to work with you over your competitors. You can improve this category by innovating new products or optimizing them to fit client needs. Customer Relationships: Different industries and customers require different types of assistance. Customer Segments - Try to target specific groups of customers to gain competitive advantage in a few key areas. These groups are called customer segments. Key Resources - These resources can be used to gain a competitive advantage. This includes superior talent or land. Channels - You must develop communication channels other than advertising. Every product must be able to be scrutinized. Cost Structure - Your cost structure will determine your business structure. This is because your cost structure will place constraints on other parts of the business.  Revenue Streams - The authors describe the revenue streams as the arteries of the business model. This is because they obtain income but impose certain constraints on operations. Business Model PatternsWhile reviewing your business model building blocks and the model they create you are likely to notice patterns. There will be some patterns unique to your business but there are also five patterns that are extremely common across all business sectors. The authors argue that understanding these patterns will help you to understand the synergy and tradeoffs associated with certain building blocks. Unbundled ModelsThis is where an organization splits three aspects into their own discrete identities. This is most common in businesses where they are actually offering multiple different services, like telephone companies who also offer broadband. Unbundling these services will prevent decisions in one area leading to limitations for the other areas. The authors offer an example of banking to explain the importance of unbundling services: The bank simultaneously advises wealthy clients and sells financial instruments. The former is a long-term business. The bank wants to sell its financial instruments to competing banks for extra revenue. But, this could hurt their competitive position. There is a clash between the advisory division and the product...

From the Host: Katherine Ann Byam I met Alex virtually in May 2020 through attending his virtual masterclass on building invincible companies. At the time, we were still figuring out how to run massive scale virtual workshops, yet Alex and his team executed this with ease. I was curious to learn what inspires the world's #4 Management Thinker. I had the honour of asking Alex these 3 questions: What's your why – what question gets you out of bed every morning with a burning desire to solve it? We know in our world today we have a burning platform of sustainability. What do you currently see as the role of business in solving these problems? We know from your work that Innovation is heavily influenced by a company's culture. What are the top 3 things that companies with a great innovation culture do to sustain that culture and expand their economic lives? About our Guest - Dr Alexander Osterwalder Dr. Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder is one of the world's most influential innovation experts, a leading author, entrepreneur and in-demand speaker whose work has changed the way established companies do business and how new ventures get started. Ranked No. 4 of the top 50 management thinkers worldwide, Osterwalder is known for simplifying the strategy development process and turning complex concepts into digestible visual models. He invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Business Portfolio Map – practical tools that are trusted by millions of business practitioners from leading global companies. Strategyzer, Osterwalder's company, provides online courses, applications, and technology-enabled services to help organizations effectively and systematically manage strategy, growth and transformation. His books include the international bestseller Business Model Generation , Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want, Testing Business Ideas and The Invincible Company published in Spring 2020. To learn more about Alex's work you can sign up for their newsletter via the following link https://www.strategyzer.com/ Where Ideas Launch - the Podcast for the Unexpected Innovator is hosted by Katherine Ann Byam and sponsored by Dieple Virtual Service Hub. DVSH is her consulting firm that supports modern day service based and manufacturing start ups to scale up with Strategy, Process Optimisation, and Advanced Analytics. Check it out on the following link https://www.dieple.com/vsh/

معرفی و خلاصه کتاب خلق مدل کسب و کار Business Model Generation   برای طراحی و تشریح و بهبود کسب و کار فقط یک راه هست، باید مدلش کنیم. ما آدمها برای شناخت و حل مسائل پیش رو همه چیز رو مدل سازی میکنیم. برای مدل سازی کسب و کار هم یک چارچوب کامل و جامع داریم که در این کتاب معرفی شده است. متن و روایت: امین علیرضایی

Alexander Osterwalder is an entrepreneur, author, business model innovator, and co-founder of Strategyzer, a SaaS company that helps organizations develop better growth engines, powerful business models, and so much more. In this episode, Alex discusses the innovative way he wrote the Business Model Generation book and explains why the Business Model Canvas is an excellent tool for businesses looking to challenge their current business model. 02:55 - Why did Alex write the book, Business Model Generation. 04:00 - How Alex crowd sourced the book. 09:00 - What is the Business Model Canvas all about? 11:15 - There is no such thing as the one and only business tool. You need to combine tools based on your needs. 17:15 - What kinds of conversations is Alex hearing from the C-suite executives about business models? 19:40 - How do you price a cure that's going to heal people with one injection? 21:35 - You can still be innovative on inferior technology. 24:00 - We're still stuck in the last century when it comes to developing innovation. 29:00 - There are some great lessons you can learn from Expresso. 34:15 - Large corporations are trying hard to be innovative, but only a few of them are able to succeed. 36:55 - What is Alex's business model? 41:55 - What has Alex changed his mind about recently? 43:40 - What does Alex do to remain creative? 44:35 - What does Alex attribute his success to in life? Resources: http://www.outsidelens.com/outsidevoices