Lean and agile methodologies are adopted as the main approach for product development. Even so, they are still too disruptive, especially for large organizations on large projects.
In 2011, Eric Ries presented through his book (The Lean Startup Method) and his blog the build, measure and learn model called Lean Startup. Using this model, product managers shorten production cycles by focusing on functionality rather than the completeness of the vision.
AThis model is more than recognized and applied globally. On the other hand, it is clear how difficult it would be for a large company to risk its brand image and take on this methodology in depth.
By using lean or agile methodologies, a service or product is quickly built and brought to market. This avoids spending unnecessary resources and takes advantage of customer feedback to influence the next phase of construction.
However, this approach can be quite unfeasible for a large company wishing to develop a new line of business.
Enterprise products tend to be comprised of multiple levels of communication and decision making. Furthermore, the bureaucracy, coupled with the number of stakeholders involved in the decision process, makes the minimum viable product simply impossible to build. That scenario guarantees an unacceptable time to launch it on the commercial network.
Minimum Viable Experiment (MVE)
But there is also another relevant aspect and that is the fact that these methodologies are not only intended to build something, but to learn something. Therefore, large organizations can focus on building Minimum Viable Experiments (MVEs) and not Minimum Viable Products (MVPs). In other words, the ultimate goal would be to learn, not grow.
By focusing on MVEs, a large organization benefits from all the advantages of an MVP, while not incurring its drawbacks. Among these drawbacks is the exposure of the brand as it is limited to a small group of customers. In addition, corporate quality standards, for example, can be gently relaxed.
But there is optimal reason to choose MVEs over MVPs; ultimately they are simpler. In the end, "if you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough."
