Build Fast, Fail Fast: The Agile Myth That’s Making You Fail

Key Takeaways

• The Agile Manifesto's principles have been reinterpreted and sometimes misapplied in modern entrepreneurship.

  
  

• Agile development without upfront research is an inefficient product development strategy.

  
  

• The democratization of market data has replaced the need for iterative discovery.

Why Agile Doesn't Work. What Most Entrepreneurs Get Wrong

Most tech entrepreneurs today treat agile development as a get-out-of-research-free card. It's not - and that misunderstanding is costing them dearly.

This approach has become almost dogmatic in startup circles: launch a minimal viable product (MVP), gather user feedback, then iterate until you find market traction. But how did we get here, and more importantly, is this really what the creators of agile development intended?"

The Lean Startup published in 2011, popularized agile product development, but the original “build-measure-learn” concept was published 10 years earlier in the Agile Software Development Manifesto. Unveiled during a ski weekend attended by some of the titans of software development at the time, it’s a short, team-focused document with 12 principles.

 The first few are:

1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.

   
   

2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer's competitive advantage.

   
   

3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale.

   
   

Well, yes, the manifesto does seem to imply you should create, test, iterate, then test again, iterate again - ad infinitum. But isn’t that just the old-timey way of doing product development?

Is “Agile” Just an Old-Timey Product Development Reboot?

This iterative approach to product development isn't new - Thomas Edison practiced it in his basement in the 19th century. He famously found 10,000 ways to not invent a light bulb before finally succeeding

From Madam C. J. Walker in her bathtub to Josiah Wedgewood's 411 attempts to perfect ceramics, history is full of entrepreneurs who followed this same iterative development process. These solo inventors' successes demonstrated the power of hands-on iteration, but their process often took years or even decades.

When Strategy Replaced Trial and Error

As companies scaled, though, they faced a different challenge. As markets expanded and production costs soared, the risk of failure became too expensive to manage through trial and error alone. The need for a more strategic approach was clear, especially as shareholders demanded more predictable returns on their investments.

To reduce this risk, companies developed a practical set of questions that every product team needed to answer before moving forward::

• What do people actually want?

• Is anybody else already making it?

• Are there enough people who want it and can afford it?

• Does the math, math to make it and sell it?

When A Few Simple Questions Became a Complex Process

This straightforward market opportunity research process had, by 2001, inevitably morphed into a time-consuming, policies and procedures-laden product development process.  Enter The Agile Manifesto.

Written, as you’ll notice, during the dotcom bust, the manifesto was a condemnation of the Big Business, research-driven approach. (And possibly an attempt to shift a bit of the blame for the dotcom bubble’s spectacular bust.)

 How Big Tech Has Evolved Beyond Agile

Twenty-five years later, the lessons from The Agile Manifesto have gone mainstream, and the “iterate and test until you get it right” approach thrives in entrepreneurial circles.  Big Tech has, however, moved on.

Consider this statement from Elon Musk (echoing similar statements from Steve Jobs.)

“At Tesla, we do no market surveys, no market testing. We just make cars that we love and that we are convinced people will love. That’s it.”

You’ll note he didn’t say, “I don’t do research. He said I don’t do consumer testing.

There’s a difference. Market research, the kind I’m proposing every entrepreneur should do, involves reading, and Elon reads a lot and widely. – as most of those we call “visionaries” do.

Freed from funding constraints, Musk may not put all of that research in a pitch deck, but he’s analyzed it and isolated the market opportunity before spending a dime on development.

The New Rules of Product Development

This research-first approach stands in stark contrast to what over half of startups do today – which is fail due to, of all things, lack of demand. Who would spend the time and money to make an MVP without an inkling of its market potential? Entrepreneurs without the resources to conduct research?

But are entrepreneurs really without the resources to perform an upfront market opportunity analysis?

In 2001, research was locked away in libraries and universities. But today, that's no longer true. We're awash in freely available data - from academic research to industry surveys. Data on demographics, psychographics, and consumer behavior are all readily available.

Iterative development may have been the best approach 25 years ago, but it’s not today. That's why Agile doesn't work today. We have access to the data we need to quantify opportunities and predict market demand – failing first doesn’t need to be part of the equation.

While the Agile Manifesto's principles of 'satisfying the customer' and 'maximizing the amount of work not done' remain valuable, incessant iteration in lieu of upfront research simply hasn't stood the test of time."

Maryanne Conlin is an award-winning, classically trained marketer and founder of NeuroD Marketing. She's worked with leading Fortune 500 brands and helped over 500 clients build their businesses strategically for sustainable growth. An expert speaker and writer on targeting & positioning, she runs workshops and teaches internationally.

Contact me to learn how to optimize your marketing strategies in an economic downturn.