Caution! Caution! Caution! be very careful of the advice above. I doubt the Lean Startup has been actually read or fully understood based on the synopsis. It's common for detractors to have only picked up parts of the advice in the book (usually from other sources than the book) and not considered the entirety of the advice. It's also important to remember the context that the book was written when waterfall was the "conventional" wisdom. There are very good reasons why this book is popular and recognised as a very important text when developing your entrepreneurial skills. Is it perfect, No. Has the body of knowledge moved on in the last 10 years or so, Yes. However the content deserves to be considered and reflected on as you develop your toolkit. I was lucky enough to have Eric as a Mentor on a programme before he published the book. It's a complete misconception that he did not believe in customer interviews, he encouraged us to get out and talk to customers every day, however he encouraged us to do that in a structured manner. In true lean fashion he believed that insights were to be found at the "Gemba" - the real place where the work actually happened. What he didn't believe in was doing research with those that were not there, didn't feel the pain of what we were trying to solve (like talking to the buyers or managers rather than end users), doing endless desk research without getting close to the actual users, or being lazy about finding a way to measure if we were making a difference or not for our customers. Again I was lucky enough to work with Rob Fitz as he developed his thinking before he published his book. The Mom test should be considered as a companion to the lean process, not an either or, nor is it the Bible. The heart of the Lean Startup Thesis is that entrepreneurship is a management science and is not simply luck, this means that learning should be validated, customer feedback loops should be shortened as much as possible and innovators need to focus on the boring stuff of how to measure progress and how to prioritise work. My advise, read the lean startup it's a classic. There is no single Bible out there, it's an important read but is complimentary to the Mom Test, Business Model Generation, Running Lean, The Agile Manifesto and many other great texts.
Caution! Caution! Caution! be very careful of the advice above. I doubt the Lean Startup has been actually read or fully understood based on the synopsis. It's common for detractors to have only picked up parts of the advice in the book (usually from other sources than the book) and not considered the entirety of the advice. It's also important to remember the context that the book was written when waterfall was the "conventional" wisdom. There are very good reasons why this book is popular and recognised as a very important text when developing your entrepreneurial skills. Is it perfect, No. Has the body of knowledge moved on in the last 10 years or so, Yes. However the content deserves to be considered and reflected on as you develop your toolkit. I was lucky enough to have Eric as a Mentor on a programme before he published the book. It's a complete misconception that he did not believe in customer interviews, he encouraged us to get out and talk to customers every day, however he encouraged us to do that in a structured manner. In true lean fashion he believed that insights were to be found at the "Gemba" - the real place where the work actually happened. What he didn't believe in was doing research with those that were not there, didn't feel the pain of what we were trying to solve (like talking to the buyers or managers rather than end users), doing endless desk research without getting close to the actual users, or being lazy about finding a way to measure if we were making a difference or not for our customers. Again I was lucky enough to work with Rob Fitz as he developed his thinking before he published his book. The Mom test should be considered as a companion to the lean process, not an either or, nor is it the Bible. The heart of the Lean Startup Thesis is that entrepreneurship is a management science and is not simply luck, this means that learning should be validated, customer feedback loops should be shortened as much as possible and innovators need to focus on the boring stuff of how to measure progress and how to prioritise work. My advise, read the lean startup it's a classic. There is no single Bible out there, it's an important read but is complimentary to the Mom Test, Business Model Generation, Running Lean, The Agile Manifesto and many other great texts.