Design Sprint

Courtesy: Jake Knapp

• A Design Sprint is a time-constrained, 5 phase process using design thinking to reduce the risk of bringing a product, service or a feature into the market. 
• Savioke's 5 Day Process is summarized below: [Savioke considered dozens of ideas for their robot, and then used structured decision making to select the strongest solution to prototype and test the idea with customers]. Objective was to come up with a prototype that delivered one specific functionality (delivery a single toothbrush to a guest).
• 1st the team cleared a full week off their calendars with OOO replies.
• Manufactured a deadline
• Made arrangements with hotel for a live test on the Friday.
• Now there were only 4 days to design and test.
• Day 1: Savioke reviewed everything they knew about the problem. [they reasserted the importance of Guest satisfaction after every service, which the hotel religiously tracks]
• Savioke created a map to identify biggest risks. (A Customer Journey Map kind of -- Guest meets robot, robot gives customer toothbrush, guest acknowledges the receipt, etc.). There may also be other points where Guest-robot interaction could take place. Team had to prioritize where to spend the effort based on the risk it carried.
• Some challenges: Where to start (eventually team chose The Moment of Delivery, Should we make robots appear smarter - some people may try to interact with the robot and if they didn't respond people might be disappointed, etc.
• Day 2: Team switched to problem solving. Instead of brainstorming each member came up with own solutions -- CEO, Head of Bus Dev, Chief Robotics Engg, everyone participated and came up with own solution. 
• Day 3 (goal was which ideas to test and document potential soln in detail so that only the execution is left out): Sketches, notes on conf hall walls, old ideas discarded, 23 competing solutions. Voting and structured decision to narrow down ideas. 
• Day 4: Execution. programmed and tuned up robot's movements (laptop and playstation controller, sound effects, face mock up.
• Day 5: Live Test. Lined up interviews with guests, duct-tape webcams etc. 

The need for Ad hoc, Autonomous Business Entities for Disruptive Innovation

One of the lessons of the disruptive innovation research is that when a business requires a new business model, i.e. new processes, new resources and new values, it must be lodged in an ad-hoc, autonomous entity. Building the disruptive venture within the same organization will simply lead to the same result as Nokia: it will fail, swallowed by the power of the existing model, and it won't be for lack of trying. Millions, if not billions of dollars will add to form, but won't deliver actual goods.

Silberzahn

Cargo cult start-ups and cargo cult agility...

Adding a foosball in your lobby won't make you a startup company anymore than building wooden planes recreated the flow of American goods in Guinea sixty years ago. - Silberzahn

Cargo Cult

A superstitious belief that practicing rituals or adopting certain practices will bring in the desired results. Often used in the context of Agile and Digitalization. Companies keen on seeing the lofty goals of agility and ditalization, mimic the practices (Hiring thousands of software programmers doesn't make you a software company -- example Nokia, which failed to make the transition from hardware to software; another example is hiring tens of Agile consultants, Coaches and practicing Agile rituals hoping to reimagine a new world of rapid feedback and value delivery!) 

"Soon after WWII, anthropologists in New Guinea noticed an unusual phenomenon: tribes deep in the interior of the country were building full-sized ritual airfields and airplanes out of bamboo, grass, etc. 

Anthropologists soon discovered that withdrawal of military forces had created a scarcity of modern technological goods, and the tribes, under the influence of so-called “Cargo Cult prophets”, were converting communities’ desires for these possessions into the external forms that had brought them in the past. 

The hope that these prophets shared with their followers was that if the correct external forms were present, the actual goods associated with them would arrive." - Forbes.

Effectuation

Effectuation is the the processes of opportunity identification and new venture creation...

https://philippesilberzahneng.wordpress.com/2017/10/16/effectuation-how-entrepreneurs-really-think-and-act/