MVPverse — How to write your MVP Hypothesis statement.

In my last article, I mentioned that the two most important aims of MVP are

1. The largest amount of validated learning
2. The least effort

And, in explaining the first bullet point I added, that the feedback that satisfies your hypothesis and is driven by your early evangelists is good enough feedback. As important as it is to understand the importance of early evangelists, as it is to understand the basics of hypothesis.

It’s important to understand that the words “idea ” and “hypotheses” mean two very different things.

Steve Blank, another one of the early MVP pioneers, writes

new ventures (both startups and new ideas in existing companies) don’t start with “ideas”, they start with hypotheses (a fancy word for guesses.)

It’s important to understand that the words “idea ” and “hypotheses” mean two very different things. For most innovators, the word “idea” conjures up an insight that immediately requires a plan to bring it to fruition. In contrast, a hypothesis means we have an educated guess that requires experimentation and data to validate or invalidate.

In the most simple form, a hypothesis comes as an ‘if… then’ statement, here’s a common example(Forming Experimental Product Hypotheses):

• ‘If I add water to my garden, then my flowers will grow faster.’

Now if this statement proved to be false and the desired outcome is that the flowers will grow faster and live longer we can add more statements to the list to either prove true or false:

• ‘If I move the flowers to an area of the garden with the most daily sunlight, then those flowers will grow faster’
• ‘If I plant all the same type of flowers together, then those flowers will grow faster’
• ‘If I add nutrients to the left side of the garden, then those flowers will grow faster than the ones on the right.’

Product Hypothesis statements can come in many different forms so pick what’s most comfortable for the team and business to understand. However, they should always include the following key details:

• feature/solution
• user group or persona
• user benefit
• business outcome

A simple hypothesis statement might look something like this:

We believe that [business outcome]
will be achieved if [user]
attains [benefit]
with [feature]

Something a little more detailed with more of an emphasis on the solution:

We believe that [building this feature]
[for these people] will achieve [this benefit].
We will know we are successful when [outcome from the market].

In the next articles I would discuss how to form hypothesis and test it as well.