Customer Discovery in the DOD/IC Workshop

Steve Blank, Tom Byers, Pete Newell, Joe Felter

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 International License

Agenda

• Customer Discovery in the DOD/IC tips

• Role Playing

Customer Discovery in the DOD/IC

Goal is to Validate Mission Model

Canvas Components

• Test each of mission model canvas components

• Most require multiple iterations

• Most are recursive and are dependent on others

• Several are multi-sided

Beneficiaries

Service

Agency

Activity

Combatant Command

Employed Unit

Research Lab

Defense Prime

Capability Developer

Requirement Writer

Acquisition Program Mgr

User

???

Who Are We Talking To?

Where Do They Fit?

Beneficiaries

Service

Agency

Activity

Combatant Command

Employed Unit

Research Lab

Defense Prime

Capability Developer

Requirement Writer

Acquisition Program mgr

User

???

Who Are We Talking To?

Where Do They Fit?

Which of these

is not a beneficiary?

Beneficiaries

Service

Agency

Activity

Combatant Command

Employed Unit

Research Lab

Defense Prime

Capability Developer

Requirement Writer

Acquisition Program Mgr

User

???

Which of These is not a Beneficiary?

• If you focus on orgs, or acquisition

programs, you lose focus on the real

problem to be solved and often don’t

recognize it until after a program reaches

Full Operating Capability (FOC) ...

• You end up with Acquisition Wins and

Mission Fails

• You need to focus on the specific people

inside those orgs and programs

Discovery Starts with Understanding

the Beneficiaries

Understand the archetype

Understand day-in-the-life

Names of Job Functions/Titles

Names of Organizations

Deeper

Understanding

What’s Their Relationship?If You Can’t Draw It

You Don’t Understand it!

Diagram Deployment/FundingIf You Can’t Draw It

You Don’t Understand it!

Also need diagrams for:

• Deployment

• Funding

See the DOD Workshop

slides for the basic diagrams

Discovery is Not

Just Questions and MVPsDeep understanding happens when you

“become the beneficiary”

First Pass of What to Ask (1)

The Problem

- What is the problem?

- Who else has this problem?

- What happens if this problem isn’t solved?

- What’s the timeframe needed to solve it?

What Do I Say? in the DOD

• Remember you are 1st testing the problem

• Members of the DOD will not respond to ”cold calls”

“Hi, I got your name from Captain xx (your sponsor.) (Or if the

person you’re calling knows them, your mentor, liaison, teaching

team, etc.) who said you’re the smartest person in this unit.

I’m from Stanford and were working on trying to understand

xyz problem and building a solution. I’d like 10 minutes of

your time to understand this problem space.

I’m not selling anything but happy to share with you what

we’ve learned about x.”

What Do I Say? in the Intel Community

• Members of the Intel Community will not:

– respond to ”cold calls”

– provide names and phone numbers of people without advance

permission

• Your sponsor is your gatekeeper

First Pass of What to Ask (2)

The Solution

- How do you solve the problem today?

- Is some portion of the problem being solved?

- How painful is the current solution?

- Has anyone else tried to solve the problem?

- What do you envision the solution to look like?

First Pass of What to Ask (3)

The Solution

- Constraints on the solution? (Physical, dollars, etc.)

• Performance necessary?

• Standards that are required?

• Other systems to be integrated with? APIs available?

- Are there any known legal, policy, oversight, or

compliance (LPOC) issues involved?

- What’s the closest off-the-shelf solution?

- If it exists, why can’t you use it?

First Pass of What to Ask (4)

in the DOD

The Context

- Who are you?

- What authorities do you have?

- What are you supposed to do (mission),

- What are you not supposed to do or not allowed to do

(constraints)?

- How are you funded?

- Color of money & special authorities

- What types of contracts do you have/use (if applicable)?

- What other beneficiaries do you work with?

- Understand the Program of Record

- Understand the Program Readiness Level

First Pass of What to Ask (5)

in the Intel Community

The Context

- Who are you?

- What authorities do you have?

- What are you supposed to do (mission)

- What are you not supposed to do or not allowed to do

(constraints)?

- How are you funded?

- Color of money & special authorities

- What types of contracts do you have/use (if applicable)?

- What other beneficiaries do you work with?

- Understand the Program of Record

- Understand the Program Readiness LevelTypically off-the-record for new vendors

Typically off-the-record for new vendors

Typically won’t answer

What Don’t I Say?

Discovery in the DOD/IC has a few special problems

• Some problems are classified

• Some of the data is classified

– ”Can you give me the ISIS data set” probably won’t go over well

• Therefore your questions have to be indirect

– ”Is this the only application you will be using?”

– “Is there a commercial analog for what you do?”

– ”Is there any commercial software that you use?”

• Do your open-source homework first to try to understand

as much of the problem as you can

How Do Students Do DOD/IC

Market Research?

• You’ll be surprised what an open-source search will

reveal about most DOD/IC customer problems

– Signal Magazine, cyber technologies, homeland security, C4ISR

– Proceedings naval matters

– C4ISR: Journal of Net-Centric Warfare

– Aviation Week – aircraft, spacecraft

– Jane's Defense Weekly, Intelligence Review

– Secrecy News – FAS blog

– Small Wars Journal blog

– Center for Defense Information blog

– War on the Rocks blog

– The Intercept *

– Snowden Papers *

– Etc.* gov’t employees and contractors can not access classified information even if it is in the public domain

The Minimal Viable Product

The MVP:

• is not a smaller version of the product

– It’s not a prototype

• it is designed to maximize learning

– It’s used to test each part of the Mission Model Canvas

• The MVP may differ each week depending on what

you’re testing

Dry Run Customer Discovery Interviews

• Test it with your team members

• Start with a script

• Then try it without

• Take notes of each discovery interview and capture

them in your team blog

Your Turn

Customer Discovery Role Play