From Caesar to Scientist - Rapid Experiments at Intuit
- 1. Rapid Experimentation Bennett Blank Innovation Leader, Intuit Inc. @BlankBen
- 2. "We improve our customers’ financial lives so profoundly they can’t imagine going back to the old way.” - Scott Cook, Intuit Founder
- 3. Customer Driven Innovation Design for Delight Our Philosophy: Innovation is everyone’s job
- 6. Say vs. Do There must be a better way to innovate…
- 7. “No business plan survives first contact with customers” – Steve Blank So, the sooner you achieve first contact, the sooner you will learn the truth about your customers…
- 8. From Caesar to Scientist You can’t pick winners (no matter how smart you are)
- 9. Opinion-Based Politics + PPT One Person Thinking& Planning Plan + Flawless Intellect Success vs. Failure Assume I’m Right Advocate and Sell Someone might stab me Evidence-Based Experiments + Data Everyone Doing it Now Enlightened Trial & Error Always Be Learning (ABL) Assume I’m Wrong Let Data do the Talking Hey, this is fun!
- 10. Goal: make faster, more informed decisions. • Dramatically reduce risk • Minimize resources required • Increase number of ideas pursued • End false positives / negatives • Create engaged employees
- 11. Does it Deliver? 600+ experiments with thousands of customers 1200+ employees innovating across the spectrum
- 12. $20m+ in new revenue Multiple new ideas in market Internal process improvements Minimal resources Employee engagement + …all in less than 18 months Yes, Rapid experimentation delivers innovation results
- 14. Build the minimum required to test your most important question Hint: It’s probably a lot less than you think
- 15. Rapid Experimentation Output = Data + Surprises
- 16. What is Rapid? Run experiments in: a few hours a few days a few weeks (too slow ?) Start now. There is always a faster way to test your business idea with real customers, find it.
- 17. Throughout your Org Go beyond product teams – Finance, HR, IT, Legal, Branding
- 18. RX Guidelines vs. Rules Honor the customer Remember our company values Freedom below 2,000 You’re in charge (see legal) Tell a great story You: Create the systems and culture – then get out of the way!
- 19. Parting thoughts… • Start small, expand fast • Go where you are loved • Be inclusive, invite everyone! • Align with your culture • Start now!
- 20. Exercise (a taste of what our employees experience)
- 21. How long would it take for 1 new hire to run an experiment at your company? (:03) Task: Write down a number in hours, days, or weeks Hint: Consider the steps an employee must go through, approvals, legal requests, etc…
- 22. How might you reduce this time by 10x? (:05) Task: Write down at least 15 things you or your organization could do to reduce this time. Hint: Be specific! Consider behaviors and tangible changes, rather than generic concepts. Be bold - There are no bad ideas!
- 23. Choose your favorite idea. Devise an experiment you can run in 24 hours or less to test this idea. (:05) Task: Write down a simple, but specific, description of a potential experiment you might run. Hint: Ensure your experiment is measuring a real behavior, and your participants will not know it is an experiment!
- 24. Your Hypothesis: If I do X, then Y% (or #) will behave in way Z. (5:00) Task: Write down a hypothesis for your experiment using this template (keep it positive) . Example: If Ben runs this exercise, 25% of attendees will run their experiment after the conference.
- 25. My Challenge to You: Run your first experiment, share what you learn. (24:00) Task: Run your 24 hour experiment in the next three weeks. Right Now: Send Hypothesis to: [email protected] and I will send you this deck with bonus content.
- 26. Thank You Bennett Blank Innovation Leader, Intuit Inc. @BlankBen
Editor's Notes
- #2: • Welcome to my talk
- #3: For those who don’t know – this is Intuit30 year old startup, Just hit a lifetime high
- #4: Why – See mission statementWhat – Customer Driven Innovation is our foundational philosophyHow – Design 4 DelightThis is the job responsibility of each and every employee…From sustaining and incremental to big breakthroughs
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- #13: Finance, HR, new business,
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- #18: • This is our founder Scott Cook walking the walk – death to PPT• We now give status updates focused on experiment progress for new ideasHypothesis creation, experiment strategy, etc.• Our job is now to become masters of creating great experiments• This is a dramatic change in the way we work!- We’re beginning a long journey
- #19: Finance, HR, new business,
- #20: • Welcome to my talk
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- #22: Imagine you are an Innovation leader, and you believe in my assertion regarding rapid experiments…
- #23: How might you make a step change in the way your company operates?
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