How much research is just enough research? How much is too much?

A graph that popped into my head when I couldn’t sleep one night

Originally published at tomkerwin.com

What’s going on here then?

On the left of the graph, we’re doing too little research

We’re trapped by a false sense of certainty. We believe we’ve got The Answer™ … but really that’s because we don’t know any better and we aren’t looking for evidence to the contrary.

This is a common place for teams and companies to end up. I know I’ve been there.

You might recognise: …

… when you’re all totally bought in on all Steve Blank’s Build-Measure-Learn approach, and know you need to Get Out Of the Building … but in practice you’re only really doing the Build part, and you keep putting off the pesky Measure and Learn parts till later.

… when the boss says, “we don’t have time or budget for research, just build!” (Of course, the same boss wouldn’t buy a $50k car without months of research and test drives … but apparently thinks nothing of setting fire to $5m of company funds on a their genius hunch.)