Build to Test to Build - #1 Principle of Business Design

While I use business design as a term to define what I do, and I consider myself a self-acclaimed business designer, I still try to find ways to simplify the concept and make it more approachable for everyone.

I have myself as a persona, so I asked myself a simple question: "If I had to explain business design to me in a catchy single sentence, what would that sentence be?"

Build something with a Purpose and Test everything!

I loved the sentence, and I hope you at least like it.

Then I attempted to break it down into smaller bits, like creating a table of contents for a book. The purpose (in my opinion) is extremely important and is definitely the first step. Once it's nailed, it's done. I don't believe in pivoting on the purpose. So once you have identified the purpose of the business and figured out how to use purpose as a decision-making filter, you would never look back.

Now begins the lifelong journey of building and testing and building and testing and so on. As an entrepreneur or a venture builder, your full-time job is designing and running experiments, while at the same time building artifacts to be used in the experiments.

If at some point you run out of experiments to run, you most probably are not looking hard enough, or you are sidetracked by non-value-adding activities. Or it could be the case that you are, by Steve Blank's definition, not a startup anymore. You have validated a scalable business model.

In search mode, build, test and do it again. Execution comes later

Most of us mortals have not found it yet. So, it's better to build something to test.