How do I validate this idea?
Hello everyone, first post here.
I currently work as an engineering manager, and a lot of my time is spent creating visual representation of teams (real and hypothetical) using Google Sheets. These sheets usually communicate a few things: actual people, skills, roles, permanent/freelance status. By having multiple sheets in the spreadsheet, I also show evolution of the team(s) over time (e.g. now, end Q3, end Q4). I use this sheet to communicate with recruiters, my product board, and anyone else interested in understanding the compositions of the teams.
Working in the spreadsheet is pragmatic, but I wish I had something that would allow me to:
- Define people once and then drag and drop them into teams
- Create multiple hypothetical setups, each with its own set of assumptions
- Be able to 'forward' and 'rewind' a team's timeline so you can get a sense of how the team evolves
- Quick stats on teams — how many people, distributions of skills, experience
- Communicating changes in teams consistently (right now I need to maintain both the spreadsheet, plus a wiki page per team containing mostly the same information) — it would be nice if I had a single place where I can point people to
The above list of features is what I think would be useful to me. My question to this community: how can I test this to figure out if it's something other people would find useful?
An important question to ask yourself, be as honest as possible: Would you pay for it?
Is there anyone else on your team who does this kind of work? If so, talk to them and see how they tackle the problem.
Maybe create a landing page for your new product with a "buy" button at the bottom and show it to them?
I would recommend reading "The Mom Test", it's a great book that will answer your question about validation and show you the best way to go about asking questions to potential customers.
Good luck!
Thanks for the response.
Good question. I guess I’ll pay for it if it’s a once-off cost (like an app from the App Store).
Not in my team, but surely elsewhere in my company. I’ll chat to them.
Thanks for the recommendations!
No worries, wishing you the best!
What are you trying to achieve by organizing the teams in this way? Is it to see how different skills among the team contribute to the success of a project? Is it more to make sure each team is diversified with various skills? Is it related to organizational psychology?
The first thing that comes to mind is to speak with the other managers in your organization and see if they have the same problems as you. Before you do that, you need to define the problem that the features you listed above is trying to solve. Don't ask your fellow managers, "would being able to define people once and then drag and drop them into teams help you?" Instead, define the problem that is solving and ask if they also have that problem. Having conversations like this would allow you to validate whether or not there is a problem worth solving.
Then you can try to create a prototype or MVP using existing tools and share it with other managers to see if it makes the process easier. From looking at your requirements, it seems like project/product management tool, but for people. Maybe you can experiment with Trello. Instead of putting tasks on each card, maybe you could the various teams on the board with the individuals' skills on each card. Or maybe there are other existing, free tools that you could repurpose from project management to people management for the sake of your validations.
The key goal is to be able to communicate actual and potential team structures to other people. Being able to also show them things like skill and experience distribution is a nice add-on.
That's a good idea, I'll have a chat to other managers in my company. Also, good idea about asking them if they face the same problems (maybe they have other — better — solutions).
Using Trello as a prototype is actually something that crossed my mind. Thanks!
That's great! I'd definitely explore trello and other existing tools you can test out your idea for free. How big is your organization? There are products out there that handle your requirements, but if you're small, the cost may be too high. If you can create a similar solution for smaller customers, there could be an opportunity.
Thanks!