Turn your differentiators into principles When you create a 2x2 chart, you end up with two strong differentiators—which can easily turn into two strong principles.

The best writing and editing is done by individuals thinking quietly, so don’t spend more than five minutes on wordsmithing as a group. Remember that, at this stage, these project principles are experimental.

First, they tried to put themselves in the mindset of a stereotypical engineer. What would be the fastest, cheapest thing to build?

Test multiple prototypes head-to-head The biggest advantage of Design Sprints over MVPs is that you can try multiple solutions at once. Teams never create multiple MVPs—it’s just too time-consuming—but in a Design Sprint, you can turbocharge your learning by creating and testing more than one prototype head-to-head.

Imagine your approach fails—then what? After you’ve written down your known options, come up with some new ones. If you feel stuck, try answering these questions: What would happen if your project hit a dead end? How would you solve your customers’ problem if you couldn’t do it the way you want? Or imagine a new competitor comes along to solve the

So, tell me: Who’s your customer? What problem are you solving for them? These

Drop everything and sprint on the most important challenge until it’s done. 2. Start by identifying your customer and a real problem you can solve. 3. Take advantage of your advantages. 4. Get real about the competition.

Customers should be real people. Problems should be real problems.

Question—Ask the team a question. For example, “Who are our customers?” 2. Silent work—Give everyone about five minutes to think in silence and write as many answers