Click: The practical and effective guide to developing successful new ideas quickly, from the New York Times bestselling authors

In practice, the Magic Lenses activity works a lot like the differentiation activity—but instead of one chart, you’ll create several, and instead of competitors, you’ll plot your own competing approaches. Here’s how we do it:

Great pizza needs great toppings, and you should always consider the classics: mozzarella, tomatoes, basil, olive oil. Similarly, you should always consider the classic differentiators: fast vs. slow, easy vs. difficult, free vs. expensive, focused vs. unfocused, simple vs. complicated, integrated vs. siloed, automatic vs. manual, and smart vs. not

First up is capability. Capability is what you can do that few can match. If you work for a big company, you might have the capability of a well-known brand or plenty of money for your project; if you work for a tiny startup, you might have the capability to focus and move fast.

Sometimes there’s no direct competition because customers are solving the problem using a substitute solution.

The sprint team must include the boss: the person responsible for making decisions on the project. I call this person the “Decider.”

The title of the approach. A one-sentence summary of why it’s a good idea. Try to reference the problem you’re solving for customers and your differentiation—those two together should make a knockout sales pitch.

If there is no direct competition, but customers are using substitutes, it could be a big opportunity. Breakthrough products are more likely to compete with substitutes than direct competitors.

The question “Hey, how do you solve this problem today?” is remarkably effective—and if you don’t hear an answer that includes time or money or both, it’s probably not a problem worth solving.

How many principles should you write? I think a good number is three. I suggest using the “Differentiate, differentiate, safeguard” formula: one principle for each of your two differentiators (from chapter 5), plus one to protect against the unintended consequences of building a product that’s successful in an unfortunate way.