What a Unicorn Knows: How Leading Entrepreneurs Use Lean Principles to Drive Sustainable Growth
by Matthew May and Pablo Dominguez, Matt Holt Books, 2023
In the late Eighties, James Womack and a workforce of MIT researchers recognized the enduring worth of the Toyota Production System and named it “lean.” Since then, many main firms, together with Fortive and Danaher, have adopted key components of this systemic, process-focused method to boosting high quality and eliminating waste. Lean’s medical evaluation of processes, versus merely closing outputs, has, amongst different issues, helped deliver a few dramatic drop in reported defects in manufacturing and heavy business.
However, lean’s many advantages prolong properly past the meeting line. And, as a brand new e-book argues, its qualitative method to enterprise enchancment has by no means been extra related. What a Unicorn Knows, by Matthew May and Pablo Dominguez, applies lean’s core rules—developed greater than 50 years in the past—to at the moment’s digital-first, “subscription-based, technology-as-a-service financial system.” Indeed, the authors declare that their lean framework is the best bridging instrument; by embracing it, “startups turn out to be ScaleUps, ScaleUps turn out to be unicorns, unicorns turn out to be grownups ($1 billion+ in income, 1,000+ workers), and grownups recapture the spirit and development of a unicorn.”
May and Dominguez put lean’s time-tested practices to work by a framework known as SCALE: Strategic Scale, Constant Experimentation, Accelerated Value, Lean Process, and Esprit de Corps. Arguing that lean-derived rules help speedy and lasting development for digital-first firms, the authors draw from established practices, comparable to Hoshin Kanri, the strategic-planning course of that emphasizes a coordinated method to making sure that an organization’s strategic objectives are driving progress throughout the group.
Specifically, the SCALE framework is designed to assist companies attain the following degree of their development journey by sidestepping 4 core challenges:
• Drag, the resistance that comes from sluggish markets, the lack to pivot the enterprise mannequin, or enterprise-wide misalignment of methods and targets
• Inertia, the resistance to vary that may construct as headcount will increase, approval layers multiply, and useful silos emerge
• Friction, which will increase when services or products are misaligned with the client expertise, conduct, and expectations
• Waste, ensuing from out-of-date KPIs, an absence of steady enchancment, and leaders who aren’t energetic in course of optimization.
By overcoming these challenges, firms can keep away from pricey points like buyer churn, rework, and the necessity to grasp new processes.
The e-book’s strongest argument could be discovered within the chapter titled “Lean Process,” during which the authors present how confirmed lean strategies—comparable to Kanban playing cards (a broadly used instrument for visualizing workflows), real-time error-proofing, and standardized work—all assist to marshal explosive development. Drawing analogies to Formula One pit crews, who flawlessly service a race automobile in a couple of seconds, May and Dominguez element how visible administration, clearly deliberate advance deployment of assets, and an only-when-necessary method to organizing work all assist a workforce handle difficult operations seamlessly.
A powerful esprit de corps amongst workforce members has additionally lengthy been important to help wholesome development and the creation of synergistic worth, and the e-book emphasizes the significance of constructing a wholesome tradition in a position to help lean processes and outcomes. This part consists of intelligent materials on nurturing a tradition of experimentation and discovery, and validating belief by consistently elevating the bar on deliverables and expectations.
May and Dominguez floor their rules within the core lean splendid of beginning with worth and dealing backward—focusing obsessively on bettering operations to seamlessly ship for the client what they name the “Job to be Done.” The authors’ materials on accelerating worth creation recapitulates this purpose and reminds readers to be vigilant about combating the inevitable waste generated by profitable firms.
As a author about lean for practically twenty years, I’ve typically been pissed off by misrepresentations of this dynamic system by administration gurus who tout solely thin-sliced components of it (like cherry-picking simplistic methods to quickly land on a viable market technique). This isn’t a kind of books. May and Dominguez have much more in frequent with established thinkers like Michael Ballé and Dan Jones, who posit that lean requires a basic change in considering in any respect ranges of a company. The e-book’s argument is that individuals ought to focus much less on decreasing random defects by inflexible types of management (known as “level optimization”) and will as an alternative emphasize a systemic technique of integrating a mindset that fosters steady enchancment of the work at hand.
With What a Unicorn Knows, May and Dominguez carry the lean spirit ahead authentically, sharing a dynamic and complete method to delivering worth to clients, studying by doing, and rising healthily as a pure final result.
Author profile:
- Tom Ehrenfeld is a contract author and editor primarily based in Cambridge, Mass. Formerly a author/editor with Inc. journal and Harvard Business Review, he’s additionally the writer of The Startup Garden. He has written extensively about lean enterprise; 9 books that he has edited have gained the Shingo Publication Award.
