First Principles Thinking: moving beyond the what

First Principles Thinking. It's the buzzword that Elon Musk has on speed dial and is hailed as the secret sauce of innovation. But once you peel back the layers of hype, what does it really mean for product development, and how can you actually put it to work? This post slices through the chatter and serves up practical tips, with a side of wisdom from top thinkers and resources.

What is First Principles Thinking (FPT), Really? (Inspired by James Clear's explanation)

At its core, FPT is like playing detective with a lab coat—stripping away assumptions to reveal the fundamental truths. Channel your inner scientist: question everything as if it's your primary duty. "Best practices"? Unleash your inner toddler and keep asking "Why?" until you reach one that needs no further questions. You would have read about what is FPT already, now lets put it into action.

Tip #1: The "Five Whys" on Steroids (Eric Ries, The Lean Startup)

Borrowing from the Lean Startup methodology, don't stop at five "whys." Keep asking until you reach the bedrock of the problem. For example, if customers are abandoning support chatbot chats, don't just assume it's not helping them. Ask "why" they find it not helpful? Is it the number of steps? The information required? The loading time? Each "why" reveals a deeper layer of understanding, leading to more targeted solutions.

Tip #2: Embrace the Socratic Method (Alex Danco's emphasis on questioning)

Channel your inner Socrates. Don't just ask "why" about the problem, question your solutions too. Challenge your assumptions. For example, "We need a mobile app." Why? Is a mobile website sufficient? Does an app truly solve the core user need, or are we just following the crowd? This relentless questioning can unearth hidden opportunities and avoid costly missteps.

Tip #3: Iterate Quickly and Focus on Validated Learning (Eric Ries, The Lean Startup)

Eric Ries' Lean Startup methodology emphasizes the importance of rapid experimentation through the "Build-Measure-Learn" loop. This involves building a minimum viable product (MVP), measuring customer feedback, and learning from the data to iterate quickly. This approach ensures that you're always making decisions based on actual customer needs rather than assumptions. Lets build an end to end approval system, with notifications, with reports, with automation, with dashboards...wait hold your horses! Start with the bare bone, get feedback, improvise and iterate to eventually build the full fledged solution.

Tip #4: Experiment Like a Scientist (Andrew Chen's data-driven approach)

First Principles Thinking isn't about armchair philosophizing. It's about forming hypotheses based on your fundamental truths and testing them rigorously. Run experiments. Gather data. Like a scientist in a lab, iterate based on evidence, not assumptions. As Andrew Chen often emphasizes, data-driven decisions are key. Does this text work best on the home page, is this CTA relavant? Do users even notice this section of the page? Well your guess is as good as mine, unless you monitor, run experiments and prove or disprove your hypothesis

First Principles Thinking lead to resilient, adaptable systems. You don't just solve for today's problems, but consider how your solution will hold up in a changing environment. Ask "What if I'm wrong?" , Build in flexibility. Embrace change. Make your product or process antifragile – something that benefits from disorder. This is often the most valuable byproduct of solving for the problem at hand, with FPT. 

Ultimately, FPT is about delivering value to your users. As Josh Elman emphasizes, focus on the core job your product is doing for them. Strip away any features or processes that don't directly contribute to this core value. A streamlined, user-centric product is not only more efficient but also more likely to succeed. Does this app help my service advisor attend to a customer better by asking pointed questions and making sure that the problem is captured correctly, and.... Well along with this, never forget that the service advisor's core need is to attend to as many customers as possible especially in peak hours, so the app cannot be clunky.

This approach, inspired by the brightest minds in product development, empowers you to move beyond incremental improvements and create truly innovative solutions that not only meet user needs today but also anticipate the demands of tomorrow.