Steve Blank in NYC Next Friday

Are you a fan of Steve Blank's Customer Development model for startups? I am. And next friday morning (Nov 12th) from 10am to noon, Steve will be speaking up at Columbia University in the Davis Auditorium in the Schapiro Center.

This event is hosted by our friend Professor Chris Wiggins and the Columbia Entrepreneurship Program and is free. Steve will be talking about his Four Steps To The Epiphany and the Customer Development Model.

I am trying to figure out how to attend. I'm already booked at that time next friday. But I am fairly certain there will be a number of people from our firm there. If you are an entrepreneur and want to get better at launching products and companies, you really should think about spending a couple hours listening to Steve.

If you want to attend, please save your place by emailing [email protected].



#VC & Technology

Comments (Archived):

  1. Fernando Gutierrez

    Thanks for the tip! Do you know if they will publish a video after the event? I’ve checked in Columbia Entrepreneurship website but they say nothing.

    1. fredwilson

      i will find out and get back to you

      1. Fernando Gutierrez

        Great, thanks!

  2. RichardF

    Just wish Four Steps was available on Kindle.

    1. fredwilson

      wtf?

      1. RichardF

        wtf is right, if I want it I either pay amazon UK $75 or order it from the US site for $40 plus shipping of $7 and a two week wait. There’s nothing lean about that!

        1. LIAD

          there may be a torrented .pdf version floating around. – just sayin

          1. RichardF

            lol

          2. RichardF

            there deserves to be just because it’s so freakin hard to get a legitimate copy

      2. baba12

        He is finding the steep price not so lean. I guess he and many others would hope to get a fair deal and according to the publisher that is the fair deal take it or leave it, forcing them to find other means to source the content.So as much as WTF is appropriate one has to also look at the other side of the equation.What percentage of readers of this blog do you suppose are similar to you in terms of wealth and business acumen.

        1. RichardF

          I was complaining about the purchase process more than anything. I hate waiting for physical books to be delivered (even though Amazon fulfilment is great). I love my Kindle and the instantaneous nature of the delivery. Although it has to be said I wouldn’t pay the Amazon UK price.

    2. Mark Essel

      I have a PDF I could email you. Don’t forget to hand Steve a twenty spot at the event.

      1. Kirill Bolgarov

        Mark, is that a photocopy PDF or a text one? If it’s a text, I’d ask to email it to me. ThanksP.S. my gmail is kbolgarov

        1. Mark Essel

          Nah, it’s a PDF. I couldn’t find an ebook friendly format (kindle/ibooks), and this was the closest facsimile.

      2. RichardF

        dm’d you, cheers

  3. LIAD

    Alongside Clay Christensen, Steve Blank has been my premier source of startup strategy and insights.Steve’s work and the ecosystem his thinking has spawned is a huge asset to entrepreneurs and startups everywhere. Especially great about him, and his heir apparent Eric Ries is that they happily share their thoughts freely and widely and don’t hide their insights behind $3,000 conferences.Other great proponents of Steve’s customer development and lean startup work are:Brant Cooper – http://market-by-numbers.com/Sean Ellis – http://startup-marketing.com/Ash Maurya – http://www.ashmaurya.com/Their blogs are well worth reading. Prime fodder for all whether in the pre or post product/market fit stages of company building

  4. awaldstein

    This is the sound of my schedule shuffling to try and make this.

  5. William Mougayar

    His blog is a great resource. Since we’re on that topic, I would also recommend April Dunford’s Rocket Watcher http://www.rocketwatcher.com/

    1. LIAD

      thanks for sharing the link to April’s blog. Really great content

  6. Scott Barnett

    Darn, I would love to go, I too am tied up Friday and I won’t be able to rearrange plans…Did you know that Mark Suster will also be at Columbia the night before? I plan to be at that one:http://marksuster-columbia….It appears to be sold out now though….

    1. fredwilson

      had no idea that Suster was doing thathe’s great

      1. Samuel Ian Rosen

        Mark is also speaking at Meetup on Nov 10http://www.meetup.com/lean-…

    2. Mark Essel

      Crap wish I knew, would love to high five him for his blog. Great resource, Columbia’s rocking the lectures.

      1. awaldstein

        You turned me on to his blog a year ago Mark. I’m a reader and I thank you for this.

        1. Mark Essel

          my pleasure

  7. lushfun

    Interesting perspectives on customer service just going to go youtube some videos from Steve Blank instead. A substitute but better than nothing.

  8. Ian

    So, “lean startup” is really trendy right now (as it should be, IMO).How about “lean VC” ?What are some ways a VC firm can run leanly or adapt some of the lessons of customer development and/or the broader “lean startup” movement?thx!

    1. Dave Pinsen

      VCs already have plenty of OPM and are profitable from the vig off of that, so they don’t need to be monastically lean. That said, I think Fred’s firm is relatively lean considering (3 partners + 3 staff members?).

      1. joeagliozzo

        “Lean” isn’t really about how much money you spend as much as not wasting effort. Wasted effort is anything that doesn’t lead to a minimum viable product that finds customer acceptance.

    2. fredwilson

      a very narrow investment strategy so that you are experts in what you do and don’t do anything elsea small team that makes quick decisionssmall fund sizes and low management feesno gulfstreams

      1. Evan

        fred, we know you have a gulfstream that you keep parked behind your brownstone. it’s cool.

        1. fredwilson

          neveri fly commercial

  9. awaldstein

    Free registration sign-up linkhttps://sites.google.com/si…

    1. Ben Tanen

      Thanks. Looks like the AVC community has crashed eventbrite — I’m getting a 503 Service Unavailable error when I try to sign up. If it’s any sign of Steve’s popularity, get there early next Friday!

      1. fredwilson

        the new slashdot 🙂

  10. Matt A. Myers

    Boy I wish I lived in NYC. So much going on. Maybe someday.

  11. Mpc2139

    Please RSVP athttps://sites.google.com/si…

  12. Nikhil Nirmel

    NYC: 1, SF: 0.

  13. akharris

    I wonder how much a signed first edition of 4 steps is worth? Could be a good seed fund…

  14. ShanaC

    He’s very smart- I always wondered how he would explain the differences between a consumer focused startup and a b2b focused startup.

  15. kmamyk

    The sign up is available through Eventbrite link on page:https://sites.google.com/si…(this is from response from mpc2139 at columbia…)

  16. Chris

    Hello,I’m in Steve’s class and I’m looking for an entrepreneur to interview for an assignment. Are you able to recommend someone I could interview?It would be great to speak to someone based in NYC that has gone through the lean startup process and is now in the Customer Creation phase. My questions would be around the Customer Development process that the startup has gone through, specifically covering the startup’s customer creation activities.Thanks for contacting my via LinkedIn (linkedin.com/in/cfong) or responding to this post if you can help.Cheers,Chris