2016 NYC Annual Boot Camp

1. ProductDevelopment101
@dblockdotorg
July 2016
Alexander Calder, Pyramids, 1970, https://www.artsy.net/artwork/alexander-calder-pyramids-1

2. —
Idea to Product
What would you do on day one?

3. —
Startup: Day 1
Ask for help.
“Dear Friend,
I have a favor to ask.
I am starting to work on a better mouse trap. I am
hoping to do things right from the start. Could I please
borrow some of your time or someone on your team and
bring a couple of my team members and ask a few
questions about your process and tools?
-Me”

4. —
Startup: Day 2
Organize chat, documents, passwords and tasks.

5. —
Startup: Day 4
Create a minimum process. XP Scrum Waterfall
What’s next? What’s next week? What is the
meaning of life?

6. —
Startup: Day 5
Create a learning process.
Taxonomy
Wireframes
Workgroups

7. —
Startup: Day 5
Happy hour!
Scheduled meetings with other startups.
Created communication channels.
Created a way to track work.

8. —
Startup: Week-End
Sustainable pace.

9. —
Software: Day 1
Have a story.
“Users can sign up.”

10. —
Software: Day 1
Source control. Repository
Commit
Push
Pull Request
Merge

11. —
Software: Day 1
Code reviews.

12. —
Software: Day 1
First commit.

13. —
Software: Day 2
Friendly visit.
2-3 People
Bring Pastries
Tell Your Story
Be Impressed
Ask Why 3 Times
Owe One

14. —
Software: Day 3
Choose a stack.
Helps focus on your domain.
Classifies problems.
Offers generic solutions.
Provides consistent experience.
Maps software evolution.
Enables reuse of skills.

15. —
Software: Day 4
Implement the story w/ tests & CI.

16. —
Software: Day 4
Deploy to production.

17. —
Software: Day 5
Demo.

18. —
Iterate on Product
More stories
Under-promise and over-deliver
Make people happy
Keep things simple
Don’t acquire technical debt

19. —
People
People make all the difference
Cultural fit is more important than technical abilities
Prefer generalists
Pigs, not chickens
Do references

20. AMA, thank you.
dblock@dblock.org
@dblockdotorg