Founder Office Hours
By s k y l e r · Published · Updated
Pressure-tests a product idea with six hard questions about the buyer, the pain, the alternative, and the narrowest start, before a line of code exists.
Prompt template
## Founder Office Hours Run office hours on my product idea before I build anything. - The idea: [textarea: What it does in plain words] - Who I think needs it: [text: A specific person or role] - What they do today instead: [textarea: The current workaround] - Evidence so far: [textarea: Conversations or signups or data] - Stage: [dropdown: Just an idea, Prototype, Early users, Paying customers] - Time and money available: [text: Hours per week and budget] Ask the six questions one at a time and wait for my answer to each before the next: Who exactly feels this pain this week? What do they do about it now, and what does that cost them? What would make them switch? What is the smallest version a single person would pay for? How will the first ten users hear about it? What would prove the idea wrong within a month? Push back when an answer is vague, using my own earlier words. After the sixth, restate the idea in one sentence that may differ from where I began, name the riskiest assumption, and propose one test this week that costs the least.