Final Reflection

I thought that the success of a startup depended largely on luck and timing. I assumed that a small fraction was effort, research, and team but that a large part of it was picking a direction and crossing your fingers that it was correct. However, through taking this course, I learned many frameworks we can use to maximize our chances of success. One specific framework was in writing out key assumptions for all parts of the business model and testing them. Then, write test cards of our learnings. Our team learned things quickly that otherwise could have been the make or break of our company. For example, we learned that creative types (our initial target users) cared deeply about customization and personalization. They were even willing to put many tough hours into building their portfolio and did not find the ease of use that StudioHub offers as valuable. From here, we were able to change our initial user group and better understand our target customer.

I learned: Being a PM is not just about organizing people and building products; rather, it’s about solving problems. In this class, most of the problems had to do with ensuring our project deliverables were complete and that all missing items were accounted for. Originally, I thought that the PM would do most of the work at the start of the project. This would involve deciding the project direction, making roadmaps, and creating clear task items. However, I learned quickly that a PM’s job doesn’t get easier; it just changes as the project evolves.

If we had more time, I would build out more MVPs to test key assumptions with the technology. Our main value add is that we simplify the portfolio creation process. To do that, we must use a resume parser and natural language processing to predict a user’s portfolio project descriptions better. However, we did not test out the heavy technology involved, and this is a key assumption to determine the validity of our product. If we had more time, I’d like to explore building this out further!