Chapter 2 of my PMF book! - The Pick

Another special issue of Sajith Pai's somewhat irregular newsletter #36

We are not letting up the pace! Another special edition of the newsletter, the second in succession, and this brings you Chapter II of my PMF book, titled ‘The Pick’!

In this chapter, I cover how to pick or select your startup idea / problem to go after. If the pick is done well, it can improve your chances of achieving Product Market Fit (PMF) disproportionately. Thus the importance of the pick. 

If you are an aspiring startup founder then you will find this chapter invaluable, for it gives you a framework to approach your startup ideation exercise. Bonus: there is a section on how to pick your cofounder(s) too. 

For those of you keen to get started, click on the link below.

PMF Playbook: Chapter II - The Pick

What is this PMF book?

Well, clearly you didn’t read open or read my last newsletter! Naughty, naughty! Ok, then a brief context setting para below.

I am writing a book on the topic of Product Market Fit (PMF hereafter), a topic I have been obsessed with for a while, and on which I have written a fair bit. Now, this book I am writing is not a book in the traditional sense of a 250-300 page printed book published by a Penguin or Harper Collins. Rather I am publishing it as an online series, with each chapter distributed freely on the interwebs whenever I finish one. At some point when I release the fifth and last chapter, I will collect all of the chapters and publish them as an ebook (and maybe a printed book) titled ‘The PMF Playbook’.

Given the book is regular sized (50-80k words), and there are only 5 chapters, expect each chapter to be long! This one, ‘Chapter II: The Pick’ is ~20k words! For the book structure, visit the book microsite at sajithpai.com/pmfplaybook

‘The Pick’ Chapter Summary

Let us quickly dive into the chapter highlights so you know what you are getting!

1/ The pick or the problem space you will work in is the single biggest early stage decision, for it sets the ‘constraints and boundaries’ of what you are going to be working on for the rest of the 2-10+ years. Also a founder has at best 3-4 picks in their career. So, take your time to get the pick right. The best founders don’t hesitate to invest a lot of time here.

2/ To get the pick right evaluate how they rank on these three criteria: 

• large attackable problem (reflecting the VC question ‘why this?’)

• inflection points / timing (VC query: ‘why now?’

• founder-problem fit (‘why you?’)

Make sure your pick hits at least two if not all three of the above criteria!

3/ To arrive at the pick, founders can take any of these four routes

1. Personal pain (e.g., Zomato, Uber)

2. Personal experience (Freshworks, Coinbase)

3. Prospecting or systematic exploration (MakeMyTrip, Vanta)

4. Opportunism (Ola, DealShare) 

Finally you can also arrive at a pick by pivoting from a different initial pick.

I got ChatGPT to create a graphic to represent the four routes to arriving at the pick.

4/ The process of arriving at the pick goes through two sequential phases:

• Problem discovery: where you expand the set of problems to pursue, through primary and secondary research, and hone in on a problem or two or three to pursue. 

• Problem validation: where you again conduct conversations with customers, and do desktop research if needed, to validate that the problems you have picked are meaningful to explore. At this stage you can start building a solution / MVP.

5/ Finally on picking cofounder(s): If you aren't able to find a cofounder organically, there are frameworks, playbooks, orgs to help in cofounder dating. But it is not the end of the world if you still don’t find one. There are ways to convince investors, and supporting mechanisms and ways to make solo founding work. If anything, the risks of a cofounder with whom you have a conflict is far more dangerous for the company than being a solo founder, so don’t rush into a cofounder partnership.

You can read the chapter at PMF Playbook: Chapter II - The Pick

Bye!

Would love to hear from you on your thoughts, observations, criticism or praise here in the comments or at sp@sajithpai.com (Please don’t send pitches or CVs or anything work-related at this id; I won’t respond to them).