How do I know your business will succeed? It's because you already know THIS.

At Full Nelsen we tend to use as little “process” for the sake of “process” as possible. We hate wasting client’s time and money. And face it. There’s a tremendous amount of silly artifacts and Kumbaya theater baked into a typical designer’s toolbox and “process.”

It’s embarrassing. And expensive.

Half is horse shit. And the other half will be forgotten in 2 months.

But not this thing.

For early stage companies and products, this exercise and its artifact are well worth your time and thought. Hell, it’s even worth your time and thought if you’re a mature company. Especially one that seems to be pulled in multiple directions.

So get your decision maker(s) rounded up and focused on this task. We won’t be moving forward until we know the following and you’ve discussed it thoroughly.

Enter: The Product Vision.

We didn’t invent this. This is stolen from “Crossing the Chasm” by Geoffrey Moore. There’s more gold in that book so get it here.

Looks simple.

But if you actually get hyper detailed in these answers, and get everyone to discuss, refine and agree, or at least acquiesce, you’ll be saving your company countless hours, days, weeks, and months of pain down the road.

This artifact, when complete, should be printed and displayed. And BIG.

A healthy organization will refer to it often.

Why?

Because you’ve filled the room with intelligent people who aren’t afraid to disagree with you, and you’ve cultivated a culture of open dialog and productive disagreement. Right? Right??

Great.

This artifact ends arguments.

If it doesn’t, it’s not detailed enough and you need to get back to refining it. It should empower even the intern to decide and act. Nobody needs to run a small-to-medium decision up the ladder if this guiding light is done well.

Empower your team (and your design agency) with the guardrails of clarity.

Do your Product Vision.