The pursuit of perfection is a double-edged sword. Perfectionism is just procrastination in disguise – and procrastination will kill a product release stone dead.

You see this happen all the time in software, and unfortunately, Edtech is no exception. Companies aim to only release a 100% perfect product because they fall into one of these traps:

1. They honestly believe they can create an amazing solution through ‘thinking things up’ in their office/bedroom/ivory tower. What they need to do is get their solution out into the real world to see if it meets the customers’ needs.

2.  They’re scared of messing up so spend a lot of time strategizing to try and ensure they don’t fail at all.

The truth is that perfectionism is bad for business. Waiting endlessly for the perfect solution not only hinders progress but also opens the door for competitors to gain an edge.

The Pitfall of Perfection: Businesses risk losing valuable time that could be spent gaining insights and refining their products by only striving for perfection. While it’s natural to want to deliver excellence, the reality is that waiting for perfection allows competitors to swoop in, gather feedback, make improvements, and potentially dominate the market.

The MVP Advantage: Enter the Minimum Viable Product (MVP). Instead of aiming for perfection behind closed doors, releasing an MVP allows you to bring your solution to market quickly. This initial version may not be flawless, but it opens the channels for crucial customer feedback.

Listening to Your Customers: The beauty of the MVP approach lies in its inherent openness to customer input. Launching a basic version of your product invites users to share their experiences, preferences, and suggestions. Your customers become invaluable collaborators, guiding the iterative process and steering your product towards perfection based on real-world needs.

Competitive Edge Through Iteration: While perfectionism breeds stagnation, embracing an iterative approach propels your business forward. By consistently releasing improved versions based on customer feedback, you stay ahead of the competition. Your responsiveness to user needs positions you as a dynamic force in the market, ready to adapt and deliver what customers truly want.

Embrace imperfection, release your MVP, and let your customers be the architects of perfection!

How good are you at predicting the future? This image has resurfaced as the article was written 110 years ago and talks about climate issues linked to coal – amazing foresight! What it doesn’t get quite right is the timeline; it says “the effect may be considerable in a few centuries” when actually we’re at a crisis point already.

How often do businesses fall into the trap of thinking a problem is somewhere out there on the horizon when it’s really about to smack them in the face?

I work with the edtech industry and there are quite a few examples I can think of:

👉 The need to access all teaching, learning and school management technology from outside of the school came into VERY sharp focus in the face of lockdowns – lots of people were caught out.

👉 With the academisation agenda, the way schools make decisions and purchase solutions has been turned on its head which has had a major effect on some company business models that probably thought they were safe (the school MIS market in particular).

👉 Free and ‘freemium’ solutions have changed what schools are willing to pay for, you need to find ways to add extra value or risk being ditched altogether.

Here’s what can you do to future-proof your edtech business:

• Listen to your customers
• Encourage employees to speak up – find out what your workforce wants
• Challenge every assumption
• Embrace imperfection
• Iterate, don’t reinvent – be agile
• Be willing to grow
• Test out new marketing strategies
• Harness the power of tech

I’ll talk more about each of these in future blogs, but we also cover all of these in detail within our coaching programme.

How are you future-proofing your education business?