Product Concept Refinement & Validation (Week 4)
I could feel that we weren’t very confident about our original MVP, but we still ended up deciding to stick with the original plan and tested how it went. Even though the interview results for this week were similar to the previous ones, interviewees mentioned a lot about their relationship with big media and platforms. The teammate who did note taking for me suddenly came up with a new perspective. I remembered their idea and waited for them to bring it up for discussion.
In our first meeting, we started to discuss again for a long time without having a clear direction. One of my teammates thought about another concept and then couldn’t stop talking about it. I wasn’t sure if I should interrupted them. Most of the time, I think I am the one who is more willing to listen but at that time, I could see rest of the group already lost their patience. I reminded the person who had the idea previously to talk about it with us, but they seemed to be completely faded out and said that they couldn’t remember anything. I was a little bit frustrated but still tried to retell their concept but failed to explain it well. After the person finally remembered the idea, they started talking about it. Since we all thought it was an efficiently fun idea that worth a try, we finally ended our meeting.
For second meeting, as the deadline was approaching, we met together and worked on the parts that we were responsible on. One of the teammate asked questions about their part and we answered them. However, while I was checking on the script once everyone was done, I failed to understand what they wrote. At the same time, it was already 12 AM and another teammate kept asking if we were ready to rehearse, I felt the pressure so I basically helped they rewrite everything and told what they should say. I knew what I did wasn’t right and I should have communicated with them and tried to understand what they meant, but at that time I felt that it was my only choice.
Luckily, I heard that the presentation went well and I am really thankful that my teammates cover for me in the presentation. As we finally had more confidence on our new MVP, one of my teammate brought up their concerns about our target audience. When we discussed together, I can felt that another team mate was kind of saying no. I didn’t have a strong opinion on the issue and I was just trying to be a middleman who wanted to help but actually knew my help was limited. I know it was hard not to get influenced by other people, especially trying to speak up while our thoughts get denied from other team mates. As speaker get discouraged, they doubt themselves which make them even harder to explain their thoughts. On the other hand, the listeners get more confused because the speaker can’t explain their concepts clearly.
Now I think I know a lot more about my teammates and myself. If we actually are open to talk about the issues we have faced, I think no one will take it personally and get offended. However, I am afraid that once we actually pointed out a problem of a person, that person might act differently as they are aware of the problem. Currently, I am still thinking what I should say in the group check-in meeting. No matter what, I still hope that we can actually be open-minded and discuss our true feelings with others.
*I use they/them pronounce to protect privacy.
