Pilot design workshop
For teams with a promising idea but not enough evidence to build it. Together we define what has to be learned, design the smallest credible test, and agree how each result will inform the next decision.
Who it is for
Founders who need evidence before investing further in development, or before presenting the next case to partners and investors.
Teams asked to prove whether a concept deserves further investment, inside an organisation that has to agree what proof looks like.
Programme teams whose startups have to show evidence by demo day. Run once for a whole cohort, or as a fixed session each batch goes through before it starts building.
What the team gains
Agree what evidence would change the team’s direction.
Reduce the pilot to the smallest scope that can still answer the question.
Define participants, observations and thresholds before the results arrive.
Find the weak ideas while changing direction is still inexpensive.
What happens in the room
Find the belief that has to be true for the idea to work at all, and separate it from the several others usually travelling with it.
Define what observable behaviour would support or challenge it. Where a number is appropriate, set the threshold with it.
Participants, conditions, duration and activities. Conditions close enough to real use to produce evidence you would act on.
What result would lead the team to continue, adapt or stop, written down and agreed by the people responsible for acting on it.
Responsibilities, data collection, timing, and the meeting where the decision actually gets made.
Deliverables
A practical plan built around your idea and agreed by the people who will act on it.
Formats
The principal offer
One team, one idea, and a pilot plan that can start the following week.
An extension for organisations that want several teams working to the same standard of evidence.
A session after the test to read the evidence together and decide whether to continue, adapt or stop.
Before you write
Built from practice
The two below are the method in practice. One turned a deadline-reminder app into a proactive service by testing what people would actually hand to an assistant, and where a human still had to answer. The other began with facility managers on site in India and became a monitoring service built on what the tanks and tanker deliveries were really doing.
Next step
Send a short note about the idea, what you need to learn, and when the decision has to be made. I will suggest the most useful format, and say so if a workshop is not the right next step.
iuliia.vorobiova@gmail.com
