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Shape Up

By Ryan Singer

2 recommend/use · 5 sourced episodes

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Appetite-Driven Product Cycles (Shape Up)

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Invest Profits, Not People: The Core Expansion Test

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Live Shaping Session

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The Circuit Breaker (Back to Shaping)

When a project overruns its appetite, don't extend it or gut the agreed value — pull it back into shaping mode.

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The Commodity Generic Play (ONCE)

Find commodity software still charging luxury subscription prices, then sell a beautiful generic once

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The Design-Led Architecture Stream

Give design a protected block to define the product's building blocks — or it will smuggle scope in at the end.

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The Detail Dial

Calibrate how prescriptive a shaped plan is to the builder's seniority — more detail lifts juniors, less frees seniors.

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The Four Forces of Progress

Model demand as a tug-of-war: two forces push people to switch, two hold them back.

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The JTBD Switch Interview

Interrogate the story of a real purchase to recover the true causes of a switch.

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The Nine-Scopes Kickoff

At kickoff, have the builders translate the shaped idea into nine-or-fewer implementation chunks to test scope and build clarity.

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The Riff Test: Hiring for Gut Instinct

Pay finalists to build something, then critique it and ask what they'd do with two more days

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The Six Phases of the Buying Timeline

Meet buyers where they are on their timeline instead of forcing them onto yours.

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The Stay-Up Scorecard

One number (profit) and one question (would I do it again) instead of OKRs, KPIs and a five-year plan

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The Three Sources of Energy

Every purchase draws on functional, emotional, and social energy, not just utility.

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The Ungated Customer Feed

Pipe raw customer feedback into Slack with no gatekeeper — and let engineers email the customer directly.

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Turn the Recurring Break into a Strategic Moat

When the same problem breaks a third time, stop patching — pull your best people off features and solve it for 100x as a competitive edge

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