Validate the problem before you position the solution

"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool."
— Richard Feynman (Nobel Prize-winning physicist)

• Duration: 3-hour workshop + 5 hours customer interviews
• Participants: Founder(s), product lead, early team members
• Deliverable: Customer personas and validated problem statements

Why this sprint matters

Before you can position your solution, you must deeply understand the problem. You must understand the problem customers actually experience in their own words.

Most founders skip this step or do it superficially. They conduct a few conversations with friendly early adopters, hear what they want to hear, and rush to build. Then they're confused when sales stall: "But our beta users said they'd buy!"

The issue? Your friendliest early adopters are not your market. They're the people most likely to tolerate rough edges, most willing to provide feedback, and least representative of the broader market you need to scale.

Customer discovery isn't about validation bias ("Do you like my idea?"). It's about problem validation ("Is this problem painful enough that you'll change behavior to solve it?") and solution validation ("Is our approach meaningfully better than alternatives?").