“In the world of startups, being agile isn’t just about software.”
When a startup is born, it’s a lot like a toddler: full of energy, no rules to bind it, often messy, and bursting with potential. In the beginning, it’s all about “flying by the seat of your pants,” making quick decisions, and improvising along the way. As refreshing as this wild-west environment may seem, like a toddler with finger paints, it can’t last forever.
Fast forward a few years and imagine this startup is now a teenager. While still brimming with energy, it requires some semblance of structure and guidance. Would you let a teenager drive a car with no lessons? Probably not. Similarly, a growing startup needs internal processes to direct its momentum. There’s often a temptation to hire a big-name consultancy to solve the problem for you. But here’s the kicker — implementing rigorous structures that are designed for large, established corporations into your growing 33-person team is akin to giving an 18-wheeler truck to your teen as their first car to drive to school. Not the best idea.
Enter the “Just-in-Time Process Development”. Taking inspiration from various agile methodologies of the software world, as well as the manufacturing world’s just-in-time supply chain management, this approach is also about continuously evaluating and adjusting. It’s about fitting the shoe that’s just right — not so loose it would trip you up, nor too tight to stunt your growth.
Big Consultancies: Shut Your Face Holes!
A quick word on our well-intentioned friends from the vast empire of generalist consultancies. Armed with MBAs and an arsenal of case studies and knowledge bases, they often come in with incredible confidence coupled with high praise from the folks who referred them (often non-operators themselves). They come with the promise of turning your start-up into the next Fortune 500 powerhouse. However, much like asking a fish to teach a bird how to fly, these consultants, despite their access to supposed vast knowledge, might not always give the best advice for fledgling startups.
It’s not their fault entirely. Their expertise is often rooted in established companies, and thus, their insights reflect that world. They’ve watched the race but haven’t necessarily run it. They may have had good seats, but haven’t really chosen to enter the arena. They read that ‘grit’ is the most important thing, so they think they should talk about it. But they haven’t felt the weight of 14 careers; 14 peoples’ families, 43 lives, including 6 college funds, 22 health care plans, 8 late mortgage payments, and little Timmy’s 6th birthday party which is supposed to be in 3 weeks, on their shoulders. That’s why you need the process to be at peak efficiency today, and tomorrow, and in 3 weeks, and in 6 months. That’s why you can’t build the process you need in 6 months and hope you get there.
So while they may be well-meaning and maybe even smart with a spreadsheet, they likely have neither the specific context of your startup nor of startups in general, to truly be useful. When you’re looking to support rapid growth, you need to build your foundation the right way, not pay for iron I-beams and receive load-bearing papier-mâché.
The Balance of Flexibility and Structure
Just-in-Time Process Development recognizes that scaling is a journey. Processes need to be dynamic. They must evolve, change, and grow with the company — all at the right pace. The key is to understand what your startup needs at its current stage, not where someone thinks it should be. Implementing a slew of massive changes all at once? That’s like trying to eat an entire cow in one bite. It’s both impractical and, frankly, not very appealing.
Rolling for Success with Just-in-Time Process Development
I’m going to geek it up again, this time, Dungeons & Dragons (D&D)-style. If conventional corporations are your rigidly scripted “choose your own adventure” books, startups are more like a lively game of D&D. Just like in D&D, your startup needs to be adaptable, imaginative, and ready to roll the dice. So what spell should you cast to navigate the labyrinthine chambers of scaling? I believe that “Just-in-Time Process Development,” is an overlooked secret weapon to add to your arsenal — your “Scroll of Resilience” in an ever-changing quest.
Real-time Feedback Loops
Consider this your party’s live-action wisdom checks. You wouldn’t continue down a trap-laden hallway without listening to your rogue, would you? Real-time feedback ensures you don’t have to face-plant into pitfalls. Be sure to validate that the process you set up last week still is producing the required output. If it’s generating what you need, you’re halfway there.
You also want to make sure that the process isn’t breaking down because it’s created a new, unexpected work effort for someone. This can change suddenly; a new person in a different group also wants that marketing report; someone doesn’t have the right permissions for a self-serve dashboard. Baking in real-time feedback loops will help you catch these sorts of issues before things grind to a halt.
Incremental Changes
No adventurer gains all their powers at Level 1. Leveling up is a process of gradual improvement and skill acquisition. Similarly, minor changes are your character traits, small but vital nuances that make you increasingly formidable as you progress.
The number of times that you radically change everything is incredibly rare. As your team grows, you’ll be able to learn what you need in your processes not just from your customers but from the team and the growth itself.
Tweaking the thing that was working so that it can work a bit longer is sometimes the right thing to do; other times you will realize it’s time to go back to the drawing board and fundamentally change how something is done. When you do that, you’ll have the benefit of understanding not only what you need to change, but the all-important why, because you took the time to evolve the process before throwing away the baby with the bathwater.
Adaptive Process Definition
In D&D, the Dungeon Master prepares a general outline, but the story adapts based on the characters’ choices. Your business processes should be equally capable of pivoting when you encounter the unexpected, like a surprise gelatinous cube in a labyrinth that you thought was already cleared.
This may come in the form of a particularly sophisticated customer who wants to drill down into the data deeper than you anticipated, or a need to plan marketing activities a year in advance because you’re now too big to just ‘show up’ and try some guerilla tactics. Understanding that the process itself is fluid is the mindset; knowing that you must pay attention to the process to understand when it needs to change is the work that gets missed when you try to plan too far ahead.
Decentralized Decision Making
Would you let the Paladin make all the decisions? Absolutely not! Your ranger might see things from a vantage point the Paladin can’t. Empower your team members to make decisions like seasoned adventurers, fully aware of their individual proficiencies. Treat metrics like their character sheets, filled with clues and insights that’ll tell you whether they can “Magic Missile” or “Cure Wounds.”
The folks closest to the work know best what needs to be done. Just-in-Time Process Development needs their input to be successful as it’s their insights that drive the changes that will be made. Maybe they are feeling overwhelmed because they’re doing multiple versions of essentially the same thing for different people, or a sense of building frustration because of some gatekeeping happening in finance for numbers that are critical for sales. Whatever the input, you can use these clues to discern where your existing process may be under strain and where it’s breaking down.
Culture of Adaptability
Turn your startup culture into the kind of party that every D&D player wants to join. One that thrives on flexibility, where adaptability isn’t a mere survival skill but a celebrated art form, as respected as a well-timed “Natural 20.”
The culture around Just-in-Time Process Development is very similar to that of agile development methodologies. Fundamentally, you need buy-in from the team (at all levels) for it to work well. When you have that, you’ll find that you are not relying on some magical ‘silver bullet’ bestowed upon you by someone else. Instead, you’ll realize that it’s the same skills that let you build your product that now help you scale your team to the next level. You just zoomed out.
Scale Fast, Scale Right
By embracing these elements, Just-in-Time Process Development becomes +5 Defender, your Bag of Holding, and your Boots of Jumping, all rolled into one. It will enable you to scale your team beyond just plucky misfits and mavericks, to build your company into the functional army you need to take on giants and dragons.
Just like in D&D, with startups, timing, and strategy are your true North Stars. While the carefree days of having no processes will inevitably come to an end, it doesn’t mean you jump straight into corporate bureaucracy. Take it step by step, adjust as you go, and remember: it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Your goal is to grow sustainably, not just rapidly. So grab your dice, leave the three-piece suit behind, and pace yourself with just-in-time processes that evolve with you. Now go and be better than me.
John P. Joseph
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Originally published on Medium (https://medium.com/@johnpjoseph/the-art-of-just-in-time-process-development-for-scaling-startups-7547c4f7d24)
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