August 20, 2025 • 26 mins
When founders design products for themselves, or worse, for their “dog,” failure is almost inevitable.
In this episode of The Disruptor Podcast, host John Kundtz sits down with Oksana Kovalchuk, founder and CEO of ANODA.
This leading UX/UI design agency has guided more than 200 startups through Techstars and beyond.
From writing her first line of code at age five to mentoring thousands of entrepreneurs worldwide, Oksana has seen the same mistakes repeat themselves:
👉 Building solutions for a problem only one person has
👉Scaling too soon—or not thinking about scale at all
👉Adding endless features instead of releasing an MVP
👉Trusting AI “hallucinations” instead of real customer feedback
Oksana explains why walking in the user’s shoes is the single most critical step in building products that work, scale, and actually get adopted.
She shares practical frameworks, from card sorting to real-world user validation, that keep startups from wasting months (and millions) on products no one wants.
Listeners will also hear:
1. Why relying on AI without data or training leads to dead ends
2. How to use the “pizza slice” approach to launch MVPs in three months or less
3. Why ignoring cultural and regulatory differences can sink global expansion
This episode is a must-listen for founders, product managers, and anyone tired of bloated apps that ignore the human experience.
To learn more about Oksana and ANODA, visit her website and connect with Oksana on LinkedIn or follow her on X.
Comments or Questions? Send us a text
***
Engage, Share, and Connect!
Spread the Word: Valuable insights are best when shared. Share this episode with peers who may benefit from it if you find it insightful.
Your Feedback Matters: How did this episode resonate with you? Share your thoughts, insights, or questions. Your engagement enriches our community.
Stay Updated: Don’t miss out on further insights.
Subscribe: You can listen to our podcast, read our blog posts on Medium, Substack, and LinkedIn, and watch our YouTube channel.
Collaborate with The Disruptor and connect with John Kundtz.
Got a disruptive story to share? We’re scouting for remarkable podcast guests. Nominate a Disruptor.
Thank you for being an integral part of our journey.
Together, let’s redefine the status quo!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
John Kundtz (00:01):
Don't build for your dog the case for
human-centered design in a worldobsessed with AI.
Hi everyone, I'm John Kundtz.
(00:22):
I'm the host of the Disruptorpodcast.
For those that are new to ourshow, the Disruptor series is
your blueprint forgroundbreaking innovation.
We started the podcast inDecember of 2022 as a periodic
segment of the Apex podcast.
Our vision was to go beyondconventional wisdom by
confronting the status quo andexposing the raw power of
(00:46):
disruptive thinking, and today'sguest embodies that spirit.
She wrote her first line ofcode at age five and now runs a
global UX UI agency that'shelped over 200 startups scale
smarter by making designdecisions that actually reflect
human behavior.
Today, we explore how to bridgethat gap from back-end logic
(01:09):
and product experience anduncover the most common mistakes
founders make as they try toscale.
Welcome to the show, oksana.
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:16):
Hi John, Thank you for inviting me.
John Kundtz (01:19):
It's great to have you.
You're from Turkey, correct?
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:23):
Yeah, these days I'm in Turkey enjoying the
sea.
John Kundtz (01:26):
As I mentioned in our prep show, it's one of my
favorite countries.
I really enjoyed travelingthere on business, so it's very
lovely.
Great ancient culture, greatfood, great tea.
All in all, it's a wonderfulplace.
So glad you could make it today.
So, as we get started, tell usa little bit about your
(01:47):
background, your education, yourexperiences.
How did you get into thisbusiness?
You can start anywhere you want.
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:54):
Oh, of course, as you mentioned, I wrote my
first line of code when I wasfive.
My both parents are alsosoftware developers and I was so
engaged and so obsessed withcomputers in childhood, Like
with games.
I want to play games, I want tolike not to be bored, because
(02:14):
when you're a kid you want toexplore everything.
And then in school we hadprogramming classes.
Then I become a student alsofor software development and
learn as much as I could.
Yeah, like it was a tough timebecause it was early 20, uh, 20,
(02:35):
00 and like not so many optionswe had.
But like I started then myfirst job in very big
outsourcing giants like E-Pump,C-Cloom, Exadel.
But I've noticed the sameproblem everywhere Nobody.
They less care about the people, but of course as a business
(02:58):
they care about the money andthe processes inside for the
clients.
For me as an employee, theywere frustrating.
They were really reallyfrustrating.
So just in a few years to belike brave and not very smart,
that time I was very young, Iwas like around 21.
(03:19):
And I decided to open my agency.
Like it's really a very goodage to start doing something to
explore and just we start to getmore and more clients, more and
more jobs and like right nowwe're around 30 people and I'm
helping the startups for adecade.
(03:40):
So right now it's around 13years for my agency and over 20
years then I'm working IT field.
John Kundtz (03:49):
So here, like geography of what I'm doing and
my background, that's fantastic,Working in large outsourcing
arena for most of my career, butalso working now with lots of
startups and early stagecompanies.
The whole focus on creating auser experience is, in my mind,
(04:14):
one of the most important thingsa startup company can make.
What are some of the biggestmistakes, though, you've seen as
you work with founders whenthey're trying to take sort of
this traditional tech firstapproach to product development
and design.
Oksana Kovalchuk (04:31):
Oh, it will be a very long list, but the
biggest problem, the first topone they are not thinking about
how they're going to scale it.
They're going to scale it, sowhat I mean?
For example, usually if it's atech founder, he or she mostly
thinks about solving the problemthat this person experienced by
himself.
(04:51):
But you need to see when you'rereleasing the product to the
market, you need to understandhow many buyers you can attract,
how many people experiencingthe same problem.
Maybe you're unique here andyou can sell 10 copies and
that's all.
(05:11):
So the scaling, it's reallyimportant.
The second part it's put userfirst.
Walk in the user's shoes.
Sometimes both business andtech entrepreneurs they're
starting solving problem intheir own way.
They're not thinking about okay, will this solution be helpful
(05:33):
for the user?
Because sometimes the startupsand new products they just drop
out of the market just becauseit's not more efficient than do
it like in old school way.
So this is the second thing.
The third one I think nobodypays attention to the scope
creep.
So we started building, forexample, the MVP yeah, I hear
(05:57):
like you're laughing becausethis pain is everywhere.
So you start building the MVP.
Then you start thinking, oh, myGod, if I wouldn't add this
feature, like from thiscompetitor, nobody gonna buy my
product.
And then it happens again,again and again and the scope
(06:17):
for the MVP becomes like twoyears roadmap for the very small
product and still zero users,zero real feedback.
Because sometimes you can buildthat feature but, for example,
only few users using this inyour competitors.
But like, don't spend money onsomething that just hypothesis
(06:43):
in your mind.
Test it with real feedback.
Start asking your mom, dad, dog, friends, everyone.
When we designing something inour agency, our designers, they
go in like to the streets, theymeet on friends.
They start asking, askinganyone in that room, like, hey,
(07:05):
are we building this one?
What do you think about?
Like, grab as much opinions asyou can, but the huge like, the
huge consideration, you need tovalidate that opinions.
Like if you're gonna ask yourgrandma about building this
feature where she's not aware of, probably her feedback wouldn't
(07:27):
be very relevant.
So it relies us to the fourthpoint that I want to mention
validate the feedback.
Because sometimes startupfounders they are so worried, so
stressed, they start consultingwith everyone, like even
talking to the dog or cat, andthen consider this feedback as
(07:50):
valuable.
It's very like high-levelvaluable and the problem for us.
For example, we try to guideour clients.
The problem is the feedbackwill be totally different, like
you have three options or twooptions and in the same time we
can have light background andthe dark background in the same
(08:13):
time, without two differentversions.
But it's often when we receivefeedback like this and then
we're guiding this and trying tovalidate with bigger amount of
respondents, bigger amount ofinterviews, to qualify what's
better for the product.
But again, the more data youhave it's better, but a lot of
(08:36):
data is your enemy.
John Kundtz (08:38):
I wholeheartedly agree and I've seen these
mistakes over and over and overagain, especially for tech
founders.
Having spent some time, likeyou, mentoring and helping tech
startups, I see, as you pointedout, tech folks trying to build
technical solutions and notnecessarily solutions people
(09:00):
want to buy or use.
And, by the way, we used tomake that same mistake at IBM
over and over and over again.
I could go through examplesfrom the 80s and the 90s,
probably all the way up to today.
Also, walking in the persona'sshoes understanding your users
and what they need is probably awhole lot different than what
(09:20):
an engineer or a tech foundermight think they need.
And then your other point I hada guy that I used to work with.
He said you know, there's threethings you need to do.
When you're trying to dodiscovery, go talk to as many
people as you can.
When you're done with that, gotalk to as many more people as
you can.
And when you're done with that,go talk to more people.
(09:42):
When we were prepping for this,you talked about people talk to
their dog and they design foryour dog, and that's why I sort
of weave that analogy into theshow title.
But you're spot on.
I mean people talk to the wrongpeople or they think their
experience is what everybodyelse's experience, and then they
build something and it won'tscale or, really more
importantly, nobody cares, orthe user experience is just not
(10:05):
that good, so they just theydon't buy it.
So, with that thought and withthat thinking, what is the one
mindset or mindset shift orhabit you wish every founder
would adopt before buildingtheir next product?
Oksana Kovalchuk (10:20):
Yeah, I think.
Pay attention.
Start paying attention toeverything what surrounds you.
For example, five minutes ago,I had a fight with my microwave
because the UX that it's builtwith it was I don't know.
Some idiot created this becauseit shouldn't be like a slider
(10:42):
to set a time.
I want to pick one minute.
Why I need to have this sliderto slide it and it immediately
slides to 30 minutes.
Who's going to cook 30 minutesin the microwave?
No, and this is about UX.
It's about how users are goingto feel when using your products
(11:03):
, how users are going to use itand their needs.
So in this time, in this case,I see they didn't do the job
well In your case, likeAlexander Osterwalder, business
model canvas understand yourbusiness and your flow around
what you're gonna build thishouse.
The second one validate theopinion.
(11:25):
I know that the tech guysusually talking to the tech guys
Tech guys I'm from this band,but we're always thinking that
we are smartest person in theroom.
You need to validate thisbecause if you want to build for
the users when you're hunting,if you want to hunt a duck, you
need to think like a duck.
(11:46):
So, guys, take our crowns downand go and speak to the real
users, to the real people.
I know 99% of us don't likespeak to the people, but you
need to decide what you wantmore to build a very good
product and become rich, ordon't talk to the people ever.
So then, when you start talkingto these people, pay attention,
(12:10):
ask them can you use thissoftware or something in front
of my eyes and start payingattention to these stupid
microwaves around it?
If you see the buttons, thefilters, the person, for example
, exports all data to Excel,normalize it, then upload it
again and struggle around help.
(12:31):
See, then, how many peoplestruggling with the same stuff
and start doing something withthis.
And if you don't have an ideahere, you have a flow.
If you're thinking andconsidering about this idea
again, see how people usingcompetitors it's impossible
right now to not havecompetitors for the new software
(12:54):
.
To be honest, more than amillion, billions of different
software already built.
If you don't have directcompetitors, of course, you will
have indirect.
So slice it by feature byfeature and seek around with
your additional feedback thatyou need to grab.
Then, for the MVP, build fast.
(13:16):
You need to release somethingin next three months.
If you have an idea that Idon't know needs years to build
and years to release.
Pick another or slice it like acake or pizza and pick only one
piece.
Don't try to eat pizza orcircle around Then three months.
Yeah, you're very enthusiasticwhen you start.
(13:38):
All we like fulfilling thisfire inside our soul.
We have so many energy but youwill work for weeks without
results.
You will wait for these resultsand still like three months
it's like minimum time to buildMVP, just to create it.
Then you need to release it andstart marketing and start
(14:01):
promotion and usually, likethree months again, you need to
see the very first small results.
You need to keep this fire forat least half of the year to not
burn out, because workingwithout results, without really
big achievements, it's reallyhard.
(14:21):
And if you will postpone withyour new ideas and you will add
new features inside this product, then you will see result in a
year or two.
Money budget, don't forget.
Second, working without resultfor a year or two, what reasons
you're gonna have to not juststop it and leave it, just drop
(14:45):
it and that's all Like okay.
You'll say, okay, I've burnedsome budget some time.
I have no energy to drive it tothe next level or even release.
This is the biggest.
It's the core of all thesethings that happens to the
founders.
John Kundtz (15:02):
There's some great things in there and let's unpack
a couple of them.
I love the pizza analogybecause we use that all the time
at IBM when I was there.
Don't try to cook the wholepizza because you don't have
time.
We actually also used the 13week or the three month analogy
of build something, bang it outin 13 weeks or three months or a
(15:24):
quarter, evaluate it, pivot ifneeded.
You're not going to spend a lotof money.
You're going to get goodfeedback.
It's the classic fail fast andfail cheaply, because every
startup is going to go through aseries of pivots.
I don't care where you are,especially right now as we
introduce sort of this next waveof disruption of AI.
(15:44):
The cloud wave definitelydisrupted a lot of tech
companies and certainly in thenext wave here's going to even
make more disruptive and thingsare going to move faster and
faster.
I want to circle back on thebusiness model canvas.
So I don't know if all of ourlisteners are familiar with the
business model canvas.
I'm a big fan of it.
I've used it with some of theclasses that I teach for
(16:05):
entrepreneurs.
Just let's circle back in on it.
Give us a little bit morebackground on it from your
perspective and I'll put a linkto some of the business model
canvas information that I usewith my students.
Oksana Kovalchuk (16:19):
Yeah, of course, some people like
founders when they start in thestartup, thinking okay, it will
be for free for now and then Iwill figure out.
No, you need to figure out,before you will send this idea
to anyone, how you're going toearn money.
It's not a charity.
To be honest, I'm the founderof a service company.
(16:42):
I think it's the same problemfor every single founder of any
business, from the cafe or copypoint up to IBM founders.
You overstressed 24-7.
You have huge responsibility.
You have financialresponsibility, your emotions
(17:02):
and everything.
You own only one person who cantake care of it, and when you
start hiring, it's again thebigger responsibility.
Don't don't fly in the sky like.
Stand on earth and understandhow your business model gonna
work.
Will it be service businessmodel?
(17:22):
You're gonna I don't know shipsome kind of physical product,
because even the tech startup itcan be backed with a physical
product.
For example, a lot of thingsright now you can buy by
subscription model, even likegroceries, everything you can
buy on the subscription modeland still is a technical idea
beside it AI startups,everything you need to calculate
(17:46):
.
For example, if you're doing AI, you're building something on
LVM and you need to pay for it.
And if you're doing somethingfor free, then okay, you're not
a business, you're a charityorganization where you're taking
all your income and cover bills.
So start building a businessand see profit points where you
(18:09):
will cut your margins, where youwill get these margins.
Because if you're doing theservice, build the financial
model.
See, okay, how many services,for example, we build the
startup easy.
All projects that start withEasy are never easy.
We built the startup and thebusiness model was to cut
(18:31):
commission between the buyer andseller.
So it's like a marketplace.
And I said okay, let's emulatethe situation where you have 100
companies and this amount oforders with this revenue.
Will this revenue be enough foryou?
He said oh, no, because hedecided to put commission less
(18:53):
than Stripe even doing and itwas for $10,000, it was around
300 bucks.
No, and it's very smallpurchase.
The check is pretty small, sothere is almost nowhere when you
can get the more margins Saidokay, you will introduce the
commission.
Then let's do the ads for theshops that promoting on your
(19:16):
marketplace.
You can sell them ads, sellthem packages, doing something.
Then again we have users, wecan sell something to them, you
have user base.
So we start thinking and wefound additional 10 20 000
dollars per month where he canalso grab the revenue.
(19:37):
So thinking about it on everysingle point.
John Kundtz (19:42):
Great points.
Let's move over to some of thestuff you've done.
You've mentored over 200startups through TechStarts, so
what makes your approach alittle different, especially
when we're focusing on design tobe so effective, especially for
these early stage companies?
Oksana Kovalchuk (20:10):
the tech stars .
I'm doing a lot of mentorshipbut in total it's around 1000
startups and always I tellingthem do it fast, find the
connection for connect dots anddo it fast.
Start.
Stop creating 101st blockschema on the wall like start
doing the real thing without allthese ideas.
Validate them, Because usuallyall these tech founders they
(20:30):
have ideas more than money andmore than time.
Harsh truth.
John Kundtz (20:36):
Totally and, anna, I'd be interested from your
perspective, particularly sincewe're working across the globe.
I see a lot of people with alot of good ideas but, as you
mentioned earlier, they don'tnecessarily validate those ideas
.
And then they start to burn alot of cash, especially in the
software space, to build aproduct and spend money on
(20:57):
developers and servers and SaaSproviders.
This is way before they evenhave an MVP and way before they
validated their SOM and theirSAM and their addressable market
and in many cases I see themtrying to go after too big a
market.
You mentioned that right.
So start small.
Know your users.
The tech stuff's great, butpeople don't buy for tech.
(21:21):
Even if you have really greattechnology or a really great app
, if the experience isn't anygood, nobody's going to use it
Because, as you mentioned,there's too many other
competitors.
So people are going to expect asuperior experience.
You said walk in their shoes.
Understand what's important tothat persona.
Use the pizza analogy.
(21:41):
Don't try to eat the wholepizza.
Just a small slice.
Make sure it's something thattastes good, cooks fast, doesn't
cost a lot of money If they gotto add pepperonis or take away
the sausage or mushrooms orsomething like that you pivot
along.
So I think these are wonderfulpieces of advice for our
founders that are listening tothe show as we wrap it up.
Is there anything else Ihaven't asked you that you'd
(22:02):
like to share with our listeners?
Oksana Kovalchuk (22:05):
I think the small note is also, when you're
doing the startup idea right now, everything with AI.
I think everyone saw this funnyTikTok video what are you doing
this year?
Ai, ai, ai, ai, ai, ai, ai.
Often AI startups they failwhen they have no idea how
they're going to train the model, because without training it's
(22:28):
not worth nothing, because chat,gpt, you can use it.
You need to train it byyourself.
That's all.
I attended too many pitchnights.
The first question do you havetrained AI model?
No, goodbye, that's end of theconversation.
So if you're doing somethingwith AI, understand how you get
the data, have the plan, how youwill get the data.
(22:51):
Then have the plan B, whatyou're going to do if the plan A
is going to fail, and have theplan C at least.
And of course, for listenerswho, for example, building the
startup from other countries andplan to expand, for example, in
the United States or expand toother countries globally, think
(23:12):
about the culture, think aboutthe problems inside that
countries.
When I consulted in UnitedNations German Council, the
problem was the German startups.
They try to attract money forpenetrating United States market
, for example with healthcareapplications, but the healthcare
(23:33):
in the United States and inGermany.
In Europe overall is differentDifferent regulations, different
processes, everything totallydifferent.
And they even didn't get thepoint where to have the
telemedicine in the UnitedStates you need to have doctors
with United States license.
So, like, think of it, likefrom every, each point that's
(23:59):
possible, it will help you tonot fail like without a huge
effort fail without a hugeeffort.
John Kundtz (24:10):
Great advice Experienced something similar to
that where we were working witha company when we invested in.
It was a healthcare company.
It goes back to your scopecreep conversation as well.
So they got an opportunity inEurope.
They put all of their focus andall of their funding into what
the client in Europe needed,totally forgetting about really
what their core market was,which is in the United States.
(24:30):
But we essentially had to firethe CEO, the founder, because he
was taking what was supposed tobe a scalable SaaS company and
morphed into a customdevelopment organization where
they were building for onespecific client that couldn't
scale in the United Statesbecause of all the unique rules
(24:52):
in the European Union At the endof the day, because he was
burning through all the cash andthey had to get rid of him, had
to go through another fundinground just to make the cashflow
so they could survive, and sothe advice I'd have is follow
your advice, Ascana, because atthe end of the day, if you don't
, and you've got investors,they're gonna say sorry, you're
(25:13):
out of here and they're gonna beback out on the street.
So this has been a greatconversation.
I really appreciate it Forthose listening who want to stop
building for their dogs, as wewere talking about.
Where can they find you andlearn more about you and your
company?
Oksana Kovalchuk (25:32):
Of course, you can visit my website, anodamobi
.
You can connect me withLinkedIn or follow me on Twitter
where I, some day after week,trying to keep sharing really
good insights about my life andabout user experience what we
see in this world.
John Kundtz (25:52):
That's awesome.
We will, of course, put all ofthose links into the show notes
so that you can connect withOksana on LinkedIn and at our
website, and so I'll give youthe last word before we wrap up
the show.
Oksana Kovalchuk (26:09):
Oh, thank you, Guys, don't be scared to build
some ideas.
Just build it in a smart way.
John Kundtz (26:14):
Awesome.
Okay, so I'm John Kundtz, andthanks for joining us in this
edition of the Disruptor.
Have a great day.
Thanks for listening.
Oksana Kovalchuk (26:23):
Bye-bye.
Don't build for your dog the case for
human-centered design in a worldobsessed with AI.
Hi everyone, I'm John Kundtz.
(00:22):
I'm the host of the Disruptorpodcast.
For those that are new to ourshow, the Disruptor series is
your blueprint forgroundbreaking innovation.
We started the podcast inDecember of 2022 as a periodic
segment of the Apex podcast.
Our vision was to go beyondconventional wisdom by
confronting the status quo andexposing the raw power of
(00:46):
disruptive thinking, and today'sguest embodies that spirit.
She wrote her first line ofcode at age five and now runs a
global UX UI agency that'shelped over 200 startups scale
smarter by making designdecisions that actually reflect
human behavior.
Today, we explore how to bridgethat gap from back-end logic
(01:09):
and product experience anduncover the most common mistakes
founders make as they try toscale.
Welcome to the show, oksana.
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:16):
Hi John, Thank you for inviting me.
John Kundtz (01:19):
It's great to have you.
You're from Turkey, correct?
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:23):
Yeah, these days I'm in Turkey enjoying the
sea.
John Kundtz (01:26):
As I mentioned in our prep show, it's one of my
favorite countries.
I really enjoyed travelingthere on business, so it's very
lovely.
Great ancient culture, greatfood, great tea.
All in all, it's a wonderfulplace.
So glad you could make it today.
So, as we get started, tell usa little bit about your
(01:47):
background, your education, yourexperiences.
How did you get into thisbusiness?
You can start anywhere you want.
Oksana Kovalchuk (01:54):
Oh, of course, as you mentioned, I wrote my
first line of code when I wasfive.
My both parents are alsosoftware developers and I was so
engaged and so obsessed withcomputers in childhood, Like
with games.
I want to play games, I want tolike not to be bored, because
(02:14):
when you're a kid you want toexplore everything.
And then in school we hadprogramming classes.
Then I become a student alsofor software development and
learn as much as I could.
Yeah, like it was a tough timebecause it was early 20, uh, 20,
(02:35):
00 and like not so many optionswe had.
But like I started then myfirst job in very big
outsourcing giants like E-Pump,C-Cloom, Exadel.
But I've noticed the sameproblem everywhere Nobody.
They less care about the people, but of course as a business
(02:58):
they care about the money andthe processes inside for the
clients.
For me as an employee, theywere frustrating.
They were really reallyfrustrating.
So just in a few years to belike brave and not very smart,
that time I was very young, Iwas like around 21.
(03:19):
And I decided to open my agency.
Like it's really a very goodage to start doing something to
explore and just we start to getmore and more clients, more and
more jobs and like right nowwe're around 30 people and I'm
helping the startups for adecade.
(03:40):
So right now it's around 13years for my agency and over 20
years then I'm working IT field.
John Kundtz (03:49):
So here, like geography of what I'm doing and
my background, that's fantastic,Working in large outsourcing
arena for most of my career, butalso working now with lots of
startups and early stagecompanies.
The whole focus on creating auser experience is, in my mind,
(04:14):
one of the most important thingsa startup company can make.
What are some of the biggestmistakes, though, you've seen as
you work with founders whenthey're trying to take sort of
this traditional tech firstapproach to product development
and design.
Oksana Kovalchuk (04:31):
Oh, it will be a very long list, but the
biggest problem, the first topone they are not thinking about
how they're going to scale it.
They're going to scale it, sowhat I mean?
For example, usually if it's atech founder, he or she mostly
thinks about solving the problemthat this person experienced by
himself.
(04:51):
But you need to see when you'rereleasing the product to the
market, you need to understandhow many buyers you can attract,
how many people experiencingthe same problem.
Maybe you're unique here andyou can sell 10 copies and
that's all.
(05:11):
So the scaling, it's reallyimportant.
The second part it's put userfirst.
Walk in the user's shoes.
Sometimes both business andtech entrepreneurs they're
starting solving problem intheir own way.
They're not thinking about okay, will this solution be helpful
(05:33):
for the user?
Because sometimes the startupsand new products they just drop
out of the market just becauseit's not more efficient than do
it like in old school way.
So this is the second thing.
The third one I think nobodypays attention to the scope
creep.
So we started building, forexample, the MVP yeah, I hear
(05:57):
like you're laughing becausethis pain is everywhere.
So you start building the MVP.
Then you start thinking, oh, myGod, if I wouldn't add this
feature, like from thiscompetitor, nobody gonna buy my
product.
And then it happens again,again and again and the scope
(06:17):
for the MVP becomes like twoyears roadmap for the very small
product and still zero users,zero real feedback.
Because sometimes you can buildthat feature but, for example,
only few users using this inyour competitors.
But like, don't spend money onsomething that just hypothesis
(06:43):
in your mind.
Test it with real feedback.
Start asking your mom, dad, dog, friends, everyone.
When we designing something inour agency, our designers, they
go in like to the streets, theymeet on friends.
They start asking, askinganyone in that room, like, hey,
(07:05):
are we building this one?
What do you think about?
Like, grab as much opinions asyou can, but the huge like, the
huge consideration, you need tovalidate that opinions.
Like if you're gonna ask yourgrandma about building this
feature where she's not aware of, probably her feedback wouldn't
(07:27):
be very relevant.
So it relies us to the fourthpoint that I want to mention
validate the feedback.
Because sometimes startupfounders they are so worried, so
stressed, they start consultingwith everyone, like even
talking to the dog or cat, andthen consider this feedback as
(07:50):
valuable.
It's very like high-levelvaluable and the problem for us.
For example, we try to guideour clients.
The problem is the feedbackwill be totally different, like
you have three options or twooptions and in the same time we
can have light background andthe dark background in the same
(08:13):
time, without two differentversions.
But it's often when we receivefeedback like this and then
we're guiding this and trying tovalidate with bigger amount of
respondents, bigger amount ofinterviews, to qualify what's
better for the product.
But again, the more data youhave it's better, but a lot of
(08:36):
data is your enemy.
John Kundtz (08:38):
I wholeheartedly agree and I've seen these
mistakes over and over and overagain, especially for tech
founders.
Having spent some time, likeyou, mentoring and helping tech
startups, I see, as you pointedout, tech folks trying to build
technical solutions and notnecessarily solutions people
(09:00):
want to buy or use.
And, by the way, we used tomake that same mistake at IBM
over and over and over again.
I could go through examplesfrom the 80s and the 90s,
probably all the way up to today.
Also, walking in the persona'sshoes understanding your users
and what they need is probably awhole lot different than what
(09:20):
an engineer or a tech foundermight think they need.
And then your other point I hada guy that I used to work with.
He said you know, there's threethings you need to do.
When you're trying to dodiscovery, go talk to as many
people as you can.
When you're done with that, gotalk to as many more people as
you can.
And when you're done with that,go talk to more people.
(09:42):
When we were prepping for this,you talked about people talk to
their dog and they design foryour dog, and that's why I sort
of weave that analogy into theshow title.
But you're spot on.
I mean people talk to the wrongpeople or they think their
experience is what everybodyelse's experience, and then they
build something and it won'tscale or, really more
importantly, nobody cares, orthe user experience is just not
(10:05):
that good, so they just theydon't buy it.
So, with that thought and withthat thinking, what is the one
mindset or mindset shift orhabit you wish every founder
would adopt before buildingtheir next product?
Oksana Kovalchuk (10:20):
Yeah, I think.
Pay attention.
Start paying attention toeverything what surrounds you.
For example, five minutes ago,I had a fight with my microwave
because the UX that it's builtwith it was I don't know.
Some idiot created this becauseit shouldn't be like a slider
(10:42):
to set a time.
I want to pick one minute.
Why I need to have this sliderto slide it and it immediately
slides to 30 minutes.
Who's going to cook 30 minutesin the microwave?
No, and this is about UX.
It's about how users are goingto feel when using your products
(11:03):
, how users are going to use itand their needs.
So in this time, in this case,I see they didn't do the job
well In your case, likeAlexander Osterwalder, business
model canvas understand yourbusiness and your flow around
what you're gonna build thishouse.
The second one validate theopinion.
(11:25):
I know that the tech guysusually talking to the tech guys
Tech guys I'm from this band,but we're always thinking that
we are smartest person in theroom.
You need to validate thisbecause if you want to build for
the users when you're hunting,if you want to hunt a duck, you
need to think like a duck.
(11:46):
So, guys, take our crowns downand go and speak to the real
users, to the real people.
I know 99% of us don't likespeak to the people, but you
need to decide what you wantmore to build a very good
product and become rich, ordon't talk to the people ever.
So then, when you start talkingto these people, pay attention,
(12:10):
ask them can you use thissoftware or something in front
of my eyes and start payingattention to these stupid
microwaves around it?
If you see the buttons, thefilters, the person, for example
, exports all data to Excel,normalize it, then upload it
again and struggle around help.
(12:31):
See, then, how many peoplestruggling with the same stuff
and start doing something withthis.
And if you don't have an ideahere, you have a flow.
If you're thinking andconsidering about this idea
again, see how people usingcompetitors it's impossible
right now to not havecompetitors for the new software
(12:54):
.
To be honest, more than amillion, billions of different
software already built.
If you don't have directcompetitors, of course, you will
have indirect.
So slice it by feature byfeature and seek around with
your additional feedback thatyou need to grab.
Then, for the MVP, build fast.
(13:16):
You need to release somethingin next three months.
If you have an idea that Idon't know needs years to build
and years to release.
Pick another or slice it like acake or pizza and pick only one
piece.
Don't try to eat pizza orcircle around Then three months.
Yeah, you're very enthusiasticwhen you start.
(13:38):
All we like fulfilling thisfire inside our soul.
We have so many energy but youwill work for weeks without
results.
You will wait for these resultsand still like three months
it's like minimum time to buildMVP, just to create it.
Then you need to release it andstart marketing and start
(14:01):
promotion and usually, likethree months again, you need to
see the very first small results.
You need to keep this fire forat least half of the year to not
burn out, because workingwithout results, without really
big achievements, it's reallyhard.
(14:21):
And if you will postpone withyour new ideas and you will add
new features inside this product, then you will see result in a
year or two.
Money budget, don't forget.
Second, working without resultfor a year or two, what reasons
you're gonna have to not juststop it and leave it, just drop
(14:45):
it and that's all Like okay.
You'll say, okay, I've burnedsome budget some time.
I have no energy to drive it tothe next level or even release.
This is the biggest.
It's the core of all thesethings that happens to the
founders.
John Kundtz (15:02):
There's some great things in there and let's unpack
a couple of them.
I love the pizza analogybecause we use that all the time
at IBM when I was there.
Don't try to cook the wholepizza because you don't have
time.
We actually also used the 13week or the three month analogy
of build something, bang it outin 13 weeks or three months or a
(15:24):
quarter, evaluate it, pivot ifneeded.
You're not going to spend a lotof money.
You're going to get goodfeedback.
It's the classic fail fast andfail cheaply, because every
startup is going to go through aseries of pivots.
I don't care where you are,especially right now as we
introduce sort of this next waveof disruption of AI.
(15:44):
The cloud wave definitelydisrupted a lot of tech
companies and certainly in thenext wave here's going to even
make more disruptive and thingsare going to move faster and
faster.
I want to circle back on thebusiness model canvas.
So I don't know if all of ourlisteners are familiar with the
business model canvas.
I'm a big fan of it.
I've used it with some of theclasses that I teach for
(16:05):
entrepreneurs.
Just let's circle back in on it.
Give us a little bit morebackground on it from your
perspective and I'll put a linkto some of the business model
canvas information that I usewith my students.
Oksana Kovalchuk (16:19):
Yeah, of course, some people like
founders when they start in thestartup, thinking okay, it will
be for free for now and then Iwill figure out.
No, you need to figure out,before you will send this idea
to anyone, how you're going toearn money.
It's not a charity.
To be honest, I'm the founderof a service company.
(16:42):
I think it's the same problemfor every single founder of any
business, from the cafe or copypoint up to IBM founders.
You overstressed 24-7.
You have huge responsibility.
You have financialresponsibility, your emotions
(17:02):
and everything.
You own only one person who cantake care of it, and when you
start hiring, it's again thebigger responsibility.
Don't don't fly in the sky like.
Stand on earth and understandhow your business model gonna
work.
Will it be service businessmodel?
(17:22):
You're gonna I don't know shipsome kind of physical product,
because even the tech startup itcan be backed with a physical
product.
For example, a lot of thingsright now you can buy by
subscription model, even likegroceries, everything you can
buy on the subscription modeland still is a technical idea
beside it AI startups,everything you need to calculate
(17:46):
.
For example, if you're doing AI, you're building something on
LVM and you need to pay for it.
And if you're doing somethingfor free, then okay, you're not
a business, you're a charityorganization where you're taking
all your income and cover bills.
So start building a businessand see profit points where you
(18:09):
will cut your margins, where youwill get these margins.
Because if you're doing theservice, build the financial
model.
See, okay, how many services,for example, we build the
startup easy.
All projects that start withEasy are never easy.
We built the startup and thebusiness model was to cut
(18:31):
commission between the buyer andseller.
So it's like a marketplace.
And I said okay, let's emulatethe situation where you have 100
companies and this amount oforders with this revenue.
Will this revenue be enough foryou?
He said oh, no, because hedecided to put commission less
(18:53):
than Stripe even doing and itwas for $10,000, it was around
300 bucks.
No, and it's very smallpurchase.
The check is pretty small, sothere is almost nowhere when you
can get the more margins Saidokay, you will introduce the
commission.
Then let's do the ads for theshops that promoting on your
(19:16):
marketplace.
You can sell them ads, sellthem packages, doing something.
Then again we have users, wecan sell something to them, you
have user base.
So we start thinking and wefound additional 10 20 000
dollars per month where he canalso grab the revenue.
(19:37):
So thinking about it on everysingle point.
John Kundtz (19:42):
Great points.
Let's move over to some of thestuff you've done.
You've mentored over 200startups through TechStarts, so
what makes your approach alittle different, especially
when we're focusing on design tobe so effective, especially for
these early stage companies?
Oksana Kovalchuk (20:10):
the tech stars .
I'm doing a lot of mentorshipbut in total it's around 1000
startups and always I tellingthem do it fast, find the
connection for connect dots anddo it fast.
Start.
Stop creating 101st blockschema on the wall like start
doing the real thing without allthese ideas.
Validate them, Because usuallyall these tech founders they
(20:30):
have ideas more than money andmore than time.
Harsh truth.
John Kundtz (20:36):
Totally and, anna, I'd be interested from your
perspective, particularly sincewe're working across the globe.
I see a lot of people with alot of good ideas but, as you
mentioned earlier, they don'tnecessarily validate those ideas
.
And then they start to burn alot of cash, especially in the
software space, to build aproduct and spend money on
(20:57):
developers and servers and SaaSproviders.
This is way before they evenhave an MVP and way before they
validated their SOM and theirSAM and their addressable market
and in many cases I see themtrying to go after too big a
market.
You mentioned that right.
So start small.
Know your users.
The tech stuff's great, butpeople don't buy for tech.
(21:21):
Even if you have really greattechnology or a really great app
, if the experience isn't anygood, nobody's going to use it
Because, as you mentioned,there's too many other
competitors.
So people are going to expect asuperior experience.
You said walk in their shoes.
Understand what's important tothat persona.
Use the pizza analogy.
(21:41):
Don't try to eat the wholepizza.
Just a small slice.
Make sure it's something thattastes good, cooks fast, doesn't
cost a lot of money If they gotto add pepperonis or take away
the sausage or mushrooms orsomething like that you pivot
along.
So I think these are wonderfulpieces of advice for our
founders that are listening tothe show as we wrap it up.
Is there anything else Ihaven't asked you that you'd
(22:02):
like to share with our listeners?
Oksana Kovalchuk (22:05):
I think the small note is also, when you're
doing the startup idea right now, everything with AI.
I think everyone saw this funnyTikTok video what are you doing
this year?
Ai, ai, ai, ai, ai, ai, ai.
Often AI startups they failwhen they have no idea how
they're going to train the model, because without training it's
(22:28):
not worth nothing, because chat,gpt, you can use it.
You need to train it byyourself.
That's all.
I attended too many pitchnights.
The first question do you havetrained AI model?
No, goodbye, that's end of theconversation.
So if you're doing somethingwith AI, understand how you get
the data, have the plan, how youwill get the data.
(22:51):
Then have the plan B, whatyou're going to do if the plan A
is going to fail, and have theplan C at least.
And of course, for listenerswho, for example, building the
startup from other countries andplan to expand, for example, in
the United States or expand toother countries globally, think
(23:12):
about the culture, think aboutthe problems inside that
countries.
When I consulted in UnitedNations German Council, the
problem was the German startups.
They try to attract money forpenetrating United States market
, for example with healthcareapplications, but the healthcare
(23:33):
in the United States and inGermany.
In Europe overall is differentDifferent regulations, different
processes, everything totallydifferent.
And they even didn't get thepoint where to have the
telemedicine in the UnitedStates you need to have doctors
with United States license.
So, like, think of it, likefrom every, each point that's
(23:59):
possible, it will help you tonot fail like without a huge
effort fail without a hugeeffort.
John Kundtz (24:10):
Great advice Experienced something similar to
that where we were working witha company when we invested in.
It was a healthcare company.
It goes back to your scopecreep conversation as well.
So they got an opportunity inEurope.
They put all of their focus andall of their funding into what
the client in Europe needed,totally forgetting about really
what their core market was,which is in the United States.
(24:30):
But we essentially had to firethe CEO, the founder, because he
was taking what was supposed tobe a scalable SaaS company and
morphed into a customdevelopment organization where
they were building for onespecific client that couldn't
scale in the United Statesbecause of all the unique rules
(24:52):
in the European Union At the endof the day, because he was
burning through all the cash andthey had to get rid of him, had
to go through another fundinground just to make the cashflow
so they could survive, and sothe advice I'd have is follow
your advice, Ascana, because atthe end of the day, if you don't
, and you've got investors,they're gonna say sorry, you're
(25:13):
out of here and they're gonna beback out on the street.
So this has been a greatconversation.
I really appreciate it Forthose listening who want to stop
building for their dogs, as wewere talking about.
Where can they find you andlearn more about you and your
company?
Oksana Kovalchuk (25:32):
Of course, you can visit my website, anodamobi
.
You can connect me withLinkedIn or follow me on Twitter
where I, some day after week,trying to keep sharing really
good insights about my life andabout user experience what we
see in this world.
John Kundtz (25:52):
That's awesome.
We will, of course, put all ofthose links into the show notes
so that you can connect withOksana on LinkedIn and at our
website, and so I'll give youthe last word before we wrap up
the show.
Oksana Kovalchuk (26:09):
Oh, thank you, Guys, don't be scared to build
some ideas.
Just build it in a smart way.
John Kundtz (26:14):
Awesome.
Okay, so I'm John Kundtz, andthanks for joining us in this
edition of the Disruptor.
Have a great day.
Thanks for listening.
Oksana Kovalchuk (26:23):
Bye-bye.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.