One launch. Three markets. A choice.
A fictional business exercise about focus, limited attention, and the assumptions behind an analogy.
Editorial interpretation for review. Separate from the creator's translation. This case is fictional.
This is a fictional teaching case, not an account of a real company. A small team has 60 hours for a launch. It is considering three customer segments and must decide how to divide its time.
State the decision
An even allocation gives each segment 20 hours. A focused allocation gives one segment 42 hours and the others 9 hours each. The team's total capacity has not changed. Its opportunity to learn deeply in one segment has changed, along with its ability to support the others.
Before choosing, the team needs to know what the hours are for: customer interviews, product changes, or support. Hours spent on unlike activities are not interchangeable just because the chart treats them as units.
Use the text to ask a better question
Chapter 6's discussion of concentration suggests asking where a limited resource can be brought together. It does not identify which market deserves it. The team still needs evidence of customer need, access, willingness to pay, and the cost of serving the segment.
In the exploration, opposing resources are divided equally across fronts. A real market is not necessarily a contest between two fixed pools. Customers may choose several products, and competitors may respond. The diagram isolates one relationship; it does not model a market.
Make the next step reversible
The team could choose a short experiment in one segment, write down what it expects to learn, and set a date to reconsider its allocation. The experiment needs a concrete observation, such as whether a set of interviews reveals the same unmet need.
The decision should change when the evidence changes. That makes the exercise a practice in examining conditions rather than finding a quotation to endorse a decision already made.
What evidence would make you move time away from the segment you initially chose? Write the condition before running the experiment.
Chinese original and the creator's independent translation, Chapter 06. The teaching interpretation above is not part of the source text.
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