Earlywork #14: WTF is Product/Market Fit?
Featuring roles from Basiq, Superhero, Eliiza & more + an interview with Lucy Wang (Solutions Architect @ Amazon Web Services + Creator @ Tech With Lucy)
Hey gang!
It’s ya boi Dan, and I’m excited to present the 14th instalment of Earlywork, a newsletter that gives you:
A shortlist of the best roles for students & recent graduates across tech & startups in Australia (+ remote roles).
Free career resources for young people looking to break into tech & startups.
Interviews with young startup founders & employees.
If you’re not already part of the crew, subscribe now to keep a pulse on our latest stories and conversations:
It’s been a hectic month between:
Starting my new role at Atlassian
🎉 Launching a pilot version of the Earlywork Career Coaching Program (if you’re actively job hunting, you can sign up here for a free intro session)
👋 Bringing on a third Earlywork co-founder (Marina Wu, Product @ Finder)!!!
🎬 Being featured in a Q&A video about my student career experiences on TechWithLucy
We’ve got some big content pieces + collaborations in-store, but keen to get back into the usual newsletter rhythm.
And now, I’ll hand over to Marina for our Weekly Cheeky Tip, breaking down a wishy-washy, often-misunderstood buzzword in the tech & startup world as we raise the question…
💡 Weekly Cheeky Tip:
WTF is Product/Market Fit?
Ah, Product. Market. Fit. The holy grail for startup founders and product people. The three words that we obsess over and fear that we’ll never reach. Marc Andreesen says that you can feel when product/market fit is happening, and you definitely know when it’s not. Sure, catching feelings is great, but heck, what does it actually mean?
A couple of other startup-world celebrities have weighed in on the debate too. Let’s see what they have to say.
1) Sam Altman (CEO of OpenAI and former president of YCombinator) says that startup founders should focus on the question “Do any users love our product so much they spontaneously tell other people to use it?”
How can we measure this? The “spontaneous” bit of this is the tricky part, but what we can do (without listening on all our users’ convos!) is measuring an NPS score, or building a referral program and tracking the growth from that channel.
2) Marty Cagan (Partner at Silicon Valley Product Group) says Product/Market Fit is the “smallest possible actual product that meets the needs of a specific market of customers. Since they are actual products, they are the result of delivery.”
How can we measure this? This falls more into the conventional product principles around shipping an MVP (minimum viable product), testing it with real users in the target market and iterating from there.
3) Sean Ellis (Former growth hacker at Dropbox, Eventbrite and the guy who coined the term “growth hacking”) broke it down into a few simple survey questions. The most important one being:
“How would you feel if you could no longer use product x?”
Very disappointed
Somewhat disappointed
N/A - no longer use
Not disappointed
The golden percentage of people who would say “very disappointed” is touted to be 40%, although Slack famously outdid this with 51% of users saying they would be very disappointed. Not bad at all!
---
So there you go: a quick primer on what the heck Product/Market Fit actually means, and as a Product person, I could go on all day about how companies got there, how they lost it, and what we can learn from them.
Any other nebulous tech, startup or careers topics you’d like to better understand? Let us know! Leave a comment below!
⛅ Intern & Part-Time Roles
🛠️ Technical
🎨 Creative
💪 Business
🌞 Graduate & Full-Time Roles
🛠️ Technical
🎨 Creative
Growth Marketer, Basiq (email kathy@basiq.io)
💪 Business
🌏 = remote role
1️⃣ 🕐 💪 One Minute Hustle
We are back once again with One Minute Hustle, a bite-sized interview with an emerging Australian young startup founder or operator. Today, let’s get inside the noggin of one of the most enthusiastic people creating content around tech careers in Australia…
Lucy Wang, Solutions Architect @ Amazon Web Services + Creator @ Tech With Lucy
What are you working on? I’m a Solutions Architect grad at Amazon Web Services, 1 month into the role! I’m learning how to help companies understand and leverage the capabilities of cloud computing - really enjoying it so far. Outside of work, I share tech & student advice on Youtube - Tech with Lucy and write fortnightly newsletters to teach students about the cloud - cloudbites.co.
How'd you get started? I’ve always found the tech space super interesting but wasn’t sure what if it was where I wanted to be career-wise. Last year, I had the opportunity to intern at AWS and found out there were so many roles in tech that weren’t centred around coding! What Solutions Architects do at AWS sounded really interesting and aligned with the skills I wanted to improve on, so I decided to give it a go :)
Why do you do what you do? Most of what I’ve learnt outside of uni classes is from older students, mentors, and people on the internet who generously offer their time and knowledge. I love working on side projects outside my main commitments (i.e. uni & full-time work) because it gives me the chance to “pay it forward”, build new skills, work with inspiring people, and have some fun.
That’s a wrap, but wait! Make sure to check out two awesome tech/startup community initiatives making recent moves:
EntryLevel: Curated 1-month practical side projects with mentors from leading tech companies.
Startmate Fellowship: A virtual two-month program helping ambitious women find their dream job in a startup (applications closing midnight Feb 14).
If you’re a zesty student careers fanatic, come join the Earlywork Gang on Slack to:
Be the first to gain access to new resources and initiatives being launched through Earlywork.
Have your suggestions and preferences on content and services incorporated into future Earlywork newsletters & associated offerings.
Ask and get answers to any of your own questions on jobseeking, applications, interviews, and all that jazz, for early-career roles in tech & startups.
Ciao for now,
Team Earlywork
Email| LinkedIn
