Why I like to use 6-6-6
6-6-6 is a great way to begin a workshop with a startup or product team.
The 6-6-6 questions are:
1. What is your 6-year vision?
2. What are your 6-month goals?
3. What do you aim to deliver in the next 6 weeks?
What is your 6-year vision?
Your six-year vision for your business or product is meant to be inspirational. It is light on the details and heavy on the motivation. It is seen as the ‘north star’, a guide to where you want your business or product to go.
The best product visions I have seen are videos of what the end product may look like. Remember, this is inspirational, it is meant to get you and anyone who sees it excited about the opportunity. It is not meant to define precisely what you will build, and it will contain few details. This is important, as the details will change significantly along the way.
Why 6 years?
When I started out on my entrepreneurial journey, I used to think that if a business or product wasn’t profitable and sustainable within 2-3 years it would never make it. Experience has taught me that this timeline is much more likely to be 5-7 years. I’ve seen this with my own projects and with countless others. It is very rare for a product to reach this state in a shorter period. Even those you would assume were an instant success, often took much longer than you would have thought.
What are your 6-month goals?
While your vision is inspirational and light on the details, your 6-month goals are practical and driven by hard numbers. Consider what you need to do in the next six months to help you achieve your 6-year vision. Your goals need to be measurable, and they need to be outcome-focused.
Why 6 months?
From a business perspective, one-year targets often make sense, as it is aligned with financial and/or investor goals. However, from a product perspective, 12 months is a very long timeline to make any solid commitments. This is particularly the case in the current climate, where technology is changing so rapidly. The other option is to go for three months. The shorter the period the more we can commit to outcomes. For this reason, my preference is to have both the quarterly and 6-month goals, which are aligned with the one-year business objectives.
What do you aim to deliver in the next 6 weeks?
What do you aim to deliver in the next 6 weeks that will help you achieve your 6-month goals? I like to focus on any blockers and then concentrate on delivering solutions that will resolve these issues.
Why 6 weeks?
I can’t explain it, but time and time again it takes 6 weeks to achieve a meaningful outcome. This is despite the fact that I run one or two week sprints. Naturally, there are exceptions to this, and ideally, this time would be shorter. If anyone has a reasonable explanation for this, then I would love to hear it.
In conclusion, with these three questions, you can quickly build a picture of where the business or product is going, and how they plan to get there. If they are unable to answer any of the questions above, it also helps me identify where the gaps might be, which is a great starting point for further conversation.
