Assuming we understand the customer

One of the biggest pitfalls of startup founders is believing they know their customer. I have been there: "I know what a biologist needs". And not only me, the people around me behave the same way. People with years of experience, who had never seen a biology lab, assumed what biologists needed.

Took me a lot of time and effort to understand I didn't actually know what they needed, nor how they worked.

When we start from prejudices and we skip a mindful Customer Discovery process, we are setting up ourselves for failure. Or, better said, to depend on luck instead of a proper path of business development.