Assumption

What is an Assumption?

An assumption is something believed to be true without proof. Every time an idea is proposed, a set of assumptions always comes with it. Some common assumption types are:

• Desirability assumptions – Do people want it, and will they use it?
• Feasibility assumptions – Can it be built?
• Usability assumptions – Will people know how to use it?
• Viability assumptions – Does it make sense for the rest of the business?
• Ethical assumptions – Should it be built?

Tip: Right sizing validation.

Validating high-risk assumptions critical to a solution’s success is a worthwhile exercise and can save time, money, reputation, and more. On the other hand, validating low-risk assumptions can be costly and have little to no return on investment. After identifying assumptions, an assumption mapping exercise can help determine which assumptions require experiments.

Examples

Good

Example 1:

Can each customer organization share the required employment data? Will they?

Example 2:

Do we currently have the expertise to build a predictive ML model? Will it perform better than off-the-shelf alternatives?