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References: Entrepreneurship, Lean Thinking & the Idea Trap

  1. Entrepreneurship - Wikipedia - Comprehensive overview of entrepreneurship's definition, history, and psychological dimensions, supporting this chapter's broad definition of entrepreneurship as turning an unproven idea into customer value, beyond the venture-capital stereotype.

  2. Lean startup - Wikipedia - Detailed explanation of the lean startup methodology, including the build-measure-learn loop, minimum viable product, and validated learning — the exact vocabulary this chapter introduces as the course's operating philosophy.

  3. Startup company - Wikipedia - Covers what defines a startup versus an established business, including funding stages and failure patterns, reinforcing this chapter's definition of an early-stage venture as one with unproven core assumptions.

  4. The Lean Startup - Eric Ries - Crown Business - Ries pioneered the Build-Measure-Learn loop and the concept of validated learning through a minimum viable product, giving this chapter's Clarity-Validation-Action-Launch cycle its direct methodological ancestor.

  5. The Startup Owner's Manual - Steve Blank and Bob Dorf - K&S Ranch Publishing - Blank originated the Customer Development process and the "get out of the building" discipline, the exact antidote this chapter prescribes for escaping the idea trap through real customer contact.

  6. Why the Lean Start-Up Changes Everything - Harvard Business Review - Steve Blank explains how lean startup practices replace an untested business plan with rapid, low-cost experiments, directly reinforcing this chapter's contrast between planning and evidence-based validation.

  7. Building a Minimum Viable Product? You're Probably Doing It Wrong - Harvard Business Review - Explains how founders should design experiments that validate or invalidate specific business-model assumptions, illustrating this chapter's distinction between an untested assumption and validated learning.

  8. Startup Business Ideas: 4 Steps to Identify the Right One - U.S. Small Business Administration - A four-step framework for turning a passion into a tested idea, ending in real-world testing with customers, mirroring this chapter's path from unrefined concept to validated action.

  9. How to Come Up with an Innovative Business Idea - Harvard Business School Online - Outlines four practical approaches for generating a business idea rooted in genuine customer needs, helping readers move an unrefined concept toward a testable business idea.

  10. Startup School - Y Combinator - A free, self-paced course covering early-stage venture fundamentals, including MVP planning and user acquisition, giving readers a practical extension of this chapter's early-stage venture concepts.