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What Is The 'Iteration Cycle'?

The Iteration Cycle is a process that you can use to improve anything over time.

It has six major steps:

• Watch: What works? What doesn't?
• Ideate: What could you improve? What are your options?
• Guess: Based on experience, which idea do you think will make the biggest impact?
• Which?: Decide which change to make.
• Act: Make the change.
• Measure: Was it positive or negative? Should you keep it or go back?

Iteration is a cycle. Once you do it, you repeat it.

The more clearly you define what you're after with each iteration, the better the feedback and the value you'll receive from each cycle.

Josh Kaufman Explains The 'Iteration Cycle'

Nobody-no matter how smart or talented they are-gets it right the first time.

For proof, consider any artistic masterpiece. Beneath the finished surface of the "Mona Lisa," you'll find layer upon layer of draft sketches, false starts, and major alterations. The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is covered with hundreds of millions of very small brushstrokes, each of which brought the resulting masterpiece one step closer to completion. It took Michelangelo millions of hammer strokes to turn a crude block of marble into the "David."

The Iteration Cycle is a process you can use to make anything better over time. There's nothing wasteful about the inevitable changes and revisions that these artists made to their creations: every iteration brought the project one step closer to completion.

Iteration has six major steps, which I call the WIGWAM method:

1. Watch-what's happening? What's working, and what's not?
2. Ideate-what could you improve? What are your options?
3. Guess-which of your ideas do you think will make the biggest impact?
4. Which?-decide which change to make.
5. Act-make the change.
6. Measure-what actually happened? Was the change positive or negative? Should you keep the change, or go back to how things were before this iteration?

Iteration is a cycle-once you measure the results of the change and decide whether or not to keep it, you go back to beginning to observe what's happening, and the cycle repeats. For best results, clearly define what you're trying to accomplish with each iteration. Are you trying to make the offering more attractive or appealing? Are you trying to add a new feature people will value? Are you trying to make the offering cost less without detracting from its value?

The more clearly you can define what you're after, the easier it'll be to understand the feedback you're receiving and the more value you'll extract from each iteration cycle.

Questions About The 'Iteration Cycle'

• How are you currently using the iteration cycle?
• Which steps are you doing particularly well?
• Which steps do you typically skip?

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"I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work."

Thomas A. Edison, prolific inventor

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