How I Tested That Alberto Savoia | How I Tested Pretotyping
Jul 16, 2025
In this engaging conversation, Alberto Savoia, former Google engineering director and author, dives deep into his concept of 'pretotyping'—testing ideas' desirability before committing significant resources. He shares the captivating story of the 'pretend to own' PalmPilot experiment, showcasing how real user interaction revealed true needs. Alberto also discusses the psychological barriers teams face against early testing, the importance of focusing on desirability, and how his principles apply broadly beyond software, including personal life experiments. Get ready to rethink how you validate ideas!
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Build The Right Thing Before Building It Right
- Building things well doesn't guarantee market success because many products are simply the wrong product.
- Test desirability before spending major resources on building feasibility or polish.
Wooden Phone Prototype That Became PalmPilot
- Jeff Hawkins carried a block of wood with paper UI to mimic a pocket device and tested real use.
- He learned people carried it and used only four features, which guided the successful PalmPilot design.
Fear Of Rejection Blocks Early Testing
- Fear of rejection drives teams to over-engineer and avoid early market tests.
- Pretotyping counters this by encouraging cheap, early exposure to market feedback.