MVP 101: Build to Test

Early-stage founders often struggle to know what to build first. Without clear prioritization, it’s easy to invest time and resources into the wrong things, delaying meaningful learning and traction.

As a result, many founders:

• Overbuild features before validating whether they are truly needed.
• Strive for perfection, slowing progress and delaying real-world feedback.

The goal of this session is simple: determine whether your idea is worth building by designing the smallest possible test to validate it.

• What to build for your ideal customer — and what can wait, building on insights from Discover 101 & 201.
• How to translate your idea into a clear, testable proof of concept (PoC) that supports early validation.
• How to leverage simple tools and approaches, including AI and prompting, to move faster and more efficiently.

• Isolate Your Riskiest Assumption: Strip your idea down to its core value to determine exactly what must be tested before building.
• Design a Low-Fidelity Experiment: Create a simple “smoke test” or proof of concept using low-cost tools to gather real user feedback.
• Map Your Customer Feedback Loop: Define how you’ll measure user reactions and the metrics that will inform whether to pivot or proceed.

✔ A clear understanding of the difference between an MVP and a Proof of Concept, and when to use each.

✔ A simple, testable proof of concept that can be immediately used to validate your idea.

✔ A user-centered validation plan that guides your next steps and supports confident decision-making.

• Pre-idea or idea-stage founders who want to validate their concept before investing in development.
• Early-stage founders transitioning from customer discovery into building their first version.
• Entrepreneurially curious individuals who are unsure what to build first or how to keep their solution simple and focused.
  

Date: April 29, 2026

Time: 6:00 – 8:00 PM

Location: In-Person at the Platform Innovation Centre

This workshop is co-created and facilitated by experienced entrepreneurs and operators who have built and scaled real products. Their combined expertise ensures the session is practical, actionable, and grounded in real-world founder challenges.

Margaret helps mission-driven teams build better products by uncovering sharper customer insights, making smarter product decisions, and aligning teams around what actually matters. She has led global product strategy at Poynt (20M+ users, Apple and Google partnerships), driven major growth at Virtual Gurus, and shaped go-to-market strategy at Benevity. She brings deep experience at the intersection of product, growth, and execution to help teams turn ideas into scalable impact.

Jennifer is an AI literacy educator and workshop facilitator who designs courses and experiences that give people real, usable AI skills. She teaches the good, bad, and ugly of AI because responsible adoption starts with full understanding. With 6+ years in startups and a background in acting and film, Jennifer brings a highly engaging facilitation style that makes learning feel energizing, practical, and far from a lecture.

👉 Start simple. Learn fast. Build the right thing.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

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