# My problem validation record

## Product and starting view

**Stage:**

**What I'm considering building:**

**Provisional customer group:**

**Problem as I currently understand it:**

**How I expect the product to make money:**

## Individual evidence

Keep each interview, observation, public post, review, or sales conversation in
its own row. Record what happened before adding your interpretation.

| Source, date, and question or public context | Person or group | Recent event | Consequence | What they did | Time, money, effort, reputation, or access committed | What weakens my current view |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
|  |  |  |  |  |  |  |

## Patterns across the evidence

**Problems that appeared more than once:**

**Places where the same problem appeared:**

**Words people used themselves:**

**Differences between people or groups:**

**Outliers I shouldn't hide:**

## What people already do

**Current workarounds or alternatives:**

**Money already spent:**

**Time or effort already spent:**

**What happens when they leave the problem alone:**

**Compliments or hypothetical buying statements to keep separate:**

## Multi-model research

Keep each complete report as well as the synthesis.

| Model | Research date | Full report location | Sources checked manually | Access or source limits |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| GPT |  |  |  |  |
| Claude |  |  |  |  |
| Perplexity |  |  |  |  |

**Findings repeated across independent people and sources:**

**Findings reported by only one model:**

**Evidence that contradicts my starting view:**

**First-person excerpts I checked against the original source:**

**Competitor and pricing claims I checked against original pages:**

**Sources or claims that still need checking:**

**Location of the complete synthesis:**

## Rough commercial check

Mark every untested figure as an assumption.

**Approximate number of suitable buyers:**

**How I estimated it and the source:**

**What buyers currently pay for alternatives, including manual work:**

**Likely price or price range:**

**Likely direct cost to serve one customer or transaction:**

**Likely time or cost to reach and sell to one customer:**

**Market timing, saturation, or entry limits:**

**What could make the commercial math fail:**

## Evidence assessment

**Strongest evidence I have:**

**Evidence still missing:**

**Evidence against my current view:**

**Facts:**

**Assumptions:**

**My interpretation:**

## My current decision

Choose one: **Continue / Change the problem or provisional audience / Park for now**

**Decision:**

**Reason:**

**What I'm not claiming:**

## Next test

**The question this test needs to answer:**

**The smallest test that could change my decision:**

**The commitment I will ask for:**

**What result would support continuing:**

**What result would make me change or park:**

**Test date:**

## Reopening condition

Complete this if the decision is **Park for now**.

**What would need to change before I look again:**

**How I will notice that change:**

## AI prompt

```text
I need to decide whether a problem deserves the next stage of work.

My context
- Product stage: [idea / prototype / lightweight MVP / pre-launch]
- Provisional customer group: [the recognizable group I'm investigating]
- Problem as I currently understand it: [one or two sentences]
- Business model: [how I expect the product to make money]
- Likely price or price range: [mark this as tested or assumed]
- Likely cost to reach and serve one customer: [known figures and assumptions]
- Market information: [demand, approximate number of suitable buyers,
  alternatives, saturation, timing, and sources]
- Interviews and observations: [paste each item separately, with the source,
  date, exact words where needed, what happened, what the person did, and any
  money, time, effort, reputation, or access they committed]
- Limits: [buying cycle, regulation, sensitivity, rare timing, marketplace or
  network requirements, access, money, or technical limits]

Your task
1. Review every interview or observation separately before comparing them.
2. For each item, extract the real event, consequence, current action or
   workaround, money or effort spent, frequency, urgency, and evidence against
   my current view.
3. Mark hypothetical buying statements, compliments, leading questions, and
   claims with no follow-through. Don't treat them as payment or demand.
4. Compare the full batch. Identify repeated patterns, meaningful differences,
   and outliers without merging different customer groups or problems.
5. Assess the rough commercial case: plausible number of buyers, likely price,
   direct delivery cost, likely acquisition effort or cost, and market timing.
   Keep every untested number labeled as an assumption.
6. Recommend one current decision: continue, change the problem or provisional
   audience, or park for now.
7. Recommend the smallest next test that could change that decision. Where
   immediate payment is possible, include a payment or paid commitment. Where
   it isn't possible, explain why and ask for a concrete action involving time,
   budget, access, or reputation.
8. List the information that is missing.

Rules
- Don't invent customer behavior, quotations, market facts, payment, usage,
  costs, or results.
- Distinguish facts, assumptions, interpretations, and recommendations.
- Preserve disagreement and negative evidence.
- Don't turn repeated complaints into proof of willingness to pay.
- Don't treat a hypothetical “yes” as a purchase.
- Say when the evidence can't support a decision.
- Produce working material I can copy into my evidence record.

Return exactly these headings
## Individual evidence review
## Patterns across the batch
## Evidence against my current view
## Commercial assumptions
## Strongest evidence I have
## Evidence still missing
## Current decision
## Reason for the decision
## Next smallest test
## Reopening condition (only if the decision is park for now)
## Next review
```

## Decision record

**Decision:**

**Evidence used:**

**Assumptions:**

**Evidence that would change the decision:**

**Owner:**

**Decision date:**

## Next review

**Review date or trigger:**

**Evidence to review:**