How I work
Viability first
Ask where an innovation effort should begin and the usual answer is the customer. Understand people deeply, then design for what you find. It is a good answer, and it makes business analysis something that arrives toward the end, once a solution already exists. Having led business design at IDEO, my preferred order runs the other way. Start with viability: whether the proposed solution can work as a business. Then feasibility: what it would take to build, and who can make it happen. Then desirability, which shapes what we test and develop with customers.
Why the business case leads
Clients of top consulting firms pay a great deal for help with outcomes they care about. That spend is never casual. It exists to achieve a business objective, and that objective is the strongest reason to examine viability at the start: the work has to add up commercially before it deserves a team, a budget and a customer's attention.
Viability done with skill already carries a customer lens. Asking whether a solution can be a business means asking who pays, why they would pay, and what it takes to reach them. That analysis produces a commercial hypothesis. Research and testing then find out whether the opportunity holds up, and the deeper anthropological work of design research builds on that ground.
Feasibility strengthens the same case. Once a business hypothesis exists and the solution looks technically achievable, and one or more technical experts associate themselves with the project, the effort gains credence. Capable people standing behind a solution is a signal in itself, and it makes the later conversation with customers, about the needs this solution addresses, that much more convincing.
What a viability analysis produces
A structured look at whether the proposed solution can work as a business: the commercial assumptions, the evidence for and against them, and the experiments that would settle the open questions. It gives a leadership team a basis for debating which opportunities are worth pursuing, and it gives design work that follows a commercial spine. It is one of the things a Wisdom engagement can produce.
Where a desirability-first start fits
When the business model is proven and the open question is which customer need to serve next, starting with desirability makes sense. When a mission matters more than a model, as in some cultural and civic work, the order bends to the purpose. Viability first suits the common case in industry: money is at stake, a business objective exists, and the idea has to earn its way early.
What are you trying to figure out?
Tell us in a few sentences. You will hear back about fit, and if it makes sense, a short call follows.
Wisdom is led by Vinay Gupta, who led business design at IDEO and invests his own capital in public equities and private companies. Last updated October 31, 2026.