I’ve been trying to figure out why MVPs in enterprise environments almost never stay truly minimal once real stakeholders get involved. In theory it’s simple: build the smallest version that validates the idea. But in a project I joined recently, the MVP already had full authentication, reporting, two external integrations, and audit logging before we even tested whether users actually needed the core feature. What surprised me most is how natural it felt for everyone to justify “just one more thing,” until the MVP stopped being minimal without anyone explicitly deciding it. I also came across a breakdown of this mindset while researching
site and it made me realize how much of this is tied to organizational structure rather than engineering decisions. I’m starting to think the real challenge isn’t building MVPs, but protecting them from becoming full products too early.