What the Movie ‘Big’ Taught Me About Product-Market Fit

Last night, I watched Big for the first time. I realize now why it’s considered a classic for a dozen reasons, but 15 years into my career, one scene stuck out more than the rest.

Josh Baskin (Tom Hanks) - a 12-year-old boy trapped in a grown man’s body - is working a low-level data entry job at MacMillan Toys. On his day off, he wanders into FAO Schwarz, just to play.

He runs into the company’s owner, Mr. MacMillan, who is watching children play with a mix of fascination and frustration. MacMillan gestures to the chaotic joy of the kids running around the store and tells Josh:

"You can't see this on a marketing report."

And Josh, with genuine, uncorrupted innocence, asks:

"What's a marketing report?"

MacMillan looks at him, smiles, and says, "Exactly."

In that moment, the CEO realizes that his entire executive team is obsessing over paper trails while this "grown man" is the only one obsessed with the product. He promotes Josh to Vice President immediately.

It’s a funny scene, but it highlights a serious business truth: The higher you go in a company, the harder it is to see the ground. MacMillan knew his reports were lying to him (or at least, omitting the truth), and he had to leave the office to find reality.

Stop Building Things Nobody Wants

There is a trend happening right now, particularly on "Founder Twitter", where people are roasting founders who fall into this exact trap.

You see it every day: Indie hackers and solopreneurs who spend six months writing code, perfecting the UI, and obsessing over their tech stack - without ever talking to a single human being. They fall in love with their solution before they’ve even confirmed the problem exists.

They are building based on what they think makes sense, rather than what a user actually feels.

When they launch to crickets, they blame the algorithm. They blame their ad spend. They try to "growth hack" their way out of a hole. But the reality is much simpler:

The best form of marketing is a great product.

If you build something that truly solves a painful problem, you don't need to scream about it. But if you build a solution in search of a problem, no amount of marketing spend will save you.

The Rick Rubin Fallacy

This brings me to the counter-argument I hear often. There’s a famous clip of legendary music producer Rick Rubin saying that he considers the audience last when making music. His philosophy is that if he makes something true to himself, the audience will follow.

It’s a beautiful sentiment. It works for art. But it is dangerous advice for business.

Unless you are an artist - or a visionary genius like Steve Jobs (and you are probably not Steve Jobs) - you cannot operate this way.

Art is about expression. Business is about service.

If you are building software, a service, or a widget, you are not Rick Rubin in the studio. You are a problem solver. Your job isn’t to express your inner truth; your job is to remove friction from someone else's life.

If you adopt the "audience comes last" mentality in SaaS or product design, you aren't an artist; you're a hobbyist with an expensive burn rate.

Be the Kid in the Boardroom

The reason the movie Big works is that Josh Baskin represents the customer. He is the ultimate user proxy.

The executives represent the "Founder Mode" trap - getting so lost in the strategy, the metrics, and the idea of the business that they forget the human on the other side of the transaction.

We need to stop treating customer discovery like a box to check. We need to stop looking for validation in spreadsheets and start looking for it in conversations.

Does this solve your pain?

Does this make your day easier?

Does this "robot turn into a bug"?

Data is important. Marketing reports have their place. But they are historical records of what happened, not predictors of how a human will feel.

So, the next time you find yourself obsessing over a feature nobody asked for, or a marketing strategy for a product nobody uses, ask yourself the Tom Hanks question:

"What's a marketing report?"

Then go talk to a customer.