Chakshu Arora | Food for thought, Beyond the NOISE.

Image: Clicked at Öland, Sweden.

In my role as a product owner over the past few years, I’ve interacted with many interesting people. They work on various products, mostly in the technology sector, across the globe. I listened to their interesting journeys. I attended many on and offline events. They focused on creating the best products to solve all humanity’s problems.

I have heard multiple product leaders from different brands. I personally love using these brands in my day to day life. I listened to their daily challenges and reflected on my own as a Product Owner.
I resonate with some common traits in all of these stories. In this small blog, I have tried to jot down three of those. They are in no particular order.
If these are managed or done, they will greatly help teams in developing the right products. This will hopefully help them achieve end business goals. I won’t delve into detailed solutions. Yet, I have added one of my favorite techniques. I use this nowadays to tackle each of these.

1. Finding the right problem to be solved.
   
   “If I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask. Once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes.” — Albert Einstein.
   
   It couldn’t have been more easily communicated as done by Sir Einstein via above lines. Most of the teams I have interacted with have turned into feature factories. They do this to ship as many deliverables as possible. They also do it to increase team velocity. It is important to have a good team’s velocity. It is much more important to work on the right things. Solving the right problems is crucial.
   
   There are numerous forums where everyone wants to present or create the best solution ever. These include big room plannings (BRP’s), solutioning workshops, and mind mapping techniques. But is there any forum to brainstorm on the actual problem being solved?
   
   Understanding and finding the right problem to solve is crucial. As a product owner, you can prioritize the right things for your team to work on. However, most teams are too hurried to solve them. They forget to dive into problem finding.
   
   Double diamond (Diverge->Converge) is one of the most effective techniques. It is also one of the easiest methods. You can use it to brainstorm the problems and solutions at the same time.
   
2. Communicate, Communicate & Communicate.
   
   “You can fix it on the drawing board with an eraser or you can fix it on site with a sledge hammer” — Frank Llyod Wright.
   
   
   There is a very thin line between under and over communication and the time of communication. Giving too much information to your teams/stakeholders might lead to information overload. On the other hand, under communication might result in the wrong product being delivered.
   
   Communication is one of the most important aspects of a Product owner/manager role or any leadership role. However, it is often underrated. Many surveys have been conducted in this field. Communication issues still top the list as the most common cause of project failures.
   
   Product vision/roadmap is important for effective communication. Every product owner/manager must use it to communicate with their team’s/stakeholders. They should do this at every possible occasion.
   
   ”(Note – There is BIG different between Product Roadmap and Product Release plan and is topic for another blog altogether).”
   
   A product vision must be simple. It should motivate and explain to team’s their existence. It should show where they fit in the big picture. It must also clearly communicate the WHY part of each deliverable. This explains what your team(s) are or should be doing.
   
   A product roadmap should show the link between team deliverables and the company’s vision. It should also align with the mission and North star’s. This ensures everyone in your teams are aligned and not working on things not aligned to the company’s mission.
   
   It might sound naive. However, it does solve a lot of communication problems. It presents product vision and gives a helicopter view to your team(s) every now and then.There are n number of ways you can communicate roadmap but I personally use and live Roadmap 2.0 Tool for its simplicity and no frills approach.
   
3. Dare to say NO & Maximize the amount of work NOT in Progress.
   
   “Every line of code your team writes becomes technical debt once committed” — copied from somewhere with pride:)
   
   If saying yes to all the requests from all the different stakeholders you meet daily only means adding to a list of ever growing backlog, it will cause frustration to both you, your team(s) and your stakeholders.
   
   Each feature request you get might be the highest priority for your stakeholders. However, you must weigh the deliverable’s place in the overall puzzle. It must support fulfilling the business goal as a whole.
   
   Explaining the consequence of saying Yes to a feature request helps stakeholders understand more. This approach makes it easier for you to say No. Be clear. Give one apt reason. Explain that you both have the same end business goals. This clarity does make your stakeholder empathize and accept NO.
   
   You have the responsibility as a product owner to create the right technical debt. You also help your organization move forward to achieve its business goals. You must decide whether prioritizing one deliverable over another creates the right technical debt.
   
   There are hundreds of prioritization methods out there. You can use one of these. Alternatively, try a combination to get the right priority decisions.
   
   I personally like using the simple and efficient ‘Bang for the buck’ prioritization technique. I apply it to fill each bucket. These buckets allocate my team(s) capacity. They include 40% Business requirements focused on Growth/Engagement, 20% Non Functional requirements/Enablers, 20% Technical debt’s, and Slack.
   
   I highly recommend wearing different thinking hats while taking any of the prioritization decisions. This strategy will help you take balanced decisions. Mine favorite is Red hat, which one’s yours?

Disclaimer: Thought’s presented above are solely my perceptions from my personal experiences and have no relation/represent anyone and/or company.

Do comment if you agree/disagree with above points and add your 2 cents to grow this list :)

Love and Peace
CA.