A common trap in product development is to go into solution driven planning. In this event, a person influential in the organization has a specific product description in mind which they want to build and is able to make the case for developing it. Usually the organization ignores to carry out adequate marketing research to validate that the solution is the appropriate solution or validate that it fixes an actual problem. Quite often those products fizzle entirely or don't achieve the full power of the business opportunity.
When you are a product manager, you must emphasize the problem you are striving to address. Avoid the drawback of solution led thinking, it can easily lead you on a track that is short of optimal for the consumer. Work on understanding the consumer, involve the consumer if you can, and document the problem you are striving to address. Ask questions, use the 5 whys to get to a better knowledge of the problem. Are there behaviors or tendencies that add to the problem that can turn into a barrier for some solutions to the problem? If you comprehend the problem and are attached to it, it gets less complicated to assess the various solutions to the problem.
You can maintain your focus on the problem by being explicit about what you are aiming to address. One technique is to produce a visual overview that is put up in the team work space. It really should incorporate the definition of the opportunity area, the consumer needs and learnings. During the course of your solution review you'll probably seek some sort of customer input, as you gain insights, add them to the workspace.
In case you live in a web product environment and utilize A/B testing or lean startup techniques, use the workspace and documentation during the definition of every single experiment. In a tangible product environment, make use of the workspace for your feature decisions. It will aid your team stay based in the problem statement as opposed to drifting away from it.
In my past experience with a high-profile product program, I caught myself contemplating small means to enhance the developed solution: What ways do we reduce drop off at point X? How do we get more consumers to set up an account? In what ways can we offer more transparency to the support agents? The limitation using this attitude is that I came to be invested in the solution and forgot to think of it as merely a available method to address our problem. One problem I faced was that we had invested a substantial amount of funds, people and time in this particular experiment. We lost sight of the truth that we had placed all the money on a solution instead of the problem. Whenever people are so deeply committed it gets harder to suggest a pivot.
It is very important to steer clear of circumstances such as this for several reasons: it may give the competition time to catch up with you, it is an obvious loss of money, failed products can badly impact the inspiration of the personnel and commonly unsuccessful products result in the detrimental politics of finding a person to blame, which could detrimentally affect spirit in the organization.
When you are a product manager, you must emphasize the problem you are striving to address. Avoid the drawback of solution led thinking, it can easily lead you on a track that is short of optimal for the consumer. Work on understanding the consumer, involve the consumer if you can, and document the problem you are striving to address. Ask questions, use the 5 whys to get to a better knowledge of the problem. Are there behaviors or tendencies that add to the problem that can turn into a barrier for some solutions to the problem? If you comprehend the problem and are attached to it, it gets less complicated to assess the various solutions to the problem.
You can maintain your focus on the problem by being explicit about what you are aiming to address. One technique is to produce a visual overview that is put up in the team work space. It really should incorporate the definition of the opportunity area, the consumer needs and learnings. During the course of your solution review you'll probably seek some sort of customer input, as you gain insights, add them to the workspace.
In case you live in a web product environment and utilize A/B testing or lean startup techniques, use the workspace and documentation during the definition of every single experiment. In a tangible product environment, make use of the workspace for your feature decisions. It will aid your team stay based in the problem statement as opposed to drifting away from it.
In my past experience with a high-profile product program, I caught myself contemplating small means to enhance the developed solution: What ways do we reduce drop off at point X? How do we get more consumers to set up an account? In what ways can we offer more transparency to the support agents? The limitation using this attitude is that I came to be invested in the solution and forgot to think of it as merely a available method to address our problem. One problem I faced was that we had invested a substantial amount of funds, people and time in this particular experiment. We lost sight of the truth that we had placed all the money on a solution instead of the problem. Whenever people are so deeply committed it gets harder to suggest a pivot.
It is very important to steer clear of circumstances such as this for several reasons: it may give the competition time to catch up with you, it is an obvious loss of money, failed products can badly impact the inspiration of the personnel and commonly unsuccessful products result in the detrimental politics of finding a person to blame, which could detrimentally affect spirit in the organization.
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To read more about product management, I recommend you follow the very good Lean Startup PM blog
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