Clarity for Product People

Transcript

1. CLARITY for Product People
2. Clarity is a crucial success factor for product people. We can only be successful together with others. Effective collaboration requires clarity, especially in challenging times. Clarity is work—and it's never "finished.“ We, as product people, can contribute to the clarity of our teams and organizations.
3. All product people can provide more clarity in collaboration! PM HoP
4. We all want clarity—where's the problem? Time pressure: Clarity requires effort upfront. Misconception: We equate clarity with certainty Fear: Clarity can be painful and frightening. Harmony: We are worried to disturb collegial harmony.
5. Lack of clarity often goes unnoticed until it‘s too late ... ...or until we actively create clarity!
6. For succesful collaboration we need clarity on four layers Directional Clarity Situational Clarity Clear Communication Role Clarity
7. We need Directional Clarity …so everyone can independently work towards a common goal.
8. How to check for Directional Clarity Who refers to vision, strategy & objectives? How clear is your story? Can your team provide reasons for saying „no“? How much is in progress, and for how long? ? ? ? ?
9. Vision Strategy Objectives Initiative Initiative Initiative Principles * https://www.thedecisionstack.com/ Initiative Initiative how? how? how? how? why? why? why? why? 1. Create a Coherent Direction Decision Stack as a mental model
10. 1. Create a Coherent Direction Decision Stack as a mental model Vision Strategy Objectives Initiative Initiative Initiative Principles * https://www.thedecisionstack.com/ NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!
11. 1. Create a Coherent Direction Decision Stack as a mental model Vision Strategy Objectives Initiative Initiative Initiative Principles * https://www.thedecisionstack.com/ NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! PM focus: ? ?
12. 2. Be clear about your initiative …even if there‘s no coherent overall direction! What key insight is behind your initiative? What is your core hypothesis, and how will you test it? How will you measure success, and what is your level of ambition?
13. 3. Reference for Context Use any chance to connect what‘s happening to direction „Because our priority for this quarter is….“ „This is a great example for what we mean by ….“
14. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Re- peat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Rep- eat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Re- peat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Rep- eat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Re- peat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Rep- eat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Re- peat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Rep-
15. Directional Clarity 1. Create a Coherent Direction 2. Be Clear about your Initiative 3. Reference for Context 4. Repeat Repeat Repeat
16. We need Situational Clarity …so that things keep moving forward
17. How to check for Situational Clarity Can your teams complete joint projects as planned? How quickly are decisions made? What do people do in case of conflicts of interest? ? ? ?
18. 1. Don‘t assume – ask & clarify!
19. 2. Speed Up Decisions with Principles Long term guardrails for day-to-day decision making Be specific about your trade-offs: X over Y statements Are they helping you make decisions? 3-6 principles with short description or examples
20. 2. Speed Up Decisions with Principles Examples* Product engagement over revenue optimization We‘re focused on showing our potential to grow by attracting, activating, retaining user through and engaging experience. (VEV) Activating teams over individuals Focusing on attracting and activating teams of user over individual designers as our focus is on collaboration. (VeV) Sensible defaults over configuration Every time we add a configuration option, we‘re implicitly saying we don‘t know what the user wants. We encourage sensible defaults & strong opinions over configuration, because people can resort back to the tool that they‘re used to (VSCode) if they want configuration. (CodeSandbox) * Shared during mtpEngage 2022
21. 3. Escalate Gracefully Agree to disagree Joint escalation Be clear about what‘s unclear Take responsibility
22. 1. Don‘t Assume – Ask & Clarify! 2. Speed up Decisions with Product Principles 3. Escalate Gracefully Situational Clarity
23. We need Role Clarity …so it‘s clear what we expect from each other.
24. How to check for Role Clarity How often do people do things that aren‘t their job? Are you disappointed by colleagues' passivity? Does everybody know who makes which decisions? ? ? ?
25. Three ways to clarify your role PM HoP PM PM 1. Organization 2. Cross-functional team Dev UX QA 3. Cross-team initiative (“project“) … … … … …
26. 1. Understand your competency profile What‘s expected of your role in your org – foundation for development dialogue * example Important: Not a checklist for promotions!
27. 2. Sharpen role expectations in the team Clear framing helps to focus on the role, not the person What traits would the perfect <Role> have? What must <ROLE> know to work well with you? What can YOU do to help <ROLE> do a great job?
28. 3. Clarify collaboration responsibilities DACI decision model Driver Aligns with the Approver on goals and decision criteria, seeks input from Contributors, and makes the decisions Approver Sets decision criteria, approves or rejects decisions by the Driver Contributors Add valuable information, including experts, implementers, and those significantly impacted Informed Updated about decisions by the Driver but do not contribute
29. 1. Understand your competency profiles 2. Sharpen role expectations in the team 3. Clarify collaboration responsibilities Role Clarity
30. We need Clear Communication …so we enable others to collaborate well
31. How to check for Clear Communication It‘s your first day: How much would you understand? How often do people ask „what do you mean?“ How confident are your customer-facing colleagues? ? ? ?
32. It's your responsibility to make yourself understood. Make it as easy as possible for your counterpart to understand you so that they can act and speak effectively! 1. Make yourself understood …even you have to repeat yourself
33. 2. Be a translator! What‘s in for them? Use their terminology & mental models Nobody cares about our product lingo!
34. 3. Adjust your storytelling Prioritize your listeners time over your own! Be prepared to adjust your storytelling to contexts & audiences: - Different lengths - Different modalities - Blending in vs. sticking out
35. 4. Provide context and framing …especially in async, remote collaboration Make sense beyond the immediate moment Make work-in-progress & decision state explicit Clear framing: How do you expect your feedback to be used?
36. 1. Make yourself understood 2. Be a translator 3. Adjust your storytelling 4. Provide context & framing Clear Communication
37. Ambiguity on one layer compromises all others Directional Clarity Situational Clarity Clear Communication Role Clarity
38. 1. Make yourself Understood 2. Be a Translator 3. Adjust your Storytelling 4. Provide Context & Framing Clear Communication Directional Clarity 1. Coherent Direction & Context 2. Be Clear about your Initiative 3. Clarify Priorities 4. Reference for Context 1. Don‘t assume – ask & clarify 2. Speed up Decisions with Principles 4. Escalate Gracefully Situational Clarity 1. Understand your Competency Ürofile 2. Sharpen Role Expectations in the Team 3. Clarify Collaboration Responsibility Role Clarity arnekittler.de
39. CLARITY is your job!! arnekittler.de bit.ly/arne_clarity
40. CLARITY for Product People bit.ly/arne_clarity