The Build Trap

The Build TrapMelissa Perri

@lissijean Produx Labs

@lissijean

@lissijean

Everyone’s doing the SAFety Dance

@lissijean

What is all this shit?

@lissijean

@lissijean

Copier Printer Scanner Fax Stapler Magician Satan

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We keep adding to the backlog and never take away.

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“We need to train our Product Owners”

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What is all this shit?

@lissijean#LAScot16

@lissijean

The Build Trap

@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

How did we get here?

@lissijean

Agile processes don’t have a brain.

@lissijean

@lissijean

“Scrum doesn’t focus on delivering just any increment of business value; it focuses

on delivering the highest priority business value as defined by the customer

(Product Owner).”

The Product Owner

Agile Project Management with Scrum

Ken Schwaber, 2004

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@lissijean

Agile is not enough. We need more…

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We need Product Management

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We treat Product Strategy as a plan.

PROBLEM

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Ingredients and recipes shipped

to your door.

@lissijean

What is your product strategy?

@lissijean

“I want a document with every field you intend to put on the site and the content strategy

so I can build a back end.”

@lissijean

Most Product Strategies

are wish lists of features.

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Most Roadmaps are gantt charts.

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Creating new products is full of uncertainty.

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Product strategy

emerges from experimentation.

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Product Strategy is a system, made up of visions, goals, constraints, and where we are now that results in desired business and customer outcomes.

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UNIFIED FIELD THEORY Bill Costantino & Mike Rother

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@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean

What is your product strategy?

@lissijean

Ingredients and recipes shipped

to your door.

5 years FDS a top dinner option for the target market.

double acquisition Dec 2016

@lissijean

Product leaders provide vision, goals, and guardrails.

@lissijean

@lissijean

“The price is too high, we should lower it.”

“The photos are not enticing.”

“We need to rebrand the sign up funnel to the new design.” “We should be offering

sign up gifts.”

“They cannot try it for free!”

@lissijean

Increase conversion rate

by X%

5 years FDS a top dinner option for the target market.

double acquisition Dec 2016

increase conversion rate across all platforms by X% by end of Q2.

conversion rate is Y% on desktop and X% on mobile.

@lissijean

Company Goal,

Product KPI, Future state.

What are users

doing now?

What’s the first

little goal?

User Research, Product

Experiments

Product Kata

1 2 3 4

Planning Experimenting

A scientific, systematic way to build better products.

@lissijean

Obstacle: We don’t understand why

people are leaving.

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@lissijean

Learned: The top reasons people are leaving.

@lissijean

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

ReasonCan't Find Menu What's in the box? The price is too high I want more plan options I am vegan

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Obstacle: People cannot find the menu.

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FAQS HELPFDS

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FDS FDS

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@lissijean

LEARNING reduces uncertainty.

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EXPERIMENTING IS THE

NEW BLACK

@lissijean

@lissijean

If users engage with the site more, then they will buy more insurance policies.

HYPOTHESIS

Pop ups that lead users to insurance policies.

Success = clicking

TEST

Jim, Exec Mgr for Business Line

Great, let’s build these three features.

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@lissijean

Experiment Theater

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I want a refund.

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Measuring success on outputs.

PROBLEM

Jim, Exec Mgr for Business Line

@lissijean

We build and launch with no measures of

success.

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@lissijean@lissijean

@lissijean

Outcomes over

Output

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Jeff Patton

60%Valley of MehAwful Awesome!

SUCCESS OF PRODUCTS

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Jeff Patton

60%Valley of MehFailure Success

SUCCESS FOR BIG COMPANIES

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Jeff Patton

Failure Success

SUCCESS FOR STARTUPS

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Lack of focus on the real customer.

PROBLEM

@lissijean

Problem

Customers don’t have custom dashboards.

@lissijean

Problem

Customers don’t have custom dashboards.

Solution

Custom dashboards.

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Customers’ problems

are not lack of your product’s features.

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Customers’ problems

are not YOUR PROBLEMS.

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“As a user I want to engage with the site

but it’s boring.”

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YOU ARE BIASED.

@lissijean#LAScot16

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TALK TO YOUR USERS. DIRECTLY.

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@lissijean

Jeff Patton & Giff Constable

Co

nfi

den

ce

Investment

@lissijean

Jeff Patton & Giff Constable

Co

nfi

den

ce

Investment

@lissijean

@lissijean

Your colleagues are not your customers. (unless you are building internal tools)

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We built a mobile app before and it was successful last time.

But, Melissa, users don’t know what they want.

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Solving big problems for customers creates

big value for businesses.

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@lissijean

DISCOVERY

DELIVERY

How did we get here?

@lissijean

@lissijean

@lissijean

@lissijean

@lissijean

We built a mobile app before and it was successful last time.

They just don’t understand Agile.

@lissijean

@lissijean

We built a mobile app before and it was successful last time.

Do we even need Product Owners?

@lissijean

@lissijean

We need product people who know how to make

valuable software by recognizing uncertainty.

@lissijean

Agile is not enough to get out of the Build Trap.

@lissijean

@lissijean#LAScot16

@lissijean

What are you going to do about it?

Melissa Perri melissa@produxlabs.com

produxlabs.com melissaperri.com

@lissijean

Melissa Perri CEO, ProdUX Labs melissa@produxlabs.com

melissaperri.com

produxlabs.com

@lissijean