In his book ‘Decode and Conquer’, Lewis breaks down the separate roles of the Product Owner. His advice includes: Have a clear set of criteria for design (he likes Dieter Rams), these should be three of four criteria that you use to evaluate other/your designs The CIRCLES method of analysing design Comprehend situation (what, who, why, when, where and […]
Category Archives: product development
January
25
What you can learn from ‘Decode and Conquer’ by Lewis C. Lin (2013, 202 pages)
posted by Max
December
28
What could you could learn from ‘Building Microservices’ by Sam Newman (2015, 250 pages)
posted by Max
When electricity replaced steam as the means of power in factories, there was initially little improvement in productivity. Factory owners just replaced their centralised steam engine, with a single electrical generator. Only factories when factories moved away from a centralised generator, to separate generators for each machine, where they able to operate machine independently, move […]
December
28
How to scale (5 of 5) – culture
posted by Max
In my last few posts I have discussed how successful scale-ups grow, and the fundamental components structure, process and architecture. In my final post, I look at possibly the most important aspect of company performance – culture. Great culture means that you need less bureaucracy and control measures to protect your customers and your company. […]
November
30
How to scale (4 of 5) – architecture
posted by Max
In my previous posts, I have talked about how start-ups scale, how to structure products teams and how to scale process. Jez Humble suggests that architecture and culture are critical to scaling. On architecture Jez argues for: Build systems that are designed to be deployed easily into multiple environments, can detect and tolerate failures in […]
November
30
Leadership hack – the role of Product Owner
posted by Max
In my previous leadership post, I discussed the role of the Chief Product Officer. In this post, I want to focus on product leadership at the team level. There is much discussion over the what a product owner or product manager does, and if there are differences between the two. While there are many […]
November
28
Leadership hack – what does a Chief Product Officer do?
posted by Max
In this post, I want to share my thoughts on what a Chief Product Officer/Head of Product does. Recently I moderated a ScaleUp Heros panel discussion in the role of Head of Product (you can find it on LinkedIn, Medium and Facebook). The host Ryan Foland and exceptional panellists John Connolly, Courtney Wylie and Ben Kim explored product […]
November
22
How to scale (3 of 5) – Agile (process)
posted by Max
In the earlier posts, I explored how successful companies scale, and ways to structure product teams. In this post, I look at execution – how to get code shipped. Modern software development (Agile) differs from historic approaches (waterfall). Agile is a commonly used term but is often embellished and miss-understood. It is important to separate […]
November
16
How to scale (2 of 5) – Product team structure
posted by Max
Welcome to the second part of my ‘How to scale’ series (you can find part 1 here). One of the first objectives when thinking about structuring your product teams is to ensure that Product is separated from Core engineering. The core engineering team can then focus on creating architecture that can scale, and services that can […]
November
09
How to scale (1 of 5) – the journey from garage band to Glastonbury
posted by Max
“Software ends up being shaped by the structure of the organisation that develops it” Conway’s Law One of the most animated discussions I often have with founders, CEOs and other product leaders is how to structure product teams when a company grows. While I think this is incredibly important (as Conway noted) I feel it misses […]
November
01
Product leadership part 2 – getting things done
posted by Max
“Actual productivity = potential productivity – coordination & motivation loss” Rich Kalgradd However, productivity is not the most important factor in team or company success. Like running a race, you will not win by running the fastest in the wrong direction. If you have chosen the right direction, .e., made a good decision about what […]
November
01
Product leadership part 1 – making great decisions
posted by Max
Product Leaders (PL) need to ensure that teams are building the most valuable experiences for customers and the company. To do this, you need to find the right problem and then find a pragmatic solution. Whether the solution should be executed, will depend on whether it is more or less valuable than your other options. Finding […]
November
01
What does a product leader do?
posted by Max
Product leaders delight customers in hard-to-copy, margin-enhancing ways. Gibson Biddle, VP Product Netflix In my experience product leaders (PL, may also be called product owner or managers) lead the teams that build amazing experiences for customers. PL’s understand existing and target customers, the companies strategic context and then translate this into a prioritised list of […]