Disclaimer: I have a keen interest in gaining knowledge. If you disagree with anything I've said, please leave a comment, and let's engage in a meaningful discussion.
In recent weeks, I've had several Product Management interviews, and one question consistently intrigues me: "What kind of team would you like to work with?" It's surprising how often I find myself explaining what I mean by an "empowered team." So, let's dive into the concept of an ideal product team. As a product manager, what types of teams should you consider working with? As a leader in an organization, what kinds of teams should you aim to cultivate?
In their insightful book, "Empowered," Marty Cagan and Chris Jones delve into why some of the world's best teams, like Microsoft and Spotify, consistently outshine most product teams globally. How do they manage to roll out remarkable products and generate billions in revenue? Is it their culture? What sets them apart?
While culture is undoubtedly essential, Cagan and Jones highlight three crucial ingredients: technology's role, the influence of product leaders, and the company's perception of the product's purpose.
Although these ingredients aren't the central focus here, it's vital to mention them because establishing the right product team is a core responsibility of product leaders. It's also something product managers should keep in mind when selecting teams to work with.
Cagan and Jones distinguish between two primary types of product teams, with a brief mention of a third:
- Delivery Teams: Also known as "scrum teams" or "dev teams," these teams primarily focus on output. Comprising a product owner and engineers, they code and ship products.
- Feature Teams: In simpler terms, these are often driven by product managers. They are assigned a list of features to develop, based on objectives like increasing customer numbers. While this may seem straightforward, it's not necessarily the most effective approach. It limits adaptability as it assumes that factors won't change over time and that product managers only need to coordinate the team's efforts.
Notably, feature teams may resemble empowered teams in their composition, a product manager, a product designer, and engineers, but they differ in their approach.
- Empowered teams: This is exactly how the best teams in the world are built. They are the kind of teams that build the best solutions in the world today. They are the kinds of teams that you should consider working with as a product manager, the kinds of teams that a product leader or a manager should strive to set up.
While Feature teams are told what to do, Empowered teams focus on solving problems and are entrusted with resources to do so effectively. These resources could include personnel, tools, or additional funding. Empowered teams are given the freedom to define their timelines, all while keeping the business's interests in mind. This level of autonomy isn't achievable in a feature team, primarily because they prioritize output, whereas empowered teams focus on outcomes.
One common stumbling block for many teams is the perceived cost of adopting the empowered team approach. Surprisingly, it's not a monetary cost but a matter of trust. To operate with empowered teams, you must trust your product teams implicitly. Trust is required in decision-making, resource allocation, and the belief that the solutions provided by your teams are indeed the best available at the time.
It's disheartening that, even in organizations claiming to have embraced agile methodologies, traces of the old waterfall mindset remain. Features are rolled out quickly, but the process of creating them often remains difficult to follow. In many cases, higher-ups tend to micromanage, despite working in supposedly agile environments.
Learning to trust your product teams is essential for achieving the full benefits of an empowered team model.
While there's no one-size-fits-all solution, two critical factors stand out: staffing and coaching. Unfortunately, I can't delve deeply into these areas here, but I would welcome insights from product leaders, recruiters, and HR professionals to complement this discussion.
Identifying the right talent for your organization's culture and providing them with the necessary resources to succeed is paramount. It may take a year, two, or even a decade, but I intend to revisit this topic to explore it in greater detail.
In summary, the empowered team model emerges as the ideal approach for product teams. Continual evaluation of your methods to ensure you haven't reverted to a feature-driven model is crucial. Trust your teams to make informed decisions, and if you find your competitors consistently outpacing you, consider reevaluating your product team model.