Good product growth requires figuring out and homing in on the magical overlap between desirability, feasibility, and viability—the place innovation lives. Product managers are continually within the place of getting to defend the stability amongst these domains, countering the forces that compete to tug a product too far in a single path on the expense of the others. This implies saying no—many occasions and to many individuals—over the course of the product growth journey.
Earlier in my profession, I labored on a undertaking within the automotive area, creating an app that used machine studying knowledgeable by environmental information and consumer habits to offer sensible strategies to drivers. On the time I joined the group, the app was poised for launch and administration was desirous to launch it, however I quickly realized that it was removed from prepared for manufacturing.
Whereas the app was visually interesting, a few of the most elementary design questions had been ignored, resembling “What downside are we fixing, and for whom?” and “How determined are individuals to have this downside solved?”
The app boasted a characteristic that might show the climate on the driver’s vacation spot. From consumer habits and site visitors information, the algorithm may infer the place a driver may be headed and the way lengthy it will take to get there, and a easy climate API integration confirmed the climate forecast for the vacation spot on the time of arrival. This appeared like a pleasant use case, however in actuality, nobody cared. After I carried out my very own consumer analysis, together with a paid survey of European drivers, the response was a powerful “Meh.” That’s arguably the worst suggestions you may get: It means your product solved an irrelevant downside and signifies that the desirability dimension is extraordinarily low. Viability is then a misplaced trigger: It’s not possible to construct a viable enterprise with a product nobody needs. We needed to scrap the entire thing.
How may this have occurred? The reply is difficult, however it boils right down to the truth that a important phrase wasn’t uttered when it ought to have been: No.
The corporate’s core competency and belongings had been machine-learning inference engines and extremely scalable structure design. The pinnacle of information science was a strong stakeholder who needed to see his inference engines put to good use in a buyer utility. His affect, partially, had resulted in a product that was utterly tech-centric. Growth had been pushed by what was possible technologically as a substitute of what prospects desired.
It appeared that no one had advised this stakeholder no, and if they’d tried, it hadn’t been efficient.
Product Technique Means Saying No
Saying no is difficult. Individuals don’t at all times like listening to the phrase, and there may be usually a worry that saying it’ll harm vital relationships. As product managers, relationships are central to our position, however so is making certain that our merchandise are profitable and stay in stability.
So, how do you reject somebody’s request whereas maintaining the connection intact? I like to recommend these practices:
- Set your self up for fulfillment.
- Don’t say no too shortly.
- Reframe the request.
- Encourage a local weather of contribution.
Set Your self Up for Success
On the outset of a undertaking, it’s important that everybody agree on a shared imaginative and prescient for the product’s success (“Why are we doing this?”) and on a set of metrics that might be used to measure progress (“How will we all know if we’re doing it properly?”). When you don’t agree on what success seems like, it’s solely a matter of time earlier than conflicts come up.
It’s useful to make use of a framework to doc targets and map them to one thing measurable. I like to make use of a unfastened model of Google’s HEART framework, which organizes consumer expertise into classes for Happiness, Engagement, Adoption, Retention, and Activity Success, after which articulates targets, alerts, and metrics for every of these classes. Targets tackle what you are attempting to realize, alerts break down every aim into consumer actions, and metrics monitor these actions to gauge the way you’re doing in a method that’s quantifiable.
On one current client app undertaking, I needed to conduct a restricted pilot to find out if customers discovered our prototype helpful and needed to maintain interacting with it; I used to be centered totally on the Engagement class of the HEART framework. I then needed to determine alerts and metrics to trace progress towards that aim:
- Purpose: Customers wish to work together with the app and proceed utilizing it.
- Sign: Customers open the app incessantly.
- Metric: Share of customers who open the app not less than twice per day.
This technique of figuring out and aligning on targets might seem easy, however it’s not straightforward. On this case, it concerned calls with the shopper and our gross sales group, unbiased analysis, and a number of group workshops. Based mostly on the data I gathered from this discovery, I used to be capable of current the finished HEART framework throughout the kickoff assembly with the shopper. We went via all of the objects and tailored the place wanted.
Guaranteeing that each one stakeholders are concerned within the goal-setting course of is important, and getting everybody to agree on what alerts and metrics have to be tracked eliminates the necessity to say no repeatedly as a undertaking progresses. It additionally offers you information to level to if somebody approaches you with a request that falls exterior the parameters of the plan.
Don’t Say No Too Shortly
Even when key stakeholders agree on what success seems like and the highway forward appears clear, one factor is for certain: Somebody, someplace, will method you with an unexpected ask.
When that occurs, don’t say no too shortly. Even in case you’re sure the request is unreasonable, rejecting it outright shuts down dialog and will harm the connection. It additionally undermines the product discovery course of. As product managers, we have to see the complete image, and listening to individuals who disagree with us reduces our blind spots.
You possibly can nonetheless say no, in fact, however you might want to keep away from knee-jerk responses. These result in binary discussions which are the results of black-and-white, right-or-wrong, win-or-lose considering: Both you implement one thing otherwise you don’t.
To maneuver towards more practical, nuanced discussions, you might want to arrange requests in line with the agreed-upon standards you’ve established as a part of your goal-setting course of.
As a substitute of asking a stakeholder “Is that this characteristic precious to you?” ask “How precious is that this characteristic to you?” The ensuing dialog ought to provide the info you might want to collaborate on an inventory of “needs,” ordered when it comes to significance. It’s important that this rating vary from 1 to n, with out permitting a number of objects to share the identical place within the hierarchy. This provides everybody a voice within the prioritization course of and excuses you from having to reject requests unilaterally. Some requests will fall by the wayside when the group downgrades them in favor of extra vital ones.
Reframe the Request
A request that appears unreasonable initially can yield optimistic outcomes with some refined reengineering. First, pay attention to what’s being stated. Actually pay attention. Put your assumptions apart and attempt to perceive the place the opposite particular person is coming from, after which discover frequent floor. When you dig just a little deeper by asking “Why”—not essentially the 5 occasions you’ve heard about; two to a few will typically suffice—you may unearth an element that speaks to a shared aim.
Even a superbly smart request can profit from a deeper dive and little bit of reframing. I keep in mind a scenario wherein I used to be engaged on a enterprise intelligence instrument for a B2B mobility service. My shopper requested me, not unexpectedly, to get subscriber numbers up. Whereas the motivation for rising the variety of paying subscribers could appear self-evident, I needed to verify I had the complete image, so I requested, “Why?”
It turned out that the product in query was approaching the tip of its life cycle, and my shopper needed to squeeze out the final drops of revenue earlier than changing it with a brand new product. With this info, I reframed the request to “How may we significantly improve income within the brief time period whereas laying the groundwork for the upcoming product launch?”
In the end, the very best answer was to not hassle with subscriber numbers in any respect however to higher align pricing with worth. Clients had been paying a hard and fast month-to-month subscription, no matter how usually they used the instrument for rider transactions. The extra rider transactions they processed, nonetheless, the extra worth they derived from the instrument. Clients ranged from particular person taxi drivers making solely a handful of month-to-month transactions to multinational freight carriers—with dozens of subsidiaries and hundreds of automobiles—making a whole lot of hundreds of month-to-month transactions. The identical mounted month-to-month subscription was too excessive for the small shoppers and too low for the massive ones.
By making small pricing changes, we elevated income whereas baby-stepping towards a tiered pricing construction (primarily based on variety of transactions) for the soon-to-be-released product. The brand new mannequin decreased the value for many prospects whereas rising it for the largest prospects, who had been benefiting disproportionately.
By reframing requests on this method, you may create win-win conditions. The particular person bringing ahead the request feels heard and revered, and also you achieve perception that may add worth with out derailing the product growth course of.
Encourage a Local weather of Contribution
One of many largest dangers of claiming no is that rejections can undermine the spirit of openness and collaboration that you just’re making an attempt to foster, each inside and outdoors your group. Concepts encourage, whether or not or not they turn into related, and the very last thing you wish to do is stem the movement of creativity and communication.
I as soon as labored with a junior QA engineer who had a wealth of concepts. At almost each assembly he requested a number of questions and volunteered strategies. His options had been usually not actionable ones, and a few of them may have been dismissed as unhelpful or irrelevant. However his dedication and enthusiasm had been invaluable. He was completely invested in delivering the very best product, and his contributions energized and impressed others. An angle like that’s contagious.
You wish to create an atmosphere wherein individuals really feel inspired to share ideas and concepts, and are rewarded for doing so. Your group needs to be motivated by the opportunity of enhancing issues as a substitute of discouraged by the considered being dismissed, ignored, or ridiculed. Implementing just a few easy practices may help make sure the psychological security of your group.
Acknowledge concepts and requests publicly. This builds belief and exhibits that you just worth strategies and are dedicated to contemplating them. Arrange a request field, or a Confluence web page or different public discussion board that each one stakeholders can entry. When a request is available in, log it and ship a message to the requester, thanking them for his or her contribution.
I do know this may occasionally show controversial, however I generally go so far as to open the product backlog to everybody. This may be significantly useful in fostering engagement from the product group, in addition to permitting group members like QA testers and designers to notice issues they’ve encountered. The foundations are easy: Anybody can add to the finish of the backlog, and through refinements (or different weekly conferences) group members share what they’ve added and clarify why. Solely the product supervisor can change the order of points or delete objects. Many individuals assume that granting everybody this stage of entry will result in chaos and anarchy, however it doesn’t. I’ve tried this at organizations of various sizes and it solely fails when individuals are too shy to contribute their concepts.
When you’ve applied an answer or launched a characteristic even roughly associated to one in every of these logged requests, credit score the requester publicly. That is particularly vital when the answer is just not a transparent achievement of the unique request however extra of a reframed model. Exhibiting appreciation for everybody concerned in successful creates goodwill, builds camaraderie, and encourages individuals to proceed taking part.
Weighing the Execs and Cons of Saying No
When you take the time to actually pay attention and perceive the place stakeholders are coming from, you not often have to reject proposals outright. Energetic listening, clear communication, and mutual respect are key substances in dealing with requests that will initially appear problematic or out of scope. Most occasions, the artwork of claiming no by no means really includes saying “No.”
There might be conditions wherein it proves not possible to search out frequent floor, and a direct no is required with a purpose to shield the product and the undertaking. In different instances, you could be compelled to observe via on belongings you don’t agree with. As a lot as your job is to guard the stability of desirability, feasibility, and viability, there’s a fourth dimension to think about: pragmatism. To maintain issues transferring ahead, compromise is vital, and generally meaning avoiding a no altogether.
The great thing about Agile product growth is that its iterative nature affords many alternatives for course correction. In any case, the aim is build-measure-learn, not debate-dispute-derail.
