Dancing to the SW<>Product Rhythm
I recently saw a comedian talking about challenges in product management. It basically laughed about all the different titles POs have while in fact their work is to “fight the developers to release a feature faster”. As funny as it was (I love this comedian), I can’t help but thinking how he got it all wrong.
About a week ago our PO told us that he is moving to his next challenge. As happy as I was for him (who am I kidding? I was so sad), I was also a bit terrified since not one, but several people are to replace him. This new team of POs is not familiar with us, the developers, and more importantly, is not familiar with the way we (PO and developers) are used to work.
Unlike the comedian, I believe that product-software relations, much like couples, rely on each other to make something bigger together. We both belong to the same project, want to please the same customers and aim to provide a quality product. Fighting will not get us to that goal. Instead, we need to work together, collaborate and always keep our eyes at the mutual goal — a great software.
When a product asks for a feature, SW is there to balance it to a time-maintainable requirement. To make sure there is enough time for full feature qualification and not just a quick development. To make sure it is designed in such a way that it will not crash the second a customer uses it (familiar with the bar joke?).
When we say a feature is too difficult/risky to develop within a time frame, it is usually followed by another suggestion. We start a process together to understand what exactly can be done within the time frame, whilst making the customer happy. It is a dance, where one side balances the other. Putting customer value first, and doing our best to ensure great quality, robustness and scalability.
Collaboration takes time to build. It took time for us and our PO to get to know each other and figure out how we work best together. How to balance requirements and quality, and how to work on a day-to-day basis. We would have to build a new relationship now with the new POs team. Agreeing on when it is OK and when it is not OK to change a story. Getting used to new spec definitions and different grooming methods. Having stories written differently, but still understandable to the developers.
We would have to sync our rhythms, because dancing, much like coding, is for life.
