Reducing Risk through Agile Product Planning

Agile Webinar Reducing Risk through Agile Product Planning Presenter: Rich Mironov Principal, Mironov Consulting Accept Proprietary and Confidential

April 29 – Distributed Teams and Complex Systems
May 12 th – Smart Requirements and Intelligent Backlogs
May 26 th – Flexible approach and methodologies
Today – Reducing risk through agile product planning
June 16 th – PRTM: Delivering Velocity and Value
Scaling Agile Webinar Series Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

About agile product planning
Reducing risk on the development side
Reducing market-facing risk
Q&A
Submit your questions at any time; answered at the end
Locate question button at the top
Type your question
Press “submit“
Today’s Topics Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

About Rich Mironov
Veteran product manager/strategist
Business models, pricing, roadmaps
“ What do customers want?”
Agile meets business
Repeat offender at software start-ups
Author of “The Art of Product Management” and Product Bytes blog
Chaired product stage at Agile 2009 and 2010 conferences

Agile’s Inner Loop (Development)

Agile’s Strategic Outer Loop (PM)
Markets
Customers
Biz Models
Strategy
Portfolios
Funding
Customers
Sales
Marketing
Support
Upgrades
EOL/EOS

What Does a Product Manager Do? Mktg & Sales Markets & Customers Development Executives Product Management

What Does a Product Manager Do? Mktg & Sales market information, priorities, requirements, roadmaps, MRDs, personas, user stories… product Markets & Customers Development Executives Product Management

What Does a Product Manager Do? Mktg & Sales market information, priorities, requirements, roadmaps, MRDs, personas, user stories… product Field input, Market feedback Segmentation, messages, benefits/features, pricing, qualification, demos… Markets & Customers Development Executives Product Management

What Does a Product Manager Do? Mktg & Sales market information, priorities, requirements, roadmaps, MRDs, personas, user stories… product strategy, forecasts, commitments, roadmaps, competitive intelligence budgets, staff, targets Field input, Market feedback Segmentation, messages, benefits/features, pricing, qualification, demos… Markets & Customers Development Executives Product Management

Development-facing: opportunities created by agile development processes
Roadmapping for early segment-specific revenue
Rethinking BUFR (Big Up-Front Requirements)
Market-facing: applying agile thinking to GTM and customer processes
Outbound process improvements/retrospectives
Managing expectations of infinite capacity
Two Kinds of Risk Reduction Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Waterfall release planning tends toward release trains
Design  Build  Test  Ship
9 month plan, 12-15 month actuals
Primary feature slowly crowds out nice-to-haves
All-or-nothing release
Huge pressure to keep your item on this train: next one is far behind
Traditional Release Train Model Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Early Releases for Specific Segments Consumer-friendly UI - Automated back-up - Credit card security - Installs/Revenue Q3-10 Q4-10 Q1-11 Q2-11 University IT

Early Releases for Specific Segments Consumer-friendly UI - Automated back-up - Credit card security - Consumer-friendly UI - √ Automated back-up - √ Credit card security - - Installs/Revenue Q3-10 Q4-10 Q1-11 Q2-11 University IT Automotive

Early Releases for Specific Segments Consumer-friendly UI - Automated back-up - Credit card security - Consumer-friendly UI - √ √ Automated back-up - √ √ Credit card security - - √ Consumer-friendly UI - √ Automated back-up - √ Credit card security - - Installs/Revenue Q3-10 Q4-10 Q1-11 Q2-11 University IT Automotive Retail

BUFR : Big Up-Front Requirements
January document, November release
“MRDs must be 100% complete before going to Engineering.”
Consumed first by architects, then designers, then coders, then testers…
Late changes to requirements can be costly
Contrary to how product managers gather, understand and share information
Rethinking BUFR Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

IMHO, best to start from a solid architecture
Business model, product strategy
Segments or target personas
Technical architecture
Development teams consume requirements over time
Details of early stories now
Broad outlines of later stories
Continuous requirements process
Agile Opportunities Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

What requirements must be locked up front ?
System architecture
Broad user roles/relationships
Basic wireframe
Which can we explore, research, postpone…
Detailed UI, workflow, branding?
Defaults, drop-downs, error messages?
Specific third party integration partners?
Detailed role-based access controls?
Take time for discovery, VOC, forums
Risk-Reduction Opportunities Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Development-facing: opportunities created by agile development processes
Roadmapping for early segment-specific revenue
Rethinking BUFR (Big Up-Front Requirements)
Market-facing: applying agile thinking to GTM and customer processes
Outbound process improvements/retrospectives
Managing expectations of infinite capacity
Two Kinds of Risk Reduction Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Market risks typically outweigh technical risks
Product positioning
Pricing/packaging clarity
Sales incentives
Channels & ecosystems
Support readiness
Most companies treat GTM as a series of one-off efforts
Outbound Product Risk Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

“Retrospective” sounds friendlier than “post mortem”
What went well on this launch? What would we do differently? What needs improvement?
Reduce market execution risk over time
Driving outbound process improvements is an organizational challenge
Launch-specific teams
Weak definitions of “done” and “quality”
Improving the Outbound Execution Process Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Sales/Marketing believes that agile instantly makes Development infinitely productive
“ Now we can address every customer’s wish list”
“ My item is small enough to fit into this sprint”
Requirements always exceed resources
Product planning still requires priorities, roadmaps, difficult trade-offs
Agile = Infinite Capacity? Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Clarity and visibility reduce risk
Backlogs highlight release-level priorities and trade-offs
Inserting something new always pushes down other items
“ Why did we rank this so high? Which customers/stakeholders need this?”
Reality-based roadmaps match product choices to revenue
Applying Agile Planning Tools Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Plans, roadmaps and backlogs are tools
You provide context, motivation, repetition
How do we model the right behaviors?
An organizational design problem
Example: giving VP Sales one “magic bullet” for out-of-plan requests
Planning Is Still a People Activity Accept Proprietary and Confidential - © 2010

Take-Aways
Agile development increases the need for product planning
Risk reduction comes from clear product priorities, understanding the market, and creating flexibility
Opportunities to apply agile thinking beyond the development process

Thank You for Attending
Reminder…to ask a question:
Locate question button above
Type your question
Press "submit“
Upcoming Webinars June 16 th – Delivering Velocity and Value with PRTM June 30 th – The New Rules for the New Economy Webinar replay www.acceptsoftware.com

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Reducing Risk through Agile Product Planning

by Rich Mironov on Jun 03, 2010

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Reducing Risk through Agile Product Planning — Presentation Transcript