This month I want to highlight an article, Planning Vs. Action: Why a Product Team’s Best Bet Is Real-world Evidence, by Todd Lankford. The author describes common product prioritization weaknesses, namely that the best laid plans don’t survive contact with real-world complexities. While the author describes familiar pitfalls, the author’s wisdom is in his three steps to avoid those pitfalls:

1. Stand in your customer’s shoes
2. Try out a good solution in a small, cheap way
3. Iterate until it’s good enough, and then stop

I love the first step! We all use many products where it is clear the creators don’t actually use the product. This might be a game you play, an app on your phone, or an enterprise tool. It is immediately clear when a product understands their customer experience through real-world usage, and equally clear when no such customer-centricity exists.

In my time at Amazon, all problems and opportunities were viewed through the lens of the customer (of course not all solutions were successful in connecting with customers). I find step 1 is often missing — or minimized — on teams, and by doing so, we are far more likely to miss the mark than delight customers.

Frustratingly, it’s not hard to be the customer for your product, however tight timelines and constant pressure will lead us to view this as an extraneous step. Remarkable experiences require us to be the customer.

https://medium.com/management-matters/planning-vs-action-why-a-product-teams-best-bet-is-real-world-evidence-c555db8d9864

“We think that more evaluation and planning will help us hit the bullseye on the first try…After all, it works for simple tasks. If I need to walk my dog, fix my breakfast, and change my baby’s diaper, I can easily decide what should come first. The screaming baby and unpleasant smell is a clear signal.

But software development is not so simple.“