What Product Owners Should Avoid While Making Decisions
The four mistakes Product Owners constantly commit with decision-making.
The four mistakes Product Owners frequently commit with decision-making.
One of the most challenging responsibilities of Product Owners is making decisions. We face constant paradigms with decisions. Some examples are:
It’s impossible to please every stakeholder. Yet, we need to keep a sustainable relationship with them.
Not all customers’ problems generate business value. Still, unsatisfied customers will eventually go for the competitors.
Product Owners may not have all the knowledge to make the best decision possible. Yet, we are accountable for maximizing the value of the product.
How can Product Owners maximize the odds of succeeding by making consistent decisions? For me, it’s essential to know what NOT to do when making a decision.
“You can’t make decisions based on fear and the possibility of what might happen.”
― Michelle Obama
Let me share with you some insights about common decision-making mistakes. Hopefully, after reading this article, you can make more consistent decisions in the scenarios you have to face as a Product Owner.
1. Postponing Decisions
The most common mistake with decision-making is to postpone until you have all the required information. As a Product Owner, you strive for certainty with decision. That’s why you search for data to back your choice up. The truth is, no matter how much data you have, you can never be 100% certain of achieving the expected outcome.
“On an important decision, one rarely has 100% of the information needed for a good decision no matter how much one spends or how long one waits. And, if one waits too long, he has a different problem and has to start all over. This is the terrible dilemma of the hesitant decision maker.”
― Robert K. Greenleaf, The Servant as Leader
I believe you should invest a considerable amount of time if the decision is irreversible. For example, becoming a parent is irreversible. But in Product Management, only a few decisions go into this category. Most decisions are reversible in a couple of hours, days, or weeks.
Avoiding making decisions results in no progress. A poor decision is better than no decision because it generates learning. You’ve got to trust your guts and make decisions regardless you have all the information or not.
“Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.”
― Peter F. Drucker
2. Striving for Consensus
Consensus is terrible. You may think it’s great when you get everyone on board. Then, everyone can commit to the decision. Well, the theory is amazing, but the reality is different. Consensus decisions result in:
Compromises: the group needs to make compromises, which means the decision is not the best for anyone.
Poor decisions: Everyone's perspective has the same weight, even though some people may not have relevant knowledge on the topic.
Waste of time: it consumes considerable time from the team.
Do you want sub-optimal decisions? Then, consensus is the answer.
“A lack of healthy conflict is a problem because it ensures the third dysfunction of a team: lack of commitment. Without having aired their opinions in the course of passionate and open debate, team members rarely, if ever, buy in and commit to decisions, though they may feign agreement during meetings.”
― Patrick Lencioni, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
Empowering the most competent person on the matter is a better way of making decisions. For example, a software developer should make technical decisions, while a product designer is the best to decide which design is more suitable for the solution. Yet, as a Product Owner, you should provide the relevant information to facilitate the decision.
Empowerment is key to make well-based decisions. Opinionated decisions are the perfect recipe for pointless solutions.
3. Unbalanced Decision
To build successful products, you need to find relevant customers’ problems that generate business value and are viable with your technology. Still, it’s easy to fall into some pitfalls and build meaningless solutions.
Meaningful decisions are well balanced. You should consider three different perspectives: customer, business, and technology. If you miss one of them, your decision will be unbalanced, and you might end up with a dreadful result.
Let’s have a look at the following Venn diagram.
The viable opportunities are in the intersection between customer, business, and technology. What happens if you miss one element?
Customer and Business: you may find a relevant problem for the customers that generate business value. Yet, you don’t have a viable technology to implement the solution. If you insist on it, you will not come with a meaningful solution because you lack the needed technology.
Customer and Technology: some problems are relevant for the customer and viable from the technology perspective. Still, they don’t generate any significant business value. You can make a conscious decision to pursue this opportunity as an investment. But you should not expect any business value from it.
Business and Technology: this intersection is the most dangerous. Generally, it comes from assumptions that will prove later to be invalid from the customers’ perspective. I call this scenario as building a solution for a non-existing problem. Be careful; this is one of the reasons pointless products are born.
“It doesn’t matter how good your engineering team is if they are not given something worthwhile to build.”
― Marty Cagan, Inspired: How To Create Products Customers Love
4. Pleasing Everyone
As a Product Owner, many stakeholders count on you to transform their wishes into relevant solutions. However, you have dozens of stakeholders, e.g., finance, marketing, operations, customer service, and so on. It’s impossible to please everyone. Yet, the wish-list keeps piling up. You need to handle the situation the best way possible. Decision-making is vital for it.
“There’s always more to build than we have time or resources to build — always.”
― Jeff Patton, User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product
I used to do a little bit of everything for everyone. I hoped to keep every stakeholder satisfied. Still, no matter what the Scrum Team produced, the pressure only increased. Stakeholders were hungry for more. My mistake was trying to please everyone. Instead of pursuing satisfaction, I should have strived for alignment. Once stakeholders are aligned with the decisions, they support the team instead of pressure them.
If you have done your homework correctly, you have a compelling Product Vision to pursue. Then, you can set the next Product Goal to achieve. After it, prioritization becomes more comfortable because you can always relate to the Product Goal by asking, “How does your request help us achieve our Product Goal?”
The main point is: your stakeholders should understand your decisions to support you on it. Stakeholders don’t have to agree with your decisions, but they have to understand the reason behind them.
Without understanding the reasoning of your decisions, stakeholders won’t support you.
Endnote
Don’t let decisions overwhelm you. Consider them as an opportunity to progress. Once you keep the three essential perspectives, customer, business, and technology, you can make the right decisions easier.
Another vital aspect is to avoid consensus. You don’t need everyone to agree with the decision. You should empower the most qualified person to make the decision, then ensure your stakeholders can follow the reasoning behind it. Once stakeholders understand, you will gain the support you need.
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