0:00

Hey Lily , what's the difference between

0:02

an inspired team and an empowered

0:04

team , and why does this sound like a dad

0:07

joke setup ?

0:09

Well , Randy , is it that the

0:11

letter has been transformed

0:13

?

0:15

How did you know ? Anyway , today

0:18

we're talking to Andrew Scottsko , a

0:20

product leadership coach at Make Things

0:22

that Matter , all about what empowered

0:24

product teams are and how to actually

0:26

get there .

0:28

And you might think you know the answer

0:30

, but Andrew digs into some pretty deep

0:32

stuff in this chat and I found it

0:34

very insightful , so let's

0:37

get to it .

0:41

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1:21

Hi , andrew . Welcome to the product experience

1:23

podcast . How are you doing today ?

1:25

I'm doing great . Lily , Thanks for having me and

1:28

great to see you and Randy today . How's everything been

1:30

in your world ?

1:31

Very , very good . Thank you , aside from

1:33

the COVID , but let's not talk about that . So

1:39

we're chatting today about empowered

1:41

teams . But before we get

1:43

stuck into our topic , it would be great if you

1:45

could give our audience a real quick intro

1:48

into who you are and

1:51

your product journey

1:53

and what you do in product today

1:55

.

1:56

Yeah for sure . So what I do today is I

1:58

work as a product leadership coach and advisor

2:00

. So I work with basically the VPs

2:02

of products , cpos and the leadership teams , helping

2:05

them build and transform into being strong product companies

2:07

. So how I got here is

2:09

a bit of a winding journey , as I'm sure Randy

2:11

and other folks like me could attest . But basically

2:15

I started my career in marketing

2:17

, switched engineering and then somewhere

2:19

along the way realized that there was this beautiful and

2:21

weird thing called product . That brought these

2:24

the technical and human sides of my brain together . And

2:26

once I once I got a taste of product

2:28

, that was it for me and just kind of went all in

2:30

. And you know , that was somewhere that was

2:32

10 or 15 years ago , and it's just been my obsession

2:34

ever since . So it's

2:37

. It's the weird world that we all love to hang out

2:39

in .

2:41

And you have been helping lots

2:43

of businesses with their product

2:45

teams and we

2:48

pretty much . I'm sure most

2:50

people who listen to this podcast will have heard

2:52

of empowered product teams and

2:55

that that is the kind of the utopia

2:57

that we're all aiming towards . So

3:00

, tell us in your words

3:02

, like what is an empowered

3:04

product team ?

3:06

Absolutely so . Yeah , as you said , literally

3:08

like by now , unless anyone's been living under

3:10

a rock , they've heard about empowered teams

3:12

and OKRs and accountability

3:14

and all these wonderful things that that paint

3:17

a picture that that I like to call sort of this , this

3:19

idea of like empowered nirvana , right , it's this

3:21

, this mythical place that we all would

3:23

love to spend our days working in . And

3:26

then there's the , the reality of like . Okay , so

3:28

that sounds awesome , but how

3:31

do we get there or how

3:33

do we do it ? And you

3:35

know , I think that's kind of what led me to

3:38

explore . Some of the questions that led us

3:40

talking today , earlier this year , was I was really

3:42

asking the question of like , what does that

3:44

actually mean ? Like , what

3:46

does it actually mean to empower

3:49

a team ? What is this word that we throw around really

3:51

mean ? And , as I said

3:53

, I really explored it , both on my own

3:55

and talking with lots of different people

3:58

. At the end of the day , I came down

4:00

to my stance is that it's really

4:02

. It's a , it's a , it's a trade , right

4:04

, it's an agreement between teams

4:06

and leadership that is often kind of

4:09

glossed over , and it's this

4:11

trade of autonomy

4:14

for accountability , and so , of course

4:16

, we're going to talk about all this a lot more , but this is

4:18

where something like OKRs is very helpful . But , in

4:21

a nutshell , what you have is you have a team that is

4:23

signing up , like they're putting their

4:25

name on the line , to be accountable

4:27

for delivering some kind of outcome , but in exchange

4:29

, they get , let's say , bounded autonomy

4:32

for it . And so when I that's

4:34

that's how I started to think about it , when I when I started to bring that

4:36

into my conversations with teams and leaders

4:38

, making that conversation

4:41

explicit and actually like unpacking it together

4:43

, really improved a lot . So that's , that's how

4:45

I've , that's how I think about it today .

4:47

Andrew , we like to talk about autonomy

4:49

a lot , but I think a lot of

4:51

people misunderstand the term or

4:53

at least use it in a way that's not

4:55

intended . So what

4:58

does autonomy actually

5:00

mean with an empowered team ?

5:02

Well , really quick . I'm curious . What do they most

5:04

people you talk to , what do they mean by that word

5:06

?

5:07

I can do whatever I want . Get

5:09

out of my way , stop telling me what to do . Yeah

5:13

, that's not what that means . Yeah , and , to

5:15

be fair , I don't hear that a ton , but

5:17

I hear people complaining about it and I've come

5:19

across it a couple of times .

5:22

For sure , for sure , and you can

5:24

imagine , you can see where someone might draw that

5:27

interpretation and where that could be

5:29

problematic . If you're I don't know a

5:31

CEO and you're going , hmm , we're having issues

5:33

already and now you just want to , like , go out of free for

5:35

all . So , no , autonomy

5:38

is not a free for all , it is not a

5:40

blank check to go do whatever you want . It

5:43

doesn't roll off the tongue quite as well . But this is why I was

5:45

saying a second ago , like a bounded autonomy

5:47

, right , you have autonomy within guardrails , within

5:49

limits , and so what

5:52

I think of it meaning in the context of an

5:54

empowered product team is you

5:56

have you being the team , like

5:58

especially the product trio , if you want to use that

6:01

language . Right , the autonomy

6:04

, you're empowered to

6:06

come up with the solutions that drive

6:08

the results . Right , like the fundamental trade

6:10

is like okay , I as the leadership team , I'm

6:13

going to give you this space and

6:15

in that space , like , it's up to you , You're going to do

6:17

, you know , you're going to figure it out . It has to meet certain

6:19

constraints , has to work for the business

6:21

, it can't violate our brand

6:23

or be illegal or destroy our business

6:26

model or whatever the infinite list of

6:28

constraints may be , but as long as

6:30

you're meeting the constraints , it's up to you to come up with the

6:32

solutions . Because the most

6:34

, I think , the most disempowering thing to use that overused

6:36

word , you know , I

6:38

guess I fundamentally look at product teams

6:40

and everybody on them as it's

6:42

a creative role . Right , product

6:45

is often pigeonholed or a lot is like a very

6:47

analytical role , and certainly there's a lot to

6:49

that , but I actually think of it fundamentally as a creative

6:51

role . You know , everyone wants to make things

6:53

that matter and use their time well

6:55

, and so I think the

6:58

most disempowering thing is just to be told like oh , I don't really

7:00

care about your creative input , just go build

7:02

me X , which is essentially the model we're all reacting

7:04

to and trying to get away from of , you know

7:06

, feature-filled roadmaps and

7:09

feature factories and on and on .

7:11

And how has that changed ? Or what

7:13

kind of problems do you see with

7:15

product leadership ? How

7:18

are product leaders getting it wrong ? Because I

7:20

feel like there's a fine

7:22

line or like a

7:24

balance that you need of like

7:26

looking after your team and

7:28

steering them in the right path

7:30

versus like giving them that

7:33

autonomy and making them

7:35

feel accountable .

7:37

Yeah , it's a great question and there is no , I don't

7:39

think there is like one perfect answer here . It's

7:41

all very situational . So when I think about some

7:43

of the product leaders that I've been working with over the last year

7:45

, they all have different contexts

7:47

, but the thing that seems

7:49

to carry

7:51

across those situations is , first

7:54

of all , it's not dictatorship

7:57

, right , they're not saying this

7:59

is it and that's it , I said it and

8:01

that's all it is . It's not . You know , they don't get to rule things

8:03

. They actually have to evangelize

8:06

and influence and persuade and build

8:08

a vision and get the team involved , because

8:10

without the team , division is you

8:12

know , it's meaningless if you can't actually execute on it

8:14

. So I think the hard line to

8:16

walk here is finding

8:19

that balance between

8:21

the rigor of

8:24

responsibility and accountability , of saying like , yeah

8:26

, this team has to truly sign up for

8:29

delivering a result . I

8:31

mean , I think this is one of the differences

8:33

, just to make a somewhat esoteric distinction

8:35

. I think there's an important distinction here between

8:38

accountability and responsibility

8:40

. And responsibility

8:43

is something that anyone can take for themselves , right

8:45

, in any situation . I can choose to

8:47

take responsibility for something , right . It

8:49

doesn't require anybody else's involvement

8:51

or agreement . But accountability

8:54

only exists by virtue

8:56

of agreement . Right , I am only accountable

8:58

to something to you , lily , if we talk

9:01

about it , have a conversation and agree that

9:03

I am accountable to it , and that involves things

9:05

like the conditions of satisfaction and the

9:07

constraints , the terms , whatever

9:09

words you wanna put . But I think that's actually

9:12

the thing that's most often skipped over is that

9:14

conversation and an explicit

9:16

signing up process , basically , where

9:19

, let's say , you're the product leader , lily , and I'm one of the PMs

9:21

reporting to you . You come to me

9:24

and you say , hey , we're gonna go do X , and you

9:26

just tell me and you don't ask me for any input . Right

9:28

, you're just sort of dictating . That's a very different

9:30

experience versus what I think you would probably

9:32

do is you would sit down with me , we would have a conversation

9:35

about the direction and the vision and

9:37

you would lay out for me what the big problems

9:39

that we could solve that would make a big difference

9:41

are , and then I would at some

9:43

point sign up to take that on . I would say

9:45

like , yeah , I'm in , I'm taking that on . I

9:48

don't know how we're gonna do it yet , but me and the team

9:50

are gonna figure it out .

9:52

Andrew , you're doing a really good job of defining

9:54

terms that we use all the time , so I'm gonna push you

9:57

to define one more Ooh good , and

9:59

it's really obvious one trust . You

10:02

said accountability is . You

10:04

can't have a trust without accountability

10:06

or accountability without trust . But I

10:09

think that word also gets confused for

10:11

people sometimes . So can you give us a little

10:13

bit more on what you mean by that

10:16

word , by trust ?

10:17

Absolutely , randy , thank you for that . And you're right

10:19

, I am a big fan of defining

10:22

terms because it sort of externalizes

10:25

and makes explicit a lot of meaning

10:27

and assumptions , and I think that's where a lot of

10:29

the problems start . But trust is a big one because

10:31

you're right , that's basically what it all comes down to . So

10:33

my personal favorite definition of trust is

10:36

from a writer named Charles Feldman , who

10:38

wrote a really great book everybody should read , called

10:40

the Thin Book of Trust , and

10:42

the definition of trust there is that trust is defined

10:44

as choosing to make something you value vulnerable

10:48

to somebody else's actions . So

10:50

it means that I am putting something I care about

10:52

and value at the effect

10:54

of you and I do not control you

10:56

. Right , I cannot control you , which

10:58

is where the vulnerability and the trust comes into play

11:00

. So I think that's really the heart

11:03

of it . And so that is

11:05

the difficult bit , because then you start to get into

11:07

all these questions and maybe this is where you want to

11:09

go , I'm not sure about like great , how do you

11:11

? How do you build it ? What do you do about it

11:13

? How do you repair it if it's out ?

11:15

I mean , yeah , you've literally just asked

11:17

all the questions that I was going to ask you , but

11:21

let's start with like one of

11:23

the harder ones , like if you're

11:25

, if you're building , let's say you maybe

11:28

don't have empowered teams yet , but you're kind of

11:30

working in that direction and

11:32

you know there are occasionally

11:35

like conflicts within peer

11:38

to peer relationships or or you know

11:40

, even with as a product leader

11:42

with the team or the team with the product

11:44

leader . So if you don't

11:47

feel like you trust people

11:50

within that product organization

11:52

, like what can you , what can

11:55

you do about it ?

11:56

Yeah , no , I love the question . I think the

11:59

first thing I want to say is I just want to name something

12:01

that's implied in your question , which is that we

12:04

can do something about trust . We can rebuild

12:06

trust . A lot of people operate like trust

12:08

is this . It's a binary

12:11

, right , it's either there or it's not , and

12:13

once it's gone or it's broken , it can never be

12:15

rebuilt . And while there are

12:17

certainly situations in which that is true

12:19

, I don't think that's usually the case , and

12:22

so I think it's helpful to look at it like okay

12:24

, where is trust a problem

12:26

? And ? But I think , more importantly

12:28

, it's really important to zoom

12:30

in on what we mean by that . So

12:33

, for example , when , when

12:35

someone says I don't trust that person , you have to

12:37

ask okay , what do you mean by

12:39

that ? Right , because trust is

12:41

multi-dimensional . Trust is not one

12:43

thing and it's not all or nothing . So

12:45

, for example , there , there's all sorts of

12:47

different sort of trust models out there . Feldman's

12:50

got one . There's another one

12:52

that I like , called the trust equation , by Steven

12:54

draw's deck , I think it's how you say his name . That's

12:57

a good book from about 20 years ago . That's useful . But one

12:59

of my favorite ones that comes actually from a friend

13:01

of mine , pam Fox Rollin , who's got

13:03

a new book coming out that I just want to say everyone

13:05

should go check out . It's called growing groups into teams

13:07

. She and her partners or

13:09

her co-authors in that book actually explained a model

13:11

that I love right now it's my current favorite which is

13:13

saying , okay , let's say trust is quote

13:15

, unquote out . Okay , is

13:17

that ? Does that mean , like this , I don't trust their sincerity

13:20

? Is it that I don't trust their

13:22

competence , their reliability

13:25

, their honesty , their

13:27

respect ? Right ? These are sort of

13:29

like five dimensions of trust that all mean

13:31

really different things and all have

13:33

different solutions . So I think the first

13:36

thing to do to answer your question , lily , is

13:38

you have to , like get a little more specific about

13:40

where the problem is , because I

13:43

might trust a PM on my team to give

13:45

an amazing demo but I'm

13:48

that which is like in the label of the bucket

13:50

of competence but I may not trust

13:52

their ability

13:55

to give a three

13:57

year projection or forecast

13:59

to the board . Right ? Same

14:02

person , awesome at their job , two

14:04

different situations , both in the

14:06

domain of competence . So I realized I'm

14:08

getting a little long-winded here . Let me zoom out . So

14:11

, step one get specific . What do you mean

14:13

? Step two is

14:15

to then actually have a conversation about it , right

14:17

? So I think you have a conversation about what's

14:19

going on here and most people don't

14:21

even realize you can actually have this conversation

14:23

and that once you can have this conversation

14:26

, there's almost no conversation you can't

14:28

have . This is almost like the skeleton . Key conversation

14:30

is like can I have

14:33

that conversation about trust and where it's out

14:35

and why ? And

14:37

you don't have to have all the answers going in , you just have

14:39

to be willing to step in there with somebody . I think that's

14:41

actually the most important thing and there's we can

14:43

get into some other like more tactical things on the team

14:45

level or the leadership level , if you like , but I think that's

14:47

how I want to at least tee it up .

14:50

Andrew , that's exactly where I wanted to go . Actually

14:52

, is there a difference

14:54

in these dimensions between creating

14:56

trust at an individual

14:59

level , you know , with your stakeholders , with your peers

15:01

, versus doing it from a leadership

15:03

level and doing it down to the teams that report

15:05

?

15:06

up ? Yeah , that's a great question . I think

15:08

there actually is a difference . I think the principles translate

15:10

across the , the different positions in the

15:12

organization , but in terms of the actions you'll

15:14

take , I think , yes , there is a difference . So I

15:17

think the way I want to frame this is that , whether

15:19

you're you know , I'm basically asserting

15:21

that this whole Thing about empowerment

15:24

comes down to this handshake between

15:26

teams and leadership right , that's the fundamental thing

15:29

, and that that handshake is built on trust

15:31

, which is where we are now . So , depending

15:33

on which side of the handshake you're on , there

15:36

are things different , things you can do to both

15:38

earn trust of the other side and also

15:40

extend trust to the other side . So

15:43

let me explain it that way . So , if I'm on the

15:45

, we'll start with the leadership team , because I , like , like

15:47

you , randy , I think a lot about the , the environment created

15:49

by leaders , so let's start with them . So if I'm

15:51

on the leadership team , I have to first think about

15:54

what am I doing to earn the trust of

15:56

my teams . I think that's where everybody

15:58

should start is like , okay , am I being trustworthy

16:00

first before I go

16:02

Pointing fingers anybody else ? So

16:05

I think in this , in this case , I

16:07

would start by looking at a few things . If I'm on the leadership

16:09

team , am I insisting on Basically

16:12

strong thinking over any one solution , right

16:14

? Am I being ? Let me give you the anti pattern Am

16:16

I being attached to my solution , right ? If I'm

16:18

just trying to , like , get the team to just do

16:20

the thing you know , build the damn thing I want you to build

16:22

already , like that is a great way to destroy

16:25

trust . That's not going to help you build trust

16:27

, or or to earn their trust

16:29

, rather , is another way to say it . But what works much better

16:31

is to insist

16:33

on strong thinking from everybody , including

16:36

yourself , and to call yourself out when maybe

16:38

you are insisting on a feature that you have not

16:40

really Substantiated . Right , maybe you keep pushing

16:43

this like pet project and

16:45

then , like I've seen this a team I

16:47

worked with earlier this year I saw the co-founder

16:49

, who's who's no longer the CEO , but he's still

16:51

very involved Actually own

16:53

in a pretty public forum

16:55

that he's like , oh wow , I

16:58

realize I have just been a broken record for this one

17:00

thing that I want

17:02

for like a year and a half and

17:05

he said something to the effect of like I realize

17:07

it doesn't make any sense . Actually , it doesn't make

17:09

sense for where we are , where we're trying to go . And

17:12

you just saw the moment he said that

17:14

, like you just saw the whole

17:16

room , you saw everybody involved in the company just go

17:18

like , oh , finally , okay , cool , we can have a real

17:20

conversation about this . And it's not

17:22

that anybody's like a bad person in the situation , but

17:25

like that level of honesty

17:27

and openness just bought so

17:29

much trust . So that's , that's one thing is like

17:31

it says insist on strong thinking , being willing

17:33

to call it out . And

17:35

then the other one I want to call out from the leadership side in

17:37

terms of earning trust is really managing your own

17:40

biases . Right , that's like an ongoing practice

17:42

for a leader is every one-on-one you're having

17:44

every presentation like owning

17:46

, where your Biases , your

17:48

own preferences and bias are coming into

17:50

the equation because you have outsized influence

17:52

by virtue of your position . So

17:55

that's . There's more we could say there , but that's probably enough for now . That's

17:57

on the earning side . On the extending side

17:59

, I think this is actually the harder one for leaders

18:01

. I think most leaders would

18:04

probably nod along quite nicely with everything

18:06

I just said . This is where the rubber

18:08

meets the road , because this is where they actually have to get vulnerable

18:10

and extend trust to the teams , right ? So

18:12

if we go back to that definition of trust from a few

18:14

minutes ago of , you know , choosing to make Choosing

18:17

, to risk making something you value Vulnerable

18:20

to somebody else's actions , that's the hard

18:22

one . And so for a leader , that means

18:24

actually giving up control . That

18:26

means actually giving the team space to pursue

18:28

things that maybe they would not

18:30

, the leader would not pursue , or that are not big

18:32

, they go against the leaders instincts , and

18:35

that doesn't mean the leader doesn't get to have a voice , but

18:37

it does mean they like , like they have handed over

18:39

the reins , but they retain the context

18:41

. So that

18:43

looks like giving the team space to explore ideas

18:46

, giving

18:48

the team data and evidence that they have that

18:50

the team may not have . That looks like leading

18:53

through context and not control , right ? So

18:55

creating a vision , creating a strategy

18:57

, creating principles and then creating

18:59

that container , those bounds in

19:02

which the team gets to really go do their thing

19:04

. And the last one is really not

19:07

overusing veto power , right ? The

19:09

thing that makes a stakeholder a stakeholder , almost

19:11

by definition , is that they do have veto rights

19:13

, and so the thing is you

19:15

can't throw those around all the time , right , if you're

19:17

just vetoing every single thing , because it's not what

19:19

you would have done . That

19:21

just destroys trust , and so that's

19:24

where actually giving space and

19:26

relying on the data goes a long way . I'm

19:28

happy to talk more about the team , but is that kind of what you were asking

19:30

about , randy , with the leadership side ?

19:33

Yeah , and you brought up something really

19:36

interesting there as well . I mean not that

19:38

everything else we talked about earlier in this

19:40

conversation was interesting , but the two

19:43

dimensions of getting trust

19:45

and then extending it . What

19:47

is the difference ? What's the thought process about that ?

19:50

No , I love that question . I think the

19:52

fundamental point I'm trying to make there is that when we think

19:54

about trust , it's very

19:57

easy to point

19:59

fingers right To say , oh , I don't

20:01

trust them , or trust is out . But

20:05

I think the first thing that a leader

20:07

has to ask is what is my contribution

20:10

to the situation ? And I actually think that's

20:12

something everybody ought to be asking . Right , if

20:14

you have a conflict whether that's in a personal relationship

20:17

, a work team , whatever if

20:19

there's a conflict , everybody has some part

20:21

to play , right , even if that part is just

20:23

tolerating it and not speaking up about it . They

20:26

may not be the person who's like most quote unquote

20:28

at fault , but that's

20:30

why I think it's so important , because then it puts everybody

20:32

in a stance of what's mine

20:34

to own and how can I contribute to

20:37

making it better somehow ?

20:39

I think in my experience as

20:41

well , I find one of the ways in which

20:43

trust is built between

20:45

a leader and their team is with

20:48

the giving and receiving of feedback

20:50

, which is very much that kind of . I

20:53

think it leans more on that earning it side

20:55

of things , but being able to

20:57

take feedback and criticism

21:00

well and

21:02

inviting it but then also kind of giving

21:04

it in a very radically

21:07

candid kind of way , like we all do . But

21:10

is there anything else ? Just thinking about

21:13

the times at which you're able

21:15

to really demonstrate earning

21:19

trust and extending it and the

21:21

one-to-one environment

21:24

that most leaders have

21:26

with their product teams , is there anything

21:28

that you kind of recommend

21:30

or speak to in

21:32

that sort of one-to-one situation ? That

21:35

is like a good sort

21:37

of moment at which you're able

21:39

to really practice or develop

21:42

your trust between your team .

21:44

Yeah , I think there's a few different angles

21:46

. One that comes to mind right now is

21:49

I mean , the broader point that I want to make here

21:51

is I think it's owning that

21:53

you're not infallible , right , like

21:55

being a human being as a leader , and not trying

21:57

to present that you're all perfect , you got it all figured

22:00

out like you make mistakes too . That

22:02

goes a long way , especially if you think

22:04

about the power imbalance or power

22:06

dynamic between , let's say , a CEO

22:09

and

22:11

a second-year product manager . Right

22:13

, there's just implicitly a huge power

22:15

imbalance there , and now in a large company , that

22:17

dynamic isn't probably going to happen , but in a smaller

22:19

company it might . So I think this

22:21

is where just owning that you

22:24

make mistakes too , and making it like

22:26

this is where both sides really opening up their

22:28

thinking , externalizing their thinking

22:30

, I think goes a very long way . If

22:33

you're on the product team side and you externalize

22:35

your thinking , you can bring your stakeholder or

22:37

your CEO or whoever you're bringing them

22:39

along for the ride . But on the

22:41

other side , if you're the CEO , the product leader

22:43

or whatever , it goes a really long way

22:45

to not just shut someone down

22:47

without explaining right , if

22:50

you actually explain the thinking and

22:52

why a certain thing might not actually

22:54

work despite a lot of good intentions and

22:56

effort . I think that goes a really long way . So

22:59

I think that's like from the leadership side of bringing

23:01

people along for the ride . But

23:04

I think the other one is really and

23:08

this one feels weirdly hard from

23:10

when I've seen leaders struggle with it but it's

23:12

to give credit right To

23:14

really say like you know what I

23:16

disagreed with this direction , but

23:18

you and the team and the data , you

23:21

totally nailed it right . Like when a

23:23

leader can disagree and commit and then three

23:26

months later to say like yeah , I

23:28

was wrong , this is awesome . Like I'm so glad

23:30

I was wrong and I'm so glad that this you know . I

23:33

don't even hesitate to say like wrong , that's

23:35

the wrong framing . But

23:37

to just celebrate the win and

23:39

to not have their ego be

23:42

so wrapped up in it . I think that

23:44

goes an incredibly long way , especially in that one-on-one

23:46

dynamic , because I

23:48

don't know , I've had a lot of calls from

23:50

one or both sides of that dynamic where they

23:53

just feel like they will

23:56

not acknowledge how things

23:58

actually evolved .

24:01

So , given all that , Andrew becoming

24:04

a strong product team , what's

24:06

the way that a company earlier in its

24:08

journey can get started and

24:10

move towards it in a deliberate fashion

24:12

? What should they be doing ?

24:14

Yeah , well , let me start by what they probably shouldn't

24:16

be doing . So what they shouldn't be

24:18

doing is what a lot of people try to do , which

24:20

is they see this picture

24:23

of kind of the empowered Nirvana and all

24:25

these wonderful books that we've read by , you know , marty

24:27

Kagan or Teresa Torres or Petra or whoever

24:29

, and they just try to

24:31

jump all the way to the end , right , like that

24:33

is almost guaranteed to fail

24:35

. One of the things that I

24:38

try to stress to people is that really

24:40

what we're saying ? If we're trying to become a strong product

24:42

company or transform or move to the

24:44

product model , or however you want

24:46

to say it , we're trying to fundamentally

24:48

shift the relationship between the product

24:50

organization and the rest of the business , and

24:53

the thing that we all overlook is

24:55

that that is the outcome , like

24:57

that's the result . So you cannot start there

24:59

, you have to get there , and so

25:01

don't try to just jump there , which means

25:03

don't try to just change everything at once

25:06

and ask the leadership team that's been used to like

25:08

controlling everything , to just hand over all the

25:10

reins , and you know it just doesn't

25:12

work . So the actual sequence

25:14

that it starts with is being able to

25:17

ship good product , right . So if you can't even

25:19

ship your toast , right

25:21

, like if the benchmark that

25:23

most of us talk about is a bare minimum two weeks , if

25:25

you can't ship to your customers at least every

25:28

two weeks , like do

25:30

not pass , go , do not collect $200

25:32

, like that's thing one . Because

25:34

if product can't even ship , then

25:36

the organization has no credibility within

25:38

the company . And so if you're

25:40

starting and things are in a super bad place , you just

25:42

got to get the shipyard shipping right . It can be like

25:44

a bug fix and just celebrate the hell out of

25:46

the bug fix . But just like the thing has got

25:49

, the pipes have got to start flowing . Step

25:51

two is , once you can actually get something

25:53

through the pipes is you have to start solving

25:56

those problems and building things collaboratively right

25:58

. So that's where all the all the great stuff around

26:01

product discovery really kicks in . Do you have

26:03

cross functional teams or

26:05

do they , you know , do they actually do

26:07

proper discovery ? Do they do prototyping , all

26:10

of that ? And then number

26:12

three is really that's where the harder

26:14

part of product leadership comes in , which

26:16

is everything around product strategy

26:18

, product vision , etc . And then , once

26:21

you get there , you actually have enough momentum

26:23

and credibility built up that

26:25

you can actually , like , start to

26:28

make much bigger changes in the company

26:30

level of relationship . So if I were to summarize

26:32

all that , first you got to be able to build ship things

26:34

, then you have to be able to build and discover what is

26:36

worth shipping , then you have to actually be

26:38

able to lead and do strategy and vision

26:40

and then at the end you have

26:43

essentially transformed your relationship to the

26:45

rest of the company . A lot more to it than that

26:47

, but that's one way to think about it .

26:49

I was going to say , in your experience , how long

26:51

does this take ?

26:54

I think it depends a lot on the size of the company

26:56

. You know , if you're , if you're trying to transform

26:58

a 50,000 person company versus

27:01

a 20 person startup , you know we're

27:04

just not even talking about the same thing at all here . I

27:06

think at the low end it's probably six

27:08

months . I think at the high end , realistically

27:11

, you're talking three to five years , probably three years if

27:13

you did this really really well . If

27:15

you have a big company and you did everything

27:18

right , it's probably like three years . If you don't do

27:20

everything right , it's probably much longer . And

27:22

there are many , many examples

27:25

of companies that are , you know , quote unquote transforming

27:28

and they're in like year nine

27:30

or version six of the transformation

27:32

. And you have to honestly

27:34

ask like does this still hold water with anybody ?

27:37

And how many McKinsey's and the and eccentric have they been

27:40

through at that point ?

27:41

Oh yeah , right , the BCG , the eccentric

27:43

, deloitte , mckinsey , etc . Etc . You

27:46

know and it's not because they're not smart

27:48

people or anything like that , but I

27:51

think a lot of times , you know , this is one of the things that I

27:53

think is really interesting about the whole

27:55

strong product company transformation

27:58

thing . Right Is that it

28:00

requires the fusing of , I

28:02

think , two disciplines which often operate

28:04

quite independently , one of which

28:07

is product , and that's all the stuff we obsess over . But

28:09

there's actually this whole other field out there called

28:11

change management . That is a domain and

28:14

a field that has worked on the problems

28:16

of organizational and company transformation for a

28:18

long time , and they've learned

28:20

a lot , and so a lot of my research and

28:22

exploration and work

28:24

recently has been bringing the best

28:26

of that domain into the product domain , because I

28:29

think we'd be a little bit silly to just ignore what all

28:31

these smart , well-intentioned people have figured out over the years

28:33

. So I think there's bringing a lot of that

28:35

together is what's actually necessary , because

28:37

the product let's say , let's call

28:39

it the product model or strong product company

28:42

is kind of what we're trying to become

28:44

. And then there's this whole other field that

28:46

has a lot to say about how

28:49

to effectively become that .

28:51

Well , andrew , it has been great

28:53

talking to you about this topic . I'm

28:56

sure all of the people who

28:58

have been listening are very inspired

29:02

and will soon be very

29:04

empowered See what I did there . But

29:08

yeah , thank you . Thank you so much , it's been really

29:11

fantastic .

29:12

Oh , it's a pleasure being with you all . Thank you for having me .

29:24

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29:28

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29:30

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29:33

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