Making product innovators leading business assets focused on customer value
Deliver new ideas more quickly, at lower cost, aligned with customer and business need
Delivering great products?
🙂 Excited by the opportunity, dismayed by the struggle to grab it 🙁
? That nagging feeling not everyone is focused - We can always do better!
Help your team be successful in your eyes and theirs – take the journey to success
🌞 Tip:
Align success criteria by shining intention and commitment,
you, and everyone, always
Heading straight to where you want to be?
The characteristics of a successful product or SaaS business.
Internal collaboration and interaction is frequent and friendly. Designers engage with the Sales team on a regular basis and reflect on how they can impact the customer experience.
Customers want to talk to you, they are pleased when you call and interested to find out more from your staff.
Engineers are frequently telling you that things should be removed or not done. They compare the investment of various requirements and make themselves heard when the investment or risk might be higher than meets the eye.
The sales team are identifying and pushing for the minimum that will add customer value. And they are eager to share their thoughts with those responsible for delivering it.
These visible aspects of culture are the ones that lead naturally to Lean, Agile and customer focused behaviour.
THE JOURNEY TO SUCCESS
YOU will be responsible for, or dependent on, product or SaaS development and dependent on the success of a team of developers, engineers and designers in delivering new products or services. THE PROBLEM IS THAT you have a level of uncertainty in their focus and direction, it is not clear that all the team’s energy is delivering on the business objective. WORKING TOGETHER I will support you in building a transparent culture where Agile and Lean behaviour is the norm. IN THE FUTURE you will point the way, watch and guide but always know you have achieved alignment as the team eagerly demonstrate the value they are adding.
WHO ARE YOU?
As a leader you must have time to excel, your success relies on it. The business is dependent on the direction you set and you want to be measured by that success. You need time and space to develop excellent strategies rather than be measured against a strategy developed in the sporadic gaps between supporting your team. Your and your teams improvement and growth depend on this.
Deliver the best and most relevant new products and services for your business.
Rest at night knowing that everyone is on the same path and motivated to deliver business success. Imagining solutions to new ideas and opportunities rather than memorising lists of things to remind people to do.
Give yourself and your team the best chances of success, development and progression, after all don’t you have the right to that?
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
Opaque cultures ARE miss aligned, if you don’t know you have alignment and focus then you can be sure that you do not. The enemy is your complacency, “I am sure they know what they are doing”, and each team members confidence that they indeed know, paralleled with an excitement to resolve challenging problems, “this looks difficult I must get to the bottom of it because it is central to our solution”. The enemy is the belief that a desire to do a good job is enough, you might have a team of clever and self-motivated individuals but without clarity of direction they will be inefficient and even quarrelsome.
WHAT DOES GOOD LOOK LIKE?
In a high performance business, with an evolving product or service at its core, leaders have time to develop strategy and direction. The organisation aligns behind this in such a way that leading is looking forwards rather than facing backwards to ensure alignment. The challenge is to stay ahead of the development team rather than pull them along. The sales team approach customers with enthusiasm at their offering and excitement at being part of something rewarding.
WHAT DOES BAD LOOK LIKE?
Opaque cultures lead to confused customers, demotivated sales teams and siloed working. In the worst case, “they don’t know what they are talking about” becomes a criticism of other teams or even customers rather than an exciting opportunity to seek clarity and alignment, “we are not saying the same thing, I need to understand more”. Micromanagement starts to become common and significant resources are constantly focused on internal problems rather than creative and innovative new ideas to improve the lives of your customers.
WHO AM I?
I have spent many years running new product development. I have felt the pain and worked with numerous designers and engineers to understand needs and create motivation and excitement to deliver on the things that really matter to businesses.
My role is not to take over, rather to help you transform each individuals mode of working in to one that promotes a transparent and cooperative environment where respect and trust are central. To show you what good looks like and free each individual to add value limited only by their ability and imagination.
This transparency will ultimately lead to your heightened knowledge of what can be done and what is important giving you the opportunity to excel with time to grow and think strategically.
