Shifting from Tasks to User Stories

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Helping teams to shift from a task-focus to writing user stories requires a different approach than simply introducing user stories as a new tool. You have to adapt the existing practices, by changing how teams think about and discuss the work they do. “Change from…” is different for people than […]

How To Make Your Product Special

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When evaluating a product, a customer may see the product as special, adequate, inadequate, or awful. What is uncomfortable for product teams is they have no control over how the customer sees the product. They only have influence. What teams need to learn is how to approach creating the product […]

Market Problem Framing Example

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As Steven Haines first told me, “strategy first, roadmap second.” There is a step between the two – deciding which problems you will focus on solving with your product. Strategy defines the context for product strategy, and your product roadmap is a planning (and communication) tool for executing your product […]

Outside-In User Story Example

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Being “outside-in”, “outcome-based”, and “market-driven” is particularly important for creating successful products. The problem is that just saying the words is not enough to help someone shift their thinking. For those of us who are already thinking this way, the phrases become touchstones or short-hand. For folks who are not […]

Minimum Valuable Problem

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Defining and building a good minimum viable product is much harder than it sounds. Finding that “one thing” you can do, which people want, is really about a lot more than picking one thing. It is a combination of solving the minimum valuable problem and all of the other things […]