Prior to doing Product Management, I was an Engineer in VTune, a performance tuning product from Intel. Now Intel prides that it is an Engineering and a Technology company. Why is this relevant to the topic? Well you see, what this means is Engineers and Architects decide what are the features for a product release and this is often based on how cool the technology sounds vs. does a user really care or is the technology being presented in a useful fashion or does this impact the top line?
In the last two years I have done product management for three products. I have been very fortunate to be working with excellent Engineering Managers with whom I have gotten along very well. Why is this needed other than for obvious reasons that all functions are necessary to release a product?
My experience has been that while Product Management is good at saying - that feature would be cool to have because it differentiates us or adds value to users, only Engineering is best positioned to say whether it can be delivered and if so what is the quality (include performance)/cost/time? Also many times if I work in a solo, I make judgments such as "Nah - this is difficult to do in this time" etc. But if you work this closely with Engineering, they can suggest you technologies / research work / alternate paths that enable you to get more than you originally thought possible.
Also things are not really black and white. If Engineering and Marketing work closely, you can prioritize and juggle tasks in a more granular fashion (than at common touch points such as Alpha, Beta, Release) which means there is nothing to test until a very long time. Welcome to Agile development - but this is not only an Engineering term, it applies to Product Management as well.
But this requires the two functions to trust each other and recognize that over-arching goal of both functions is the same - product success. Trust is key because there are sensitivities if one function crosses over to the other and this happens far too often because there is a thin line that separates the functions. Transparency is key as well - when I was an engineer, I know my team has done features that Marketing never requested because we said "marketing just does not get it". Similarly it is important for Product Planning to work out product objectives and features with Engineering and ensure agreement on the rationale, priority, time-frame. It is also important to stay out of dictating how things get done.
Every time I tend to be in a difficult spot with Engineering - I step back and ask - there's got to be a win-win, why are we fighting when we have the same goal.
Thoughts?
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Friday, January 18, 2008
Persistence pays off
We have been working over close to one year trying to get a design win with a potential customer. The process has been painful and frustrating to say the least but today it finally paid off when one of the key influencer's agreed to take our product and work with us to build the gives/gets that he could use to gain his management's approval.
Here's what worked for us. First patience. In our case, the customer first needed to buy the right hardware. Since we were approaching him for a software sale in parallel, he would use most of our meeting time addressing issues with hardware - this was frustrating to say the least. We all know how long it takes to set up time with customers. The hardware issues took over a quarter of talks. Then the influencer was pulled into other higher priority project and assigned a delegate. We worked with the delegate for another quarter or so and he agreed to take our product and provided the green signal to have Engineering teams collaborate and co-design. A quarter passed and the key person returned to his project but refused to accept the decision made by his delegate. He presented very valid and pertinent issues that made it clear that the earlier decision was a wrong strategy for them. But we were pissed to say the least. He brought us back to the drawing board - worse he still did not consider this priority enough. Meanwhile we kept hearing from other sources that he was formulating a strategy without our product.
So I applied my second strategy - listen and put yourself in the customer's shoes. The customer had voiced to us why he could not take our product. What if we could work through these issues? This is what we did - it took us another quarter worth of negotiations before we could come up with a win-win situation. We are still working the details on this one - but looks like this time will go through. We are looking to get the customer's senior management approval in next few weeks.
Have you had a really difficult sale? What worked for you?
Here's what worked for us. First patience. In our case, the customer first needed to buy the right hardware. Since we were approaching him for a software sale in parallel, he would use most of our meeting time addressing issues with hardware - this was frustrating to say the least. We all know how long it takes to set up time with customers. The hardware issues took over a quarter of talks. Then the influencer was pulled into other higher priority project and assigned a delegate. We worked with the delegate for another quarter or so and he agreed to take our product and provided the green signal to have Engineering teams collaborate and co-design. A quarter passed and the key person returned to his project but refused to accept the decision made by his delegate. He presented very valid and pertinent issues that made it clear that the earlier decision was a wrong strategy for them. But we were pissed to say the least. He brought us back to the drawing board - worse he still did not consider this priority enough. Meanwhile we kept hearing from other sources that he was formulating a strategy without our product.
So I applied my second strategy - listen and put yourself in the customer's shoes. The customer had voiced to us why he could not take our product. What if we could work through these issues? This is what we did - it took us another quarter worth of negotiations before we could come up with a win-win situation. We are still working the details on this one - but looks like this time will go through. We are looking to get the customer's senior management approval in next few weeks.
Have you had a really difficult sale? What worked for you?
First Design Win
Yes, it feels great. Anyone who says there are better things in life are probably right - but if you have gotten your first one for a brand new product you are introducing into market - the thrill is probably no less.
We were close to 18 months into the planning cycle - yes that is a really long one. 18 months of people telling you that you are probably out of your mind to be building this product. Recall I work for a hardware company, so software is a second citizen. No, software enabling is probably a second citizen, software product is clearly a third citizen. So you get the picture...
But this design win went fast. It is a small customer. I went and pitched the product - 3 hours straight. There were about 10 people in the room. I was standing on a podium and presenting to the audience (that felt funny). But the meeting went well - surprisingly. They asked about our licensing. I was baffled - well I had the licensing terms but not approved by management. We said we would get back. The account manager told me as we walked back - if a customer wants to know the terms, you know you have the sale - I should have been ready to seal the deal right there.
Next few days was quick - management approvals, what terms will work, what will not. Finally had something. Meanwhile the customer called back. Marketing wanted to hear the pitch again. Well OK??? I had already started my Holiday Season but a lesson learnt the very hard way - if a customer gives you a date, there better not be a higher priority anything.
I landed up again. The marketing meeting turned out to be a very technical meeting. And I had no engineering representation. Sigh! Plus he asked a ton of questions on hardware protocols and buses. What do I know. The account rep was extremely knowledgeable though. He was able to handle most of them. For others, we just said we have to get back. But rest of the meeting went well. He told us several challenges with adoption of our technology - I was familiar with each of them, he knew what he was talking about. But he also agreed that we needed to make baby steps instead of dreaming Nirvana.
Next we met with the technical representative to present the terms. He started off with saying - my engineering team in Taiwan feels they can build the product in-house, we are not sure we want to buy from you but would like to know your terms. Yes, I was literally shaking. It was my vacation and it was 6PM and I had slogged the last week. Well so what? I presented the terms. The customer said - wow, this is cheap. Can you share with me your specs? I said No, please make a decision first. I returned home and tried to relax by thinking of our upcoming Mexico trip.
1st week of Jan and I am back to work. A sweet one liner from the customer - We have decided to license your product. Please send us your documents so we can proceed to next steps.
How was your first design win? Write to me about it
We were close to 18 months into the planning cycle - yes that is a really long one. 18 months of people telling you that you are probably out of your mind to be building this product. Recall I work for a hardware company, so software is a second citizen. No, software enabling is probably a second citizen, software product is clearly a third citizen. So you get the picture...
But this design win went fast. It is a small customer. I went and pitched the product - 3 hours straight. There were about 10 people in the room. I was standing on a podium and presenting to the audience (that felt funny). But the meeting went well - surprisingly. They asked about our licensing. I was baffled - well I had the licensing terms but not approved by management. We said we would get back. The account manager told me as we walked back - if a customer wants to know the terms, you know you have the sale - I should have been ready to seal the deal right there.
Next few days was quick - management approvals, what terms will work, what will not. Finally had something. Meanwhile the customer called back. Marketing wanted to hear the pitch again. Well OK??? I had already started my Holiday Season but a lesson learnt the very hard way - if a customer gives you a date, there better not be a higher priority anything.
I landed up again. The marketing meeting turned out to be a very technical meeting. And I had no engineering representation. Sigh! Plus he asked a ton of questions on hardware protocols and buses. What do I know. The account rep was extremely knowledgeable though. He was able to handle most of them. For others, we just said we have to get back. But rest of the meeting went well. He told us several challenges with adoption of our technology - I was familiar with each of them, he knew what he was talking about. But he also agreed that we needed to make baby steps instead of dreaming Nirvana.
Next we met with the technical representative to present the terms. He started off with saying - my engineering team in Taiwan feels they can build the product in-house, we are not sure we want to buy from you but would like to know your terms. Yes, I was literally shaking. It was my vacation and it was 6PM and I had slogged the last week. Well so what? I presented the terms. The customer said - wow, this is cheap. Can you share with me your specs? I said No, please make a decision first. I returned home and tried to relax by thinking of our upcoming Mexico trip.
1st week of Jan and I am back to work. A sweet one liner from the customer - We have decided to license your product. Please send us your documents so we can proceed to next steps.
How was your first design win? Write to me about it
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