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The Workflows of Product Management

Dasmer
June 01, 2017

The Workflows of Product Management

Presented at the Flatiron School in New York on Thursday June 1st.

Dasmer

June 01, 2017
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  1. The Workflows of Product
    Management
    Dasmer Singh, Product Manager at Venmo
    Twitter: @dasmersingh

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  2. My Background: Timeline
    iOS
    Engineer
    February 2014
    July 2016
    Product
    Manager
    January 2016
    Strategy
    Associate
    Graduate of first
    Flatiron iOS class
    December 2013

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  3. My Background: Features Built at Venmo

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  4. My Background: Timeline
    iOS
    Engineer
    February 2014
    July 2016
    Product
    Manager
    January 2016
    Strategy
    Associate
    Graduate of first
    Flatiron iOS class
    December 2013

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  5. Agenda
    ● Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team
    ● Projects: What Venmo Product works on
    ● Process: How ideas come to life
    ● Transitioning: How to change roles at a technology company

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  6. Agenda
    ● Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team
    ● Projects: What Venmo Product works on
    ● Process: How ideas come to life
    ● Transitioning: How to change roles at a technology company

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  7. ● Product Manager
    ● Engineer
    ● Designer
    ● Marketer
    ● User Tester
    ● QA Engineer
    Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team

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  8. ● Assessing product
    opportunities
    ● Defining the product
    requirements and user
    experience design that
    describe the project to be
    built
    ● Validating the product to be
    built with real customers
    and users
    Responsibilities of a Product Manager
    Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team

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  9. ● Providing feasibility estimates during product exploration
    ● Writing production code
    ● Testing production code
    ● Reviewing code written by peers
    Responsibilities of an Engineer
    Roles on a Product Team

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  10. Responsibilities of A Designer
    Roles on a Product Team
    ● Creating the actual views and UI look and feel, including
    layout, colors and fonts
    ● Coming up with tasks, navigation, and flow that are both
    usable and productive
    ● Developing a deep understanding of the target users and
    personas
    ● Rapid Prototyping

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  11. ● Telling the world about the product, including
    positioning, messaging, and pricing
    ● Managing the external facing product launch
    ● Leading key influencer programs and marketing campaigns
    Responsibilities of A Marketer
    Roles on a Product Team

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  12. ● Recruiting test subjects
    ● Evaluating results
    ● Recommending Alternatives
    Responsibilities of A User Tester
    Roles on a Product Team

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  13. ● Writing and executing manual test cases
    ● Coding automated tests
    ● Logging bugs
    Responsibilities of A Quality Assurance
    Roles on a Product Team

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  14. Agenda
    ● Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team
    ● Projects: What Venmo Product works on
    ● Process: How ideas come to life
    ● Transitioning: How to change roles at a technology company

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  15. Venmo Product Team Projects
    ● Building Features
    ● Creating Enhancements
    ● Decreasing Tech Debt
    ● Fixing Bugs

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  16. ● One or more weeks of work for a team
    ● Helps Venmo accomplish a core objective
    Features
    Tasks Of The Venmo Product Team

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  17. ● Usually less than one week of work of work for a team
    ● An improvement to Venmo product functionality
    Enhancements
    Tasks Of The Venmo Product Team

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  18. ● A code refactor or improvement
    ● Improves availability, performance and / or scalability
    Tech Debt
    Tasks Of The Venmo Product Team

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  19. ● When product functionality is not working as expected
    ● Usually less than one week of work of work for one
    engineer
    ● When a bug is time sensitive and unplanned it is called
    and interruption.
    Bugs
    Tasks Of The Venmo Product Team

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  20. Agenda
    ● Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team
    ● Projects: What Venmo Product works on
    ● Process: How ideas come to life
    ● Transitioning: How to change roles at a technology company

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  21. Process: How ideas come to life
    1. Write a narrative
    2. Share and get feedback
    3. Flesh out the narrative
    4. Kickoff Project
    5. Create Product Spec Tickets
    6. Execute
    7. Celebrate
    8. Measure Impact

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  22. ● Outlines the problem being solved
    ● Every major feature has one
    ● Used by all stakeholders
    Write a narrative
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  23. ● Problem
    ● Context
    ● Goals
    ● Milestones
    ● Metrics
    ● Potential Pitfalls
    ● Open Questions
    Components of a narrative
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  24. ● User test to verify the problem
    ● Have stakeholders identify issues and opportunities
    ● Confirm metrics with leadership
    Share and get feedback
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  25. ● A meeting with everyone working on the project
    ● 2-3 weeks before coding is anticipated
    ● All members should have reviewed the narrative beforehand
    What is A Kickoff?
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  26. ● Shared understanding of goals
    ● Brainstorm implementation approaches
    ● Design work is outlined
    ● Agreement on an approach + solution
    ● Identify engineering leads
    Kickoff Outputs
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  27. ● Detailed building blocks of work
    ● Tickets should be separate for each platform
    What are Product Specification Tickets
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  28. ● Summary
    ● Assignee
    ● Priority
    ● Due Date
    ● Description
    ● Component
    ● Points
    Fields in A Ticket
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  29. ● Context
    ● Opportunity
    ● Acceptance Criteria
    Content of A Ticket Description
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  30. ● Stands (daily)
    ● Pre-sprint planning
    ● Sprint Planning
    ● Retro (every few weeks)
    Execute in (1-2 week) Sprints
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  31. Celebrate
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  32. ● What was the impact?
    ● Was the feature successful as defined by metrics?
    ● What do the metrics tell us about how we need to iterate?
    Measure Impact
    Process: How ideas come to life

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  33. Agenda
    ● Roles: Who makes up the Venmo Product team
    ● Projects: What Venmo Product works on
    ● Process: How ideas come to life
    ● Transitioning: How to change roles at a technology company

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  34. How to transition roles at a technology company
    1. Excel in your current role

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  35. 2. Take on responsibilities of the role you want to
    assume to the extent you can
    How to transition roles at a technology company

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  36. 3. Communicate your desire to change roles to the
    team you want to switch to
    How to transition roles at a technology company

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  37. Q&A
    @dasmersingh

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