Product of Theseus - NIDC2020

Presentation for NI Developer Conference 2020.
https://www.nidevconf.com/sessions/heather-mcnamee/

Do you need to create a clear vision of why your product exists and where it’s going, grounded in the reality of what it does, why, and for what audience? If you’re building products - you’ll find this talk helpful.

Ship of Theseus is a thought experiment about a boat that leaves on a journey and during that voyage, it’s continually mended. When it arrives as its destination, every part has been replaced. This results in a philosophical question: Is it still the same boat?

Transcript

1. The Product of Theseus Heather McNamee - 
 Open Strategy Partners NI Developer Conference 2020
2. Heather McNamee Client operations & Content strategy Contact me @nearlythere heather@openstrategypartners.com About me
3. Connect Grow Communicate
4. How do you express… the value of your product in a way that is grounded in evidence to help users be successful?
5. Hey, there! Help us help people to use our product, pls.
6. OK! First, I gotta know… Who is it for? What do they do with it? Why?
7. Oh… uh… isn’t that your job?
8. Cool cool cool!!
9. My mental model of “a product feature” Affordances, attributes, states, contexts, purpose, outcomes.
10. How do I find this out? Where to start….
11. How do I find this out?
12. interview and observe users interview product team analyse product, docs, code interview stakeholders, sales, c-level
13. Sometimes it gets weird
14. Scary things I’ve seen • Surprised by their own users! BOO! • Sales selling things that don’t event exist. Ghosts! • Painful workarounds that break in new versions. • Features that don’t even get used. • Losing to competition who are better at communication. • No one even knowing what a product actually does, for whom, and why.
15. Zen koan: If there’s a feature But no one uses it… Does it even exist?
16. What even is a product?
18. Is this a boat? Displace water ✅ Cannot move! Cannot control direction!
19. What even is a boat? Displace water ✅ An oar or a sail! A rudder or a keel! Can propel ✅ Control direction ✅
20. Affordances of boats Displace water ✅ Semi-enclosed ✅
21. So… what does this say about products?
22. With each feature, someone had to decide…. Does this feature belong in this product? Who is it for? What are they doing with it? And why?
23. What is the underlying drive and purpose?
24. It’s seaworthy ✅ It’s commemorative ✅ It continues a tradition ✅ SUCCESSFUL PIVOT!
25. How do you make decisions about product direction? How do you express this to stakeholders, decision makers and users?
26. Value Map Target Audience Trust & Vibrancy Signals Buyer’s Journey Editorial Plan Channels & Asset Plan Strategic Narrative Personas OSP Strategic Framework
27. Value Map: What it is what it does, and the value it delivers
28. Living documentation containing an inventory of all features and benefits of a product, expressed as value statements. Value Map - What it is.
29. Clarify, build consensus, enhance understanding: • what our product IS and • what it DOES and • what VALUE it delivers • … in a series of value statements. Value Map - What it does.
30. • Living documentation and • Single source of truth of product and service features, using • Agreed-upon language for all stakeholders. Value Map - Value it Delivers.
31. • Feature - Atomic unit of functionality or attribute. • Activity - How you apply the feature in a workflow or process. • Benefit - The positive result of applying a feature. = Value Statement Anatomy of a Value Statement Value Statement Benefit Activity Feature
32. • Clear vision of the components = clear positioning of the platform. • The positioning statement articulates the fundamental essence of value statements that comprise a product. Positioning Statement Product Positioning Statement Value Statement Feature Area/Activity Benefit Value Statement Value Statement Value Statement
33. Results from qualitative survey of users in the developer persona. • “We develop our Most Products with Symfony. Now we want a CMS with Symfony.” • “Sulu is a Symfony bundle without blocking access to Symfony. So there is great Symfony integration.” • “Symfony Full Stack, use our own business logic.” Case example: Sulu - full-stack Symfony CMS • “innovative backend”
 • “Beautiful backend for content managers.” • “Intuitive modern admin UI yet powerful developer experience.” • “very nice structured admin. good UX/UI” • “The enormous flexibility, lightning-fast support, simplicity of usage for content managers” • "How easy it is to setup a simple website and keep focus on custom development instead of template development” • “Easy extensibility using custom entities”
34. The Value Map Workflow 7. Get to work! (VM is always WIP) 1: Industry Research 2. M arket-Level C ues 3: W orkshops / Interview s 4: Value M ap M odelling 5. Value M ap Drafting 6. Feedback & Iterate
35. Examples of value statements Value Statement Benefit Activity Feature Sulu’s innovative, beautiful backend provides a modern admin UI to simplify your app’s user experience. good user experience build your app with Sulu Flexibility to extend your own custom entities and business logic to seamlessly integrate with Symfony applications. seamless integration integrate with Symfony applications custom entities modern admin UI
36. Sulu’s Guides • Show newcomers how to be successful. • Content for mixed audiences (decision making unit). • Employ the language of the users. • Learn from the experiences of other happy users. https://sulu.io/guides Examples of using it in content strategy
37. Authentic Communication: Compelling & Accurate Empathy Clarity Trust The Value Map helps create accurate content, with clear and consistent language. Authentic Communication
38. What’s Your Story? hello@openstrategypartners.com Heather McNamee heather@openstrategypartners.com
39. @nearlythere https://nearlythere.com/2018/05/30/why-draw-your-next-presentation/
40. What do you consider part of your product? The CLI, the UI, Docs, Services, Support, Marketing…
41. How do I find this out? Where is this information? • In the product? • In a feature list? • The documentation? • In a series of shared (very long) internal process docs that Jill used to maintain, but she moved to another team. And just no one knows anymore.