FlowCon 2019 - Beyond the Black Hole: Product Management for Continuous Delivery

Elizabeth Ayer

Closing the Loop
Product Management for
Continuous Delivery

@ElizAyer #FlowCon19
Kirkaldy stopped
bridges falling down

Kirkaldy stopped
trains derailing

by testing materials
and components

Could tell whether
something had ﬂaws in
weeks rather than years

This led to faster
delivery, lower cost of
maintenance, and safety

Continuous Delivery

Continuous Delivery:
Get useful software to
users quickly, safely,
and sustainably

Version
Control
Continuous
Integration
Release
Management Production
Design, Dev,
Test, Review
Performance
User
Acceptance
Pre-production

CD presents opportunities to
Product Managers

From the Big Bang…

https://www.slideshare.net/indrisrozas/example-requirements-speciﬁcation

Then we got Agile!
Backlog
Software
Team Product Owner
Icons by freepik at ﬂaticon.com

… to Black Holes?
Backlog
Software
Team Product Owner
Real Users
Icons by freepik at ﬂaticon.com

… to Black Holes

Signs of Black Hole Agile
• Done means coded/tested/released (not validated)

• Releases celebrated more than user success

• No feature ever fails

• Planning starts with feature ideas

What lies
beyond the
black hole?

Closing the Loop

Closing the loop is easy
1. Describe the outcome
2. Ship software
3. Measure

Objective-setting
frameworks
Objectives and Key Results (OKRs)
Also, 4 Disciplines of Execution (4DX), Key
Performance Indicators (KPIs), SMART goals,
Performance Measurement Process (PuMP),
Big Small Quick (BSQ), North Star
Framework…

OKR example: Conference
From previous years, they’ve established categories that they believe correlate
with attendee satisfaction, and hence drive recommendation and repeat
attendance: Registration, Speaker Quality, and Lunch
Objective Keep user satisfaction with registration high

Key result 1 Get more than 90% of registrants into the
hall before ﬁrst session.

Product Managing for CD
#1
Align at the level of intent

#1
Align at the level of intent,
check and change course

But it’s probably OK if
we don’t measure, right?

But it’s probably OK if
we don’t measure, right?
NO

@ElizAyer #FlowCon19 http://ai.stanford.edu/~ronnyk/ExPThinkWeek2009Public.pdf

Obviously value can go
down as well as up when
a “feature” is added

https://www.slideshare.net/EhudUdiWaizer/ui-origin
https://www.slideshare.net/EhudUdiWaizer/ui-origin

“We have a lot of
metrics, but it isn’t
changing anything.”

The difference is
culture

CULTURE is “a pattern of
shared basic assumptions
that the group learned …
that has worked well
enough to be considered
valid and, therefore, to be
taught to new members as
the correct way”
Edgar Schein
Organizational Culture and
Leadership

Product wins when we extend
the CD (DevOps) culture

Feedback
Autom
ation
Build quality in
Shared
responsibility
https://www.martinfowler.com/bliki/DevOpsCulture.html
Autonomous
teams
No silos
Organizational Culture
Team Culture
DevOps Culture

Feedback
Autom
ation
Build quality in
Shared
responsibility
Autonomous
teams
No silos

Team Culture
DevOps Culture
Product CultureValidation

Primary mechanisms
to embed culture (Schein)
• Attention

• Reactions to big events

• Resource & reward allocation

• Role modelling, teaching, coaching

GOAL: KEEP THE GOAL IN MIND

Promoting a close-
the-loop culture
• Make objective and current results visible

• Normalise working in small batches

• Make time to collect and analyse results

• Act on what you learn

CD presents challenges to
Product Managers

Continuous Delivery
feedback cycles
Dev CI Production
Dave Farley, Private Communication

Continuous Delivery
feedback cycles
Dev CI Production

Despite better dev practices,
teams were feeling disengaged,
and decision-making was slow.

#2
Empower your teams to avoid
being bottlenecked on product
decisions

How we broke and fixed
team autonomy
The 'A' Word
Elizabeth Ayer
@ElizAyer

@ElizAyer #FlowCon19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqmdLcyES_Q
Train in
product:
scope,
ordering,
timing,
thinking
commercially

Feedback
Autom
ation
Build quality in
Shared
responsibility
Autonomous
teams
No silos

Team Culture
DevOps Culture
Product CultureValidation Empowerment

Validation culture and
empowerment are not easy

… but we can recognise the
challenges for what they are
and make progress together!

Goal-setting

Culture and Empowerment

FlowCon 2019 - Beyond the Black Hole: Product Management for Continuous Delivery

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FlowCon 2019 - Beyond the Black Hole: Product Management for Continuous Delivery