Product Engineering 3.0
You probably have not done Software Engineering 1.0, but you certainly heard some talk or joke about the "Waterfall" development process.
Today, you are almost certainly running on Software Engineering 2.0 - The Agile upgrade.
And if you have been listening to or hanging out with those who are ahead, you have probably thought of or been living this already:
I want to build a product our customers love and see as a valuable addition to their lives.
This is Software Product Engineering 3.0 - The Value upgrade. It's rolling out, and you should not miss out on it.
Why should I upgrade?
This upgrade brings you three benefits.
.1Stay competitive.Your value as an engineer will double or triple immediately, and eventually dectuple. This has now become more relevant in the face of AI replacing shallow or low-value work. Producing code and software is next in line.
.2Gain more trust and confidence.Your team will trust you more than anything else for your engagement and focus on delivering value with them.With trust comes freedom. You will leave behind those questions about estimates, number of hours or tickets you delivered, and even what technologies/tools you use.
.3See your impact.You will gain that super power of drawing a direct line between your work and the value you deliver to customers and to the business. With this power, making and owning good decisions becomes effortless.
How do I upgrade?
Focus on value
I have heard way too many engineers talk about their interest in the product they are building in the following way
As a software engineer, I want to participate in key product discussions (planning, user interviews etc)So that I can estimate the effort, help the business make better decisions and ship good software.
This used to be a great sign of an Engineer willing to break out of the software cocoon. But am afraid that isn't enough any more.
You are not there to deliver software, nor to only participate and consult.
You are there to make the decisions together with your team, and be accountable for them.
You are there to deliver value.
This is how to do it.
Learn, think and talk about your end user/customer, market and business with everyone in your team/company, everyday.
Understand your business KPIs, connect them to your work as you form your hypotheses and monitor your impact.
Demand accountability
On the flip side, I have also heard many engineering leads/managers/directors describe and live their role this way
As a tech leader, I want to create a nourishing, safe and supportive environment detached from business discussions and complexitySo that I keep my engineers happy and protect them from ignorant blame
Your job is not to be a protective parent to your engineers.
Your job is to remove opaque walls and make value delivery accessible.
Your job is to drive and empower them to own their decisions and seats in the team.
Start by demanding accountability from your self and your teams. Make sure it's based on value delivery and nothing else.
Let's talk
Outside the technical wordplay/references above, I hope the essence of the message above will lead you to a moment of reflection.
This is a discussion starter, not an end of one. So I'd be very happy to hear your thoughts on it too sarhan.alaa@hey.com . Currently, I'm having two further lines of thought following on this:
- what are the breaking changes to our daily work in terms of tools, processes and habits this upgrade will bring?
- what about our extended responsibility towards larger societal impact, thinking of big tech especially? when and how should we judge on the value we deliver?
Thank you Laura, Armin, Tim , Vini and Felicitas for the deep conversations, great feedback, and fun/productive writing sessions! You turned this into a "collaborative piece by us" rather than "an opinion piece by me".
Thank you Laura, Armin, Tim , Vini and Felicitas for the deep conversations, great feedback, and fun/productive writing sessions! You turned this into a "collaborative piece by us" rather than "an opinion piece by me".
A funny coincidence that had to make it into this one. The feature image is part of the screenshot below, which was the Wordle word of the day I finished writing this piece.
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