Tackling the problem: A simple three-part framework to align your team’s efforts

Unifying your team's efforts can often feel like a daunting task. Discover a straightforward three-part framework that can help streamline this process. This approach aims to tackle the problem head-on, fostering alignment and enhancing productivity within your team.

Aligning on 3 things before diving into a solution

Start with the problem: What outcome does the customer want? Why do they want it? What problems currently exist that prevent them from achieving it?

• A well-crafted problem statement ensures the team shares an understanding of the core problem your customers are facing.
• Not every problem is created equal, and their solutions shouldn’t be either. By failing to acknowledge the differences early, teams risk misallocating focus and energy when solving problems, investing too much or too little in each one.

Align your team and stakeholders early to maximize success

This framework is a useful tool for defining and communicating your team’s approach to a project.

How to Rank

Innovation can be defined as building something new, different, and better

• Before starting a project, consider potential innovation within product strategy, product strategy and execution levels
• At the product strategy level, does this project sit within a product area that requires an innovative solution?
• In the execution level, contributes to differentiation or closing product gaps
• If the problem is directly tied to your product’s differentiation, innovation should be higher, and the team should spend more time thinking big, evaluating multiple directions, and iterating before committing to a solution.
• On the other hand, if the sole goal is to close product gaps, low innovation is appropriate.

Example 1: Inbox 2

A forthcoming feature will substantially change the way the Inbox looks and feels for the user.

• Project priority: Thinking big
• Teams contributing: Multiple
• Time spent: One to two quarters
• Approach: We’ve committed to spend time thinking big

How to rank

Can your team solve this alone? If not, investment will be higher

• How will you prioritize against other problems? Would you spend more time solving this problem than others?
• When ranking investment, ensure your team has a practical understanding of what it will take to complete a project

WhatsApp integration

Project priority: Speed

How to Rank

Urgency can have both top-down and bottom-up inputs

• Product and launch strategies can dictate a problem’s urgency from the top down
• If your strategy demands a compelling solution in one core area, the urgency to build that solution will be higher
• Customer impact can be a strong signal of urgency if a problem has a major impact on how customers use and enjoy the product

Consider all three elements together to align on the project’s focus

The confluence of these three elements will dictate what steps your team should prioritize for the project and roughly how long they should spend on each

• Speed: this is about quickly achieving a successful customer outcome
• Innovation: look at the big picture and explore multiple different solutions
• Urgency: focus on short-term gain

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