The journey from a project-focused to a product-oriented model requires a thoughtful and multi-faceted approach, demanding time, effort, and patience along the way. Here's a feasible and engaging path I see for an organisation's teams to navigate this shift effectively.

Understanding the "Why" and setting the vision

• Articulate why the organisation wants to make this transition: What problems are they trying to solve? What benefits are they hoping to achieve (e.g., increased customer satisfaction, faster time-to-market, recurring revenue, better innovation)? A clear "why" will provide motivation and direction.

• Develop a compelling vision of what a product-oriented organisation looks and feels like. Share this vision broadly and consistently across all levels. Emphasise the benefits for employees, customers, and the business as a whole.

• This transformation requires strong leadership commitment and active sponsorship. Leaders champion the change, allocate resources, and model the desired behaviours.

Building the strategy around customers

• Deep Customer Understanding is paramount. Organisations need to invest in understanding their customers deeply through various methods:

  • Conduct surveys, interviews, focus groups, and usability testing to understand their needs, pain points, motivations, and desired outcomes.

  • Analyse customer data (e.g., usage patterns, service requests, requested and used data, CSAT) to identify trends and insights.

  • Create visual representations of customer thoughts, feelings, behaviours, and pain points.

  • Map out the end-to-end customer experience to identify opportunities for improvement and value creation.

  • Encourage teams to interact directly with customers to build empathy and understanding.

• Identify distinct groups of customers with shared needs and create detailed personas to represent them. This helps teams focus their efforts and tailor solutions.

• Shift the focus from delivering outputs (project deliverables) to achieving desired customer outcomes. What results do customers want to achieve by using the organisation's products or services?

• Create mechanisms for continuous customer feedback. This could include regular surveys, in-app feedback tools, customer advisory boards, and active social media monitoring.

Identifying actual value for customers

• Using tools like the Value Proposition Canvas may help to map the customer journeys, pains, and gains, and then align the organisation's products and services to address them.

• Formulate hypotheses about what customers value and then test those hypotheses through experimentation and data analysis.

• Where and when it's applicable, release early versions of products (like MVPs) or features to gather real-world customer feedback and validate value before investing heavily.

• Analyse the end-to-end process of delivering value to the customer to identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement.

• Use frameworks like RICE (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) or Value vs. Effort to prioritise features and initiatives based on their potential value to customers and the business.

Visualising the strategy and making it clear and reproducible

• Create a visual representation of the product vision, target audience, key features, and business goals. This provides a high-level overview and aligns everyone.

• Develop clear and live (regularly updated) product roadmaps that communicate the strategic direction and planned initiatives over time. These should be visible and accessible to the entire organisation.

• Visually depict the customer experience, highlighting key touchpoints, pain points, and opportunities for value creation.

• Illustrate the flow of value to the customer, making it easier to identify areas for optimisation.

• Define ambitious objectives and measurable key results at the product and team levels. This provides a clear framework for setting goals and tracking progress. Make these OKRs transparent across the organisation.

• For product teams, use visual boards (physical or digital) to track progress, identify roadblocks, and foster transparency.

• Consistently communicate the product strategy, progress, and customer impact through various channels (e.g., town halls, newsletters, internal blogs). Use storytelling to bring the customer's perspective to life.

• Provide coaching, mentoring, training and education to help employees understand the principles of product thinking, customer-centricity, and new ways of working.

• Utilise tools and platforms that facilitate communication and collaboration across product teams and other departments.

What can significantly support the transformation?

Focus on Mindset Shifts. This is crucial. Encourage a shift from a project-delivery mindset to a customer-value mindset. Celebrate customer success and learning.

Start Small and Iterate. Don't try to transform the entire organisation overnight. Identify a few key product areas to pilot the product-oriented model and learn from those experiences.

Empower Product Teams. Give product teams the autonomy and required resources to make decisions and deliver value.

Invest in Product Ownership. Ensure you have skilled and empowered Product Owners who can effectively represent the customer and guide the product strategy.

Measure Progress. Define key metrics to track the progress of the transformation and demonstrate its impact.

Embrace Failure as a Learning Opportunity. Experimentation is key in a product-oriented model. Encourage teams to learn from failures and adapt their approach.

Provide Ongoing Support and Coaching. The transition will require ongoing support and coaching for individuals and teams.

Involve the senior leadership teams. Everything starts from them and finishes on them too. SLT needs to assist product owners and teams to drive the transition but does not command and control them.

In the next note, I put some of my ideas of what are the major "7 sins" that kill this transformation.