There is an expression in Swedish "eldsjäl" it translates into the soul of fire. It describes an extremely passionate individual. A person that can do and is doing everything. I spent some time with people working with NGO development. They claimed that organizations built on "Eldjälar" (souls of fire) will always collapse. I was intrigued: "Why?" I asked them. "teams, will always be more sustainable than individuals."
I started reflecting on the words of wisdom and the product people I have met. Many product managers are TOO ambitious! Know too much! Do too much! The team is the most crucial aspect of the product management work. The Product Manager must secure that Product Management is done. But we don't need to do everything!
But how can we create an environment for teams and collaborations? In an earlier webinar with Roman Pichler we discussed how to deal with stakeholders. But there are also other solutions to the problem of teams.Solutions based on proactivity.
Designing an organization and a way of working will make it easier to collaborate. Heather Kay shared the process and the result of their new way of working at Synchron. I was inspired by how they involved colleagues in the process. Firstly, they chose a starting point and visualized the existing way of working. Then, they started improving the process and integrated the heart of UX with the logic of Product Management.
Now they have established and already implemented a documented way of working. The terminology makes it easier for everyone to contribute in the product management work. They are building sustainable product teams!
