Ways of working — Having common language is good but same interpretation is more important. Here is why and how
Here is part 1 on this story — Ways of working:It all starts with own experience for designers and why it matters
An organization is a system of different functions like business, engineering, products, data analytics, data science, design etc… Each of this works and deliver best from within towards common vision. Each function is lead by own leadership and cross functional leaderships at top might agree on common vision, goals and what are they going to enable and deliver for organization. They may have common language to understand each other world. This doesn’t meant teams working at execution level understand in same way.
Each function has their own language based on their nature of work and process. All team members within that function understand it very well. It’s very important to note that it’s not single function that walks on organization vision and deliver everything by own. For better ways of working It’s common and good practice to talk common language for better cross functional collaboration. This is not enough.
Having common language is good start but more important to have same interpretation at both leadership and execution levels. A visualisation has super power for same interpretation & synergy over big words.
Words cloud
There is words cloud below with big words open for self interpretation and confusion. This has different meaning for different function and team members. This is called “Mental metadata” problem, the reality that each team member has a differing understanding of these words and concepts.
This is the very human tendency to assume that everyone else has the same level of understanding. We can’t effectively make the point when we fail to realize that what is abundantly clear to one, may be unfamiliar or confusing to others.
Telling stories with these words, multiple times on different occasions does not guarantee success. Most team members and leaders settle for “message sent” without realising that the goal is actually “message received.” Generic messages go over other’s minds quickly drifting elsewhere.
Success demands actions and contributions by all teams towards the same vision. Actions need to be followed based on same interpretation of these words without any mental gap, noise and fog.
Questions are
(1) How do all these big words fit together seamlessly? They are great to talk about in theory, but how do we apply them in real life?
(2) How can we make sure these words covey the same meaning to each team member in all cross functions, not only at leadership level but execution level too?
(3) How can we make sure these words are aligned with organization vision, strategy and setup the direction as whole?
I believe, If meaning of “Outcomes” is well defined and put across with alignment, It becomes easy for everyone to understand and resonate their work towards larger vision. It’s so powerful and connecting tissue for everything teams aspire to achieve. This helps them to understand what they need to do and why with clear purpose.
Inspired by Tim Simmon (on Fly wheel and Member obsession culture at Walmart) and based on knowledge from Jeff Gothelf, Melissa Perri Teresa Torres, I was able to synthesise the “The Result Framework”: Outputs → User outcomes → Business impact.
There are 2 levels in an organization:
Leadership — Strategy
Cross functional leaders are responsible for vision, strategy and direction at organization level. They think ahead of time like next 5–8 years and define where should they take organization in future with sort & long term goals and how.
More focus is on delivering values to customers (outcomes), business(impact). Based on some facts, assumptions, treads, tech advancement, competition, past learning, they define initiatives for products & services to focus and deliver. They associate each initiative with expected business impact.
They believe that delivering those initiatives on time should give an edge and move the needle in positive direction. They prioritise and pass on these initiates to Product trio in form of inputs — This is the team, responsible to act on those initiatives and deliver on time.
Product trio — Execution
This team is more focused on executing initiatives (inputs) based on priorities and brief, known and unknown areas. They relay on discovery — to do the right things in problem/opportunity space and delivery — do the things right in solution space.
Goal for this team is to make sure they deliver values to customers in form of outcomes and achieve expected business impact.
In order to reach achieve goal, they need various resources and perform activities to create artifacts/deliverables in form of outputs. These outputs should generate intended value to customers in form of outcomes. Values delivered to customer should result value for business in form of impact. This is actual impact of delivered initiative.
All teams do retrospective on expected impact vs actual impact. They measure, learn and do iterate with new outocme and impact. This completes the cycle of Outputs → Users outcomes → Business impact.
Outcome is essentially a change in user journey map (As-is vs To-be) and main anchor for everyone. All need to agree upon what are we aiming to change in user’s life and how can it be measured.
Revisit below framework and contemplate on definition of phases from (1) to (5) with examples below.
Design thinking connects Users (Outcome) with Product trio (Outputs) and Product thinking connects Users (Outcome) with Business (Impact).
Cross functional teams can not directly influence business impact metrics. All they have in their control is to create various outputs and influence outcome metric. This outcome metric is leading indicator to business impact metric that is lagging indicator.
This is also valid that teams start with an input/idea and later connect with Outputs → Outcome → Impact. We may not have outcome and impact metrics all the time. It’s advisable to have clear intention in users and business spaces. This intention will surface next steps and direction towards the common goal.
Product manager has crucial role to define aligned outcome / clear intention and Product designer is ready to design for that experience.
Main takeaways
- All business is bet on future user behaviours (Outcomes). So leaders need to define whose behavior will change, how and how will that lead to more impact.
- Leaders need to come up with focused strategy (Where we will play, How we will compete and Why we will win) that create proper alignment with teams. Teams need focus and clarity to wisely invest their time and resources.
- Focus and act for outcomes aligned with impact, not just outputs created by technologies, tools and internal actions.
- For better ways of working, It’s good to have common language but more important to have same interpretation at both strategy and execution level. Visualisation has super power than mere words.
- Be very vigilant about your work. Is it in output mode vs outcome mode vs impact mode? As a cross functional team — (1) Connect impact and outcomes with measurable metrics and then (2) Connect various outputs from different functions towards desired outcome metric. This is also true that you start with an input/idea and later you connect with Outputs → Outcome → Impact.
Stay tune for more insights, learning on this vision.
Feel free to share your point of view, observations, learning in comments. To learn more, follow me on Linkedin.
Disclaimer
This is my understanding out of my research, curiosity and learning from other professionals. This has nothing to do with my current and past employers.
