Defining and Validating Problems.
How does the product team define and validate problems found in order to improve the product of the company?
Being a member of a product team absolutely necessitates quick thinking, thorough analysis, and precise solutions. However, as a member of the product team, you are required to define a legitimate and validated problem prior to attempting to solve it.
Why should I take a long time to do research just to find a proper problem?
Here are several reasons why an associate PM should focus on defining the problem rather than simply providing a solution:
- The priority of the project
“There is no perfect product in the world and there will never be.” — Pooja Agnihotri
It is common for a product team to come up with multiple types of issues over the course of a period of time because it is known that there is a low probability that everyone will believe a product offered by a company is absolutely flawless. A PM will be able to correctly prioritize the issues that need to be resolved in the correct order if the problem is clearly defined because not all issues should be resolved simultaneously.
- Limitation of time and human resources
The engineer will also be able to see things from the perspective of effort if the problems are clearly defined. Instead of working on multiple projects simultaneously but none of them delivering a smooth experience for the end user, engineers will be able to concentrate on completing and delivering a problem solution on time with the assistance of prioritized problems.
- Fully defining the root cause of the problem
A biased assessment of the main problem’s root cause will result if a problem is not properly defined. Most people don’t do a breakdown of a product’s problem, but PMs are responsible for defining a problem down to its underlying causes to ensure that a chosen solution completely addresses the issue.
What type of methods can a PM use to gather a Problem?
- Data Analytics
Using Data Analytics, a PM can determine which efforts are successful and which are unsuccessful. It is beneficial to acquire the fundamental knowledge of reading processed data that has been visualized in a dashboard, even though advanced skills in querying large amounts of data are not required.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of using Data Analytics for PM to gather a problem?
Advantages: If the data is thoroughly processed, data analytics will provide the PM with accurate customer behavior; it will also allow the PM to examine what works well and what doesn’t in the customer’s life journey; and it is one of the most reliable methods because the data comes directly from the customer.
Disadvantages: In the early stages of a start-up, not all businesses provided a well-built data team, so the job desk of gathering and visualizing the data into a relatively clear dashboard will be dependent on the data team if the PM does not have sufficient data-processing skills; If the data lifecycle is not constructed correctly, it also becomes a bottleneck in the early stages of the company.
- Group Discussions
The goals of group discussions are to define several of the main problems’ root causes from various perspectives. Stakeholders typically participate in group discussions in order for the PM to explain and solicit feedback on the current issue facing the company, the Business Development team in order to consider a number of potential solutions, and customer service representatives, who frequently interact with customers and probably have a better understanding of their habits.
What are the pros and cons of implementing group discussions to find the problem?
Advantages: A PM will have a broader perspective on the experiences customers have had while using products because the group discussions bring together a large number of people from the customer’s life. In addition, the gathering of information and concerns from a large number of individuals will enable the PM to consider a problem possibility that he or she had never considered before.
Disadvantages: In some kinds of business, the hierarchy will limit the staff’s ability to express their opinions as a result of a large number of participants joining to provide their perspectives. A paper-written-based solution is a good way to solve the hierarchy and get past this issue.
- User Research Data
The UX team can collect user research data from user research, which provides an answer from real users regarding their opinion of the products. Data from the Appstore and Playstore, as well as complaints that the customer service department receives over time, can also be used to analyze and verify a problem.
Advantages: Because it comes from customers and the customers who give it their opinions are the ones who are already involved in the product’s customer life journey, user research data is the most reliable data for analyzing customer pain points and taking them as a problem to solve.
Disadvantages: Finding suitable and trustworthy customers to interview about the product can be difficult in some cases. Likewise, relying solely on the information in the review section can sometimes be inaccurate because we may still find user reviews that are unrelated to the product.
- Customer Journey Mapping
The customer experience within the company is put into and visualized through this kind of research. It incorporates the customers’ feelings at every stage of the experience in a common way. When it comes to mapping a customer’s journey, several factors are essential: phase (awareness, consideration, and decision), the customer’s interaction, and how it feels about each one.
Advantages: This mapping will make it easier for a PM to look up and identify the pain point that customers are experiencing at the time because it specifically describes the customer’s step into the product and includes their emotions.
Disadvantages: Journey mapping may be regarded as a not-really-reliable result for a product that is segmented into various types of persona segmentation because different personas will lead to different customer journeys. Furthermore, because the customer journey can change rapidly, conducting this research requires more effort.
Above is an example of Tokopedia’s as my team studies cases in doing customer journey mapping regarding the purchase cycle in e-commerce.
Summary: As none of the above-explained methods can be guaranteed as the best methods to define and validate problems, a PM will have to use his/her intuition to determine what kind of method suits best its products and company.
Note: The article I provided above is from what I have learned in my online-Bootcamp and the customer’s journey mapping is what my teams have to try to come up with as part of our final projects.
