Playing nicely with others

Throughout my time as a product manager, I learned a lot about working with others, especially software developers. All I can say is I really like the way developers work, and think.

I did find that sometimes my actions as a PM would upset my team. While this at first perplexed me, I eventually learned the appropriate role for a PM to play within a scrum team. More importantly, I learned what role not to play.

Developers get annoyed, and rightfully so, when PMs start solutioning. Solutioning is like standing on the right side of the escalator in Tokyo. It’s a big no no. Solutioning is essentially when a PM says, “We are going to build this” and shows the team a mockup of some random new product. The team just sits there blankly wondering: 1) What problem are we actually solving 2) Why is this the best solution and 3) Where were we when this solution was concocted?

Software developers, like any employee, value having the autonomy to make their own decisions. If you take that autonomy away, employees start losing motivation and disliking their role. Software developer are not on your team to just code. They are there to solve your problems. They are paid to help think of creative technical solutions.

As a PM, your job is to bring well defined problems to your team, not well defined solutions.