

Product management is still generating requirements, but these more often come in the form of user stories. Instead of being handed a paint-by-numbers picture of what to build, UX and product development play a more active role in determining what gets made.


Product releases tend to get spread out, scheduled, and, in most cases, things don’t ship until they’re complete.īut in an Agile world, the organization follows a different path once everyone agrees on the strategy.

The modus operandi here is “build me exactly what I asked for.” UX and product development would grab the baton, get to work, and pass it off to QA after weeks or months. In a traditional waterfall environment, product managers would create detailed product requirements documents, listing out every parameter of the feature, use cases, acceptance criteria, and maybe even wireframes or mockups. It’s what happens next where things diverge. They’re typically organized and presented to stakeholders in a product roadmap.Īgile or waterfall, the above, high-level view of the role doesn’t change. These product elements intend to delight customers, illustrate the product’s value, build loyalty, and generate revenue (or other KPIs the organization values ).
Agile product manager how to#
They then determine how to pursue that strategy and its related goals and objectives by prioritizing different initiatives, many of which they identify using quantitative and qualitative research tactics. Product managers are responsible for creating a product strategy in collaboration with their stakeholders and securing organizational buy-in and alignment. Regardless of the methodologies employed or the environment where they work, the fundamentals of being a product manager shouldn’t change. The learning curve isn’t quite as steep as it may seem for both newcomers and veterans. The role’s processes, artifacts, and traditions have been upended, with old-timers scrambling to adapt while newcomers see Agile as how business gets done.Īgile product management comes with new rules, new tools, and new expectations. While this Agile wave has shaken up the status quo for many disciplines, product managers have been uniquely impacted by Agile overtaking their corporate cultures. Combined with increased experienced Agile practitioners eager to transplant their favored methodologies to new workplaces, along with consultants and coaches ready to ease the transformation, Agile has become a certainty in most industries. There’s something comfortable and reassuring about the old way and its command-and-control, predictable nature of product development.īut the ability to rapidly respond to shifting market conditions and quickly incorporating new technology has made Agile too tempting to resist for many. Its appeal is apparent-shortening timelines, maximizing productivity, empowering agile decision making, and creating autonomy-yet it comes with tradeoffs.
Agile product manager software#
Since then, Agile has infiltrated not just software development but many other industries. Agile product management might be the “new kid on the block” compared to linear, waterfall development, but the Agile Manifesto was published two decades ago.
