Product Discovery & Delivery

As the Head of Product Research & Design at FTI Group, my mission was to transform our traditional, project-managed organization into a customer-centric, product-led entity. This involved setting up a robust research infrastructure, adopting modern methodologies, and fostering a culture of continuous discovery and improvement.

Challenge

• Missing Research Process: Research activities were inconsistent and scattered (3rd-Party Brand Surveys), leading to a lack of coherent insights and data-driven decision-making.

• Siloed Teams: Departments operated in isolation, resulting in misaligned goals, inefficient workflows, and a disconnect between product development and user needs.

• Traditional Mindset: The prevailing top-down project management approach stifled innovation and adaptability, making it difficult to respond quickly to market changes and user feedback.

• Limited User Engagement: There was insufficient engagement with users throughout the product development cycle, leading to assumptions that often did not align with actual user needs.

• Intransparent and Inconsistent Metrics: There was a lack of standardized metrics and access to it, to measure the success and impact of products, making it challenging to track progress and identify areas for improvement.

Results

The transformation yielded significant results. Enhanced research capabilities were achieved not only through tools like Dovetail, PowerBI, Adobe Analytics, and Lookback, but also through adapted processes, improved structures, and the addition of dedicated product researchers. These changes improved the frequency and quality of both quantitative and qualitative data collection. A centralized, accessible insights repository ensured efficient sharing and empowered teams to make informed decisions.

Culturally, integrating Continuous Discovery Habits within the teams prioritized user feedback, enhancing our awareness and understanding of customer needs. The Product-Trio model, enhanced with clear definitions of roles (scope and accountabilities) fostered cross-functional collaboration. Each role within the trio took ownership of specific product risks (value, usability, feasibility, and business viability), effectively minimizing them. Combining these approaches with the Double Diamond framework significantly improved the efficiency of our product development process.

Adapting Agile practices like Scrum helped streamline our workflows, resulting in faster product delivery - to be honest not in every team as the maturity was still growing.