Convergence Points

When your attempts at structure and process fails, what do you do as a TPM? Go back to basics for inspiration.

Being part of a startup has been an education in many subjects. Lately, I've been reflecting on the nature of effective organizations that succeed by moving quickly, staying nimble, making decisions, and achieving their goals.

You've made various attempts to establish structure, but they have all fallen short. The sprint process you tried didn't catch on. The document writing culture you wanted to build only lasted until receiving a panic message from leadership. The demos you planned were overshadowed by scheduling issues. And those decision frameworks you believed the company desperately needed were not maintained by leadership.

Yet, you continue to hear the same frustrations time and time again:

• The engineering team feels that there is no priority given to their work.

• The product team can't figure out why the roadmap keeps slipping.

• Designers are frustrated that their work always comes back with the request to "make it simple."

• The QA and test teams don't know what to test, so they end up testing everything.

As Technical Program Managers, it is disheartening to witness your attempts at implementing effective processes consistently fail. You might blame yourself for not following through with your own plans or feel that you could have done more evangelism or been more inclusive. Looking back, what should you do now? Should you give up? Try something new? Or perhaps try the same approach with more rigor?

My advice is to go back to the basics. When you find yourself in this situation, focus on the one thing that truly matters in my opinion: conversations.

All successful cross-functional projects have one common thread: meaningful conversations. These conversations occur between leaders, individuals, teams, and departments.

At their core, PRDs, meetings, steering committees, demos, and project plans are all forms of conversations. It may seem obvious, but it's often overlooked.

It's widely known that communication becomes more challenging as companies and teams grow. We introduce processes in the hopes of bridging those gaps.

Conversations are grand “convergence points” that bring different systems together to achieve a common objective.

Perhaps the process you introduced didn't facilitate conversations; instead, it hindered them.

Maybe the decision framework you wanted leadership to adopt was too rigid and impeded open conversation.

Or perhaps that meeting you organized was too broad, with too many attendees, leading to breakdowns in communication.

Remember, conversations don't have to be limited to in-person interactions or meetings. Conversations can manifest in many forms. What matters is asking yourself whether a particular approach or method will facilitate or hinder conversation.

Until next time! 👋🏽

-Aadil

Convergence