Throughout 2009, I struggled to find the right tool set for the product development and roadmap planning. I was mostly working with external resources, with limited budgets and I also made the switch from PC to Mac, so there were a lot of adjustments.

I moved from Visio to OmniGraffle and from MS Project to Omni-Plan, but what I found for the most part, was that there are a lot of tools out there that achieve similar results, so it’s not the ‘technology’ that’s important, it’s how you use it.

My advice? Have a plan in place, not only for ‘project management’, but for yourself personally, as a Product Manager. Know that for internal concept work, you are only going to use quick and dirty tools like Skitch, and you’ll only consider wireframing tools once you know the concept is solid. Have a plan, and be brave.

Here’s some of my favourites from 2009 which I plan to continue using in 2010…

Planning tools
OmniPlan for roadmaps and Green-hopper/Jira for issues management and sprint planning

Wireframing tools
OmniGraffle for basic wireframes (recommend the Pro version only), Skitch for super quick mark-ups, Jing for video screen captures, and Photoshop for more detailed designs. I also find Formspring (and similar form creation tools) useful – it’s particularly helpful for demos, so you can actually show your colleagues/clients a working prototype of your forms (with conditions etc).

Document management
Confluence for ‘wiki’ style communication, GoogleDocs for document collaboration (not the most advanced tools, but they are reliable and easy for everyone to access) and drop-box for file sharing.

(I can see a pattern emerging in my personal usage with OmniGroup and Atlassian products, but I’m no loyalist, so if you have any other recommendations, I’m open to ideas!)

I’m also keen to try Google Wave as a collaboration tool for product planning. After all, it’s been designed as a collaboration tool, so it will be interesting to see the uptake in industry.

The other tool I’d like to use more in 2010 is my voice. In 2010, I’d like to have more phone calls, more skype talks, more face to face meetings, more voiceovers on my videos, more informal chats and overall, more vocal communication. Tone conveys so much, and without it, so much is lost. Emoticons just don’t cut it anymore.

In keeping with my voice-activation aspirations for 2010, I’ve arranged a F2F meetup for Product Mavens – our first meetup for 2010!

When: Thursday, 21 Jan, from 8.30am onwards (til about 10am)

Where: Cook & Archie’s 1a/4 Buckingham St, Surry Hills

Topic: What tools or frameworks will you be using to plan your product roadmap and related activities for 2010?

Hope to chat with you soon!

Here’s the insights:

Employ processes that work for you. Everything will work a lot better if everyone is on the same page – with the same expectations. Having solid processes (be it ‘agile’ or whatever works best for your team) can be a lifesaver, especially around stressful times like releases when you don’t want to be thinking about how to administer the project, you just want to be thinking about all the individual tasks that need to be finalised!

Get into a routine and stick to it. If it doesn’t work, make small changes every few days/weeks until you get it right. Making radical process changes can be very confusing, so take baby steps and get everyone’s input and agreement before implementing the changes.

Use your tools effectively. There’s loads of ways to communicate with your remote teams without investing in huge overheads. I find that (like with processes) it’s best to stick to a few tools and use them effectively.

My favourites are:

• Skype – This is the best replacement for face to face that I’ve found. I use this for our daily scrums/huddles or any other chit-chat that would usually occur F2F. Call costs are cheap, though we stick mostly with chat (so we have records of our conversations).
• Jira – Issue management tools are a must! It forces you to put in place a workflow – just make sure everyone is aware of the process (ie. who to assign tasks to, what is a bug versus an improvement etc). Jira starer licenses are only $10 so it’s worth a try! If you’re into agile, it’s worthwhile checking out Greenhopper while you’re there.
• Confluence – This is like a wiki, and it’s handy for text/documents. For me, it’s where documents go to die, but it’s useful for record keeping. For example, we put all our test cases there  so it’s easy for everyone to access (and yes, we could use google docs or similar, but I found it too confusing – it was better to have a dedicate space). Starter licenses are also available for $10.
• Email – This is really one of the last resorts for communication. It’s too clumsy and things get lost. Plus, a lot of people don’t effectively manage their Inbox (eg. ‘Inbox Zero‘), so it can just turn into a hairy mess! That said, it is of course an essential communication tool – but just make sure everyone uses it in the same way (eg. if you’re using a bug tracking tool, make sure you don’t report bugs via email – it confuses everyone and it’s just likely that the issue will not get fixed!).
• Phone - What else are you meant to do when skype fails?
  
• Text – Have a text policy (or at least acknowledge an agreed protocol). Use text sparingly for blockers only eg. the site is down. Reserve it for the really important issues and you’ll find you get a much better response!

Embrace the cultural. Often working with an outsourced team means working with another culture – one which may or may not be similar to your own. Without harping on about it too much (I’m a student of sociology, so I could rattle on about this forever… buy me a drink and I’ll talk your ear off about this topic!), there are a few basic things to watch for:

• Respect the local age/gender roles – some countries have very strict rules about this and it can impact the structure of your team
• Be mindful of the local festivals and holidays and try not to schedule your major releases around these times if at all possible
• Be aware of the politeness rules that many cultures adopt (eg. always saying ‘yes’ to a superior)
• Be aware of the company’s hierarchy when dealing with conflict resolution / HR issues

Play nice. Without having ever met face to face, and with only a handful of skype calls each week, it’s easy to forget that it’s real people, not magical freaking pixies, who are completing tasks. Treat outsourced developers as you would your in-house developers, invest some time in small talk, say ‘hi’ once in a while and (without being too naff) make sure they know ‘you’ are a real person’. It makes late night releases and problem solving a whole lot easier if you understand the personalities you’re working with!

Tip: Fusion food is tricky and knowing which spices work well together is an art. Does szechuan and fennel work together? How about turmeric and oregano? It’s worth a try, but always be sure to taste it before you serve it to your loved ones.

Sometimes, I find it easier to understand a process when I don’t apply it to my ‘area of expertise’. Whether my product is the next Twitter of Facebook, or if I’m simply planning to make a birthday cake, the process is essentially the same.

You’re probably wondering at this point how pesto fits into product planning? Well, wonder no more!

Pesto is a super simple product, so it serves as a great test case… but don’t be fooled! There are tonnes of user cases. There’s lots of flavour options (I often make coriander & almond pesto, carrot pesto etc). There are many competitors. And within pesto ‘the category’, there are a myriad of product lines. Each product line suited to a different market segment … a different vision.

Let’s start with a quick poll…

If you have a great product planning process, then you probably shouldn’t read this. But feel free to add your comments and tips below!

I think the key to a great product is great planning. And it’s hard to have a great plan without a great process. Today, instead of using dry ingredients like sign up screens and server loads, let’s look at the high level product process through pesto goggles.

Have you ever made pesto? No? Well, then let’s start with a basic recipe: Combine basil, garlic, pine nuts Parmesan or Pecorino cheese and olive oil.

It’s dead easy. Right?

WRONG! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve eaten horrid pesto (think: that jar of pesto that’s been sitting in the back of your friend’s fridge since 1986).

Revisiting focus!

In an earlier blog post, I spoke about (brutal) focus, broken into the following sections (thx @liubinskas)

• Vision
• Market Segment
• Core Feature
• Key Metric

As we learned earlier, pesto has 5 simple ingredients: basil, garlic, pine nuts, cheese and olive oil. But it’s dead easy to fuck up.

Let’s journey through this process to start up Mishy’s Multinational Pesto Corporation Pty Ltd, which will no doubt be cash flow positive by year end.

Vision:

For the pesto product plan, my vision couldn’t be clearer! I want to make the world’s #1 Best Pesto! It’s so simple… Let’s move on.

Market segment

Who am I making this pesto for? Who is my #1 ideal customer? Is it sold at a Saturday market? In the local corner shop? In a supermaket chain? Who is it best for? Am I really going global right away?

We encounter our first stumbling block. We need to refine the vision…

Vision 2.0:

I want my Pesto to be the #1 Pesto on sale at the Fox Studio Saturday Farmers Market (let’s start small, we don’t want to get carried away).

That’s better. The vision now helps me understand my market segment. I even know when and where I’m distributing, and the likely customer reach (mid-upper class foodies and families).

The more refined my vision is, the more likely I’ll get an early win. But is my vision too narrow? Maybe I should aim higher? #1 Pesto on sale in Australia? Too high! #1 Pesto on sale in Sydney’s Gourmet Markets & Stores?

Ask yourself ‘is my vision realistic?’ If your vision is too big, you’ll most likely feel deflated before you reach your end goal. Start small and build up from there.

I’m settling with “#1 Pesto on sale at Sydney’s Farmers Markets & Gourmet Grocery Stores”

This still covers a lot of ground. Sydney (whilst not as big as New York or Shanghai) does still have a lot of gourmet food outlets & farmers markets.

So, now we go back to market segment…

Market segment 2.0

I’m going to target middle aged affluent, educated women who live in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney.

Why? Because (based on personal experience & broad stereotypes) often these women either don’t want to cook, don’t have time to cook or don’t know how to cook. They also like to buy presents for dinner parties, for friends, for their children, for Christmas/Chanuka/Housewarmings, thus they can extend my reach.

Core feature

It’s always tough to pick one core feature. I think for this product, it’s a given that it needs to taste like great pesto, but does it need to be the best tasting pesto in the world? Probably not. Is freshness important? Yes. But is it the core feature? Not likely. I need my pesto to stand out. I need one single feature that will make it remarkable. That will make it stand apart from all the other pesto on sale at the market.

So, in this instance, I’m being brave and opting for stunning packaging as my core feature. I know that if it doesn’t stand out, it won’t sell. It needs make noise. It needs to look like a gift. Something you could take to your friends place for dinner in place of a good bottle of wine or box of Lindt chocolate.

I know, I know, of course, it has to taste great (ie. it has to work), but for my market segment it really needs to look impressive. Whether they gift the pesto or keep it for themselves, it needs to feel like a real treat. An indulgence. It should even have a gift tag so people know that it’s perfectly acceptable to give to a dinner party host. (In future I may even include an option for the pesto pamper hampers which can be delivered, like flowers, to your loved ones, but let’s keep it simple for now!)

So, in sum, my core feature is actually the bottle which showcases the pesto!

Key metric

This could simply be ‘number of sales/day’ to begin with.

In future, I’ll track number of hampers sent, number of repeat sales, or number of subscribers (in my ideal world, people subscribe to pesto) but like I said, I’m keeping it simple while I’m in start up mode.

What else have a learned about my product through this process?

I know it needs to be good quality. It needs to taste fantastic. It needs to look expensive. It needs to be fresh. I can’t cut corners because these people expect the best (no substituting pine nuts for walnuts to reduce the cost ok?). It needs to last for a while out of the fridge if I’m going to sell it at Farmers Markets.

I know my price point (a little less than a decent bottle of wine eg. $15-20). Maybe I need to bundle the pesto with free home made lavosh crackers so they feel like they are getting good value? That would also mean that it’s ‘ready to go’ straight from the Farmers Market to the lunch table.

I know my vision, my market segment, my key feature & my metric… Now what?

The next step is research! Confirm your assumptions. Go to the markets. Check out what else is on sale. Taste the competition. Speak with the stall holders. Find out how much foot traffic is likely each Saturday. Check out the Gourmet food outlets in the area. Get out there and ask some questions!!!

I’ve done some research… where to from here?

Now I know what I’m making, who I’m making it for, what my goal is and how I’m going to track my success, I just need to make a checklist of the next steps:

1. Budget – how much is it going to cost to produce and how much do I need to sell to make a return?
2. Time line – do I to have something ready this Saturday or is there a 6 month waiting period for a stall at the market?
3. Resourcing – am I making it at home, by myself? In my tiny mortar and pestle? Or should I outsource it? Will I run the stall or hire a more polished sales person?
4. Distribution – Where are you going to target first? Start with the Fox Studios Farmers Market, then tackle Ultimo, Glebe, Rozelle?
5. Marketing – How are you going to market your product? Are you going to advertise or is word of mouth sufficient? Are you offering a starter special (2 for 1) or will this cheapen the brand? Are you hosting a dinner party for gourmet foodies to up-sell your product? (I know most product plans don’t include marketing, but I think it’s important to have an idea of how the product is going to be marketed, so you can ensure you are creating something desirable for the customer you’re trying to reach. If you don’t know how you’re going to reach your market, how are you going to get your plan off the ground?). It’s a bit of chicken-and-egg, but if you don’t plan you plan to fail!

Of course, this is only a high level product plan. But it’s a step in the right direction toward global domination (or whatever it is that you’re trying to achieve). Remember, the more refined your plan is to begin with, the less headaches you’ll have down the track!

What’s your #1 product planning tip?

Tip: If you want your pesto to stay green add a handful of chopped flat leaf parsley to the mix.

It was interesting to watch the unbridled optimism shift toward defeat and mediocrity as small, tangible (and most importantly realistic) goals were set.

The session’s main aim was to focus on the…

• Vision
• Market Segment
• Core Feature
• Key Metric

Yet, it amazes me how much I gained from this experience.

Here’s my ‘take homes’…

1. Join in – If you aren’t part of the conversation then you’ll never get anywhere.
2. Be brave – Pick an idea and run with it. After all, there are no stupid ideas, just ideas that need to be refined.
3. Failure is fine – If you don’t try, you can’t fail, and if you’re not failing (somewhere) then you haven’t tried hard enough.
4. Love your team – If you’re working in a small team on a tight time-line and budget, there’s no room for ego. It’s important to actually want to work with your team (even if you don’t get your  way).
5. Focus! Focus! Focus! I know it’s obvious, but no matter how many times I hear it, it’s always good to hear it again!

Thanks & congratulations to Kim, Bart, Brian, Mick and all the participants & organisers at #bootupcamp!