Subnostr

I hate product owners that demand every story has some immediate appreciable benefit to the user experience.

1) It makes velocity of green field projects look like the team is sitting on their thumbs for weeks while they bootstrap all the infrastructure (database schema, scaffolding code, CI/CD)

2) It forces the engineering team to rush past the initial phase of the project, so they can start increasing their main KPI: velocity. When you rush, you create technical debt that you have to live with for future iterations, hampering future velocity

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Discussion

The Fockin’ Fury 2y ago

I’m a product owner in the IRL fiat mines and I feel this deeply and am also powerless to stop it. Too often it’s underlying business pressure that creates this dynamic. I could write your post from a PM’s perspective but replace the words “product owner” with “bizops” and have something equally accurate. The truth is that quarterly revenue pressures are a bitch for shipping good product.

nikotsla 2y ago

"you have to live with for future iterations" but not the Product Owner, they "migrate" or "leave" 🏃‍♂️ It's all about business, like #[2] just comment.

Rich Nost 2y ago

God, isnt that the truth. I've had more than one PO who was an inveterate climber that would prioritize delivery over quality every time, because the role was just a stepping stone to the C-Suite. Now they're probably all CPO's that rain their shitty culture down on the whole product group.

The Fockin’ Fury 2y ago

Speaking as a product leader myself, PMs who prioritize delivery over everything else, absent a specific business mandate to do so in the short term, are shitty PMs that I would not endorse for promotion. That kind of shit is wack and I hope never to work in a fiat mine with that kind of product culture.