Basic Product Concepts

Question 1

Gerkin

Answer 1

Business readable language which helps you to describe business behavior without going into details of implementation.

Given/When/Then

Used for BDD (Behaviour-Driven Development)

Question 2

Feature/Given/When/Then syntax belongs to…

Answer 2

Gerkin language

Question 3

PRD

Answer 3

A product requirements document (PRD) is a document containing all the requirements to a certain product.

It is written to allow people to understand what a product should do.

A PRD should, however, generally avoid anticipating or defining how the product will do it in order to later allow interface designers and engineers to use their expertise to provide the optimal solution to the requirements.

Question 4

RSD

Answer 4

Requirements and Specifications Document (project management).

Produced by the requirements engineering process; describes all requirements for the system under design.

Question 5

Cost of Delay

Answer 5

The cost of delay (CoD) is a prioritization framework that combines urgency and value — to make decisions on what will deliver the most value right now.

CoD is often used by teams following the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe). CoD is a component of the weighted shortest job first (WSJF) prioritization framework.

Question 6

Kano model

Answer 6

The Kano model weighs customer satisfaction against the cost of implementation.

This prioritization framework can be useful for teams that want to determine which features to build for a Minimum Lovable Product (MLP).

The model says that a product or service is about much more than just functionality – it’s also about customers’ emotions.

Question 7

MoSCoW method

Answer 7

The MoSCoW method qualifies initiatives and features into four categories:

• Must-haves
• Should-haves
• Could-haves
• Will not have at this time

MoSCoW prioritization can help teams deliver incremental value across each of the four categories.

Question 8

What Are the Elements of the Kano Model?

Answer 8

The model assigns three types of attributes (or properties) to products and services: Threshold Attributes, Performance Attributes, and Excitement Attributes. By assigning a product or service to an attribute, you’ll be able to determine its impact on customer satisfaction. Let’s look at each in more detail:

1. Threshold Attributes (Basics). These are the basic features that customers expect a product or service to have.
2. Performance Attributes (Satisfiers). These elements are not absolutely necessary, but they increase a customer’s enjoyment of the product or service.
3. Excitement Attributes (Delighters). These are the surprise elements that can really boost your product’s competitive edge . They’re the features that customers don’t even know they want, but are delighted with when they find them.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newCT_97.htm

https://www.mindtools.com/media/Diagrams/Kano-Model_v1.png

Question 9

Product tree

Answer 9

Product tree refers to an exercise in which the product roadmap is represented by a tree:

Branches: The primary product or system functionalities

Roots: The technical requirements needed to support feature branches

Leaves: New feature ideas

This method of feature prioritization can be helpful for organizations with a large portfolio of products. The visual of a tree encourages teams to focus across the portfolio with decisions that positively impact the entire ecosystem.

Question 10

RICE

Answer 10

The RICE prioritization framework scores feature based on four factors:

1. Reach: How many customers the feature will benefit from this?
2. Impact: A measurable impact on customers or the business, such as an increase in sales or customer sentiment.
3. Confidence: (based on data) that this will happen as planned
4. Effort: Resources needed to complete the feature.

Whereas CoD combines urgency and value, RICE balances value and effort.

Question 11

User story mapping

Answer 11

User story mapping can be considered a prioritization framework as well as an exercise for charting the customer journey. Teams create a map of the user’s interactions with the product and evaluate which steps have the most benefit for the user.

This framework is commonly used because all product teams strive to be customer-focused. It is also often used by user experience designers, who are also intently focused on the customer experience.

Question 12

Value vs. effort

Answer 12

Somewhat of a simplified version of RICE, the value vs. effort framework scores features based on value to the customer and organizational effort.

Lean teams that prefer a lightweight framework may choose this one.

Question 13

Weighted shortest job first

Answer 13

Used in SAFe, weighted shortest job first (WSJF) sequences jobs (features, capabilities, and epics) in a flow-based order by measuring CoD against job size or duration.

Question 14

Product vision

Answer 14

Product vision represents the core essence of your product and what makes it unique. It should be something that everyone in the company deeply understands — the “why” behind the product you are all responsible for.

Who exactly are your customers? What are the problems you are helping them solve? What opportunities and threats do you face? Grappling with these questions allows you to understand the true value of your product and to craft a vision statement that is both accurate and aspirational.

Question 15

What is product strategy?

Answer 15

Product strategy is the process of defining what you want to achieve and how you plan to get there.

A product strategy is a high-level plan describing what a business hopes to accomplish with its product and how it plans to do so. The strategy should answer key questions such as who the product will serve (personas), how it will benefit those personas, and the company’s goals for the product throughout its life cycle.

Product management expert Roman Pilcher suggests a strategy should contain the following key elements:

1. The market for the product and the specific needs it will address.
2. The product’s key differentiators or unique selling proposition.
3. The company’s business goals for the product.

Another way:

1. Product Vision
2. Goals
3. Initiatives (strategic themes)

Question 16

What is user story mapping? (recap, don’t have to remember)

Answer 16

User story mapping is a visual exercise that helps product managers and their development teams define the work that will create the most delightful user experience. It is used to improve teams’ understanding of their customers and to prioritize work. Software leader Jeff Patton is often credited with having developed and shared extensive knowledge around user story mapping.

In user story mapping, teams create a dynamic outline of a representative user’s interactions with the product, evaluate which steps have the most benefit for the user, and prioritize what should be built next. For agile organizations, it provides an alternative to building a flat list of backlog items or working from lengthy requirements documents.

User story mapping employs the concept of user stories — which communicate requirements from the perspective of user value — to validate and build a shared understanding of the steps to create products users love. Teams write user stories in a format that captures business value and can be completed within a development iteration (usually called a sprint).

The user story format — As a [type of user], I want to [action] so that [benefit]. — can be helpful in thinking about product interactions from a user’s perspective.

Question 17

OKRs

Answer 17

Objectives and key results is a goal-setting framework used by individuals, teams, and organizations to define measurable goals and track their outcomes. The development of OKR is generally attributed to Andrew Grove who introduced the approach to Intel.

Question 18

SMART Goals

Answer 18

To make sure your goals are clear and reachable, each one should be:

• Specific (simple, sensible, significant).
• Measurable (meaningful, motivating).
• Achievable (agreed, attainable).
• Relevant (reasonable, realistic and resourced, results-based).
• Time bound (time-based, time limited, time/cost limited, timely, time-sensitive).

Its criteria are commonly attributed to Peter Drucker’s Management by Objectives concept. The first known use of the term occurs in the November 1981 issue of Management Review by George T. Doran.

Question 19

Product strategy breakdown

Answer 19

1. Business Objectives
   (get alignment on the initiatives/themes)
   - Overarching goals
   - High-level priorities
2. Product Strategy
   (Vision->KPIs->Roadmap)
   - Product Vision
   - Goals / KPIs
   - Roadmap
3. Tactics
   (fill in the details with the team)
   - Feature backlog
   - Wireframes and prototypes
   - User stories

https://miro.medium.com/max/1400/1*FgR-8drcfrSiyhCqi6QUuA.png

Question 20

Types of Product Strategy (5 + 3)

Answer 20

1. Cost Strategy
2. Differentiation Strategy
3. Focus Strategy
4. Quality Strategy
5. Service Strategy

https://blog.hubspot.com/service/product-strategy

6. Time-based strategy
7. Market-oriented strategy
8. Platform-based strategy

https://www.aha.io/roadmapping/guide/product-strategy

Question 21

Elements of product strategy

Answer 21

Foundation: What you want to achieve
- Vision
- Business models
- Positioning

Market: Your customers and the market landscape
- Personas
- Competitive analysis

Imperatives: The work you will accomplish
- Goals
- Initiatives

Question 22

SDR

Answer 22

Software Design Reviews

Software design reviews are a systematic, comprehensive, and well-documented inspection of design that aims to check whether the specified design requirements are adequate and the design meets all the specified requirements. In addition, they also help in identifying the problems (if any) in the design process. IEEE defines software design review as a formal meeting at which a system’s preliminary or detailed design is presented to the user, customer, or other interested parties for comment and approval.’ These reviews are held at the end of the design phase to resolve issues (if any) related to software design decisions, that is, architectural design and detailed design (component-level and interface design) of the entire software or a part of it (such as a database).

Also: Small Development Requirement

Question 23

Customer development stages

Answer 23

Discovery, Validation, Creation, Building

Discovery:
- problem-solution fit
- proposed MVP
- proposed funnels

Validation:
- product-market fit
- business model
- sales & marketing roadmap

Question 24

Types of customer interviews

Answer 24

• Exploratory
• Validation
• Satisfaction oriented
• Efficiency

Question 25

BDD

Answer 25

Behaviour-Driven Development

BDD is a way for software teams to work that closes the gap between business people and technical people by:

• Encouraging collaboration across roles to build a shared understanding of the problem to be solved.
• Working in rapid, small iterations to increase feedback and the flow of value.
• Producing system documentation that is automatically checked against the system’s behavior.

Question 26

What is the minimum criteria for success (MSC)?

Answer 26

A Minimum Success Criteria (MSC) is how you make a hypothesis falsifiable. This criteria helps you decide whether your product is worth building after all.

It is common that most of the experiments end up somewhere in the middle of valid and invalid.

Costs
- Team time (PM, dev, other)
- Labor wages
- Marketing costs
- Brand effect
- Legacy issues
- Opportunity costs

Reward
- Increased revenue
- Time spent on section
- # of shares
- Increased satisfaction
- Number of likes
- Conversion rate
- Open rate
- Customer LTV

Question 27

Prioritization framework that combines urgency and value to make decisions on what will deliver the most value right now.

Answer 27

Cost of Delay (CoD)

Question 28

This prioritization framework weighs customer satisfaction against the cost of implementation.

Answer 28

Kano Model

Question 29

Difference between CoD and RICE

Answer 29

Whereas CoD combines urgency and value, RICE balances value and effort.

Question 30

Prioritization framework that weights value against the effort

Answer 30

RICE

Question 31

The recommended user story format

Answer 31

As a [type of user], I want to [action] so that [benefit]

Question 32

JTBD user story format

Answer 32

As a [type of user], I want to [motivation/action] so I can [benefit/expected outcome].

Question 33

JTBD Timeline

Answer 33

First thought -> Passive looking -> Active looking -> Deciding -> Consuming -> Satisfaction

Question 34

INVEST acronym

Answer 34

The acronym INVEST helps to remember a widely accepted set of criteria, or checklist, to assess the quality of a user story. If the story fails to meet one of these criteria, the team may want to reword it, or even consider a rewrite (which often translates into physically tearing up the old story card and writing a new one).

A good user story should be:

“I” ndependent (of all others)
“N” egotiable (not a specific contract for features)
“V” aluable (or vertical)
“E” stimable (to a good approximation)
“S” mall (so as to fit within an iteration)
“T” estable (in principle, even if there isn’t a test for it yet)