We live in an era where digital products have become crucial to our daily lives because they help us solve problems like organizing our tasks, improving our time, connecting with people in different ways, and learning as a human.
The most challenging part for every company is to deliver quality and timely software because customers need to solve their problems the moment they arise. When software isn't available, it triggers problems not only for customers but also for the company — some projects fall into a large tech debt to be delivered on time, others go over budget, and the worst offer features that do not solve the customer's problems.
Why ideas often don't pan out
All start with a problem that needs to be solved where an idea is the mechanism that we have to build the solution. This idea needs to become tangible and meaningful for the customers, and in most cases, it requires accomplishing different requirements to be successful.
In my lifetime I've seen ideas that are destined for success, but others aren't because they don't provide enough value — it doesn't have good usability so it is very complex to operate, others aren't feasible because it requires too much effort, and others don't have business viability due to constraints like government restrictions.
Another factor is that it takes a lot of iterations to deliver the MVP or the solution into production to get customer feedback. We fall into many circumstances around deadlines and accomplishments that only trigger delivering features without purpose, increasing the technical debt.
We live in a dynamic market. The customer's needs are constantly changing — we need to adapt our delivery process with the right product at the right moment.
I saw many projects fail because they miss the process of product discovery that allows us to analyze the customer problems, the market trends, and the risk associated with solutions. Unfortunately, there's often a tendency to hastily proceed to creating roadmaps with features that only make sense for us.
Pitfalls of roadmaps
Building a roadmap is one of the most difficult tasks that every product leader faces. It involves functional features, technical aspects, and a well-defined user experience — plus milestones, deadlines, and risks that need to be mitigated.
The challenge arises when a significant amount of time is dedicated to defining and creating features, and as the deadline approaches, the team is fervently committed to delivering those features. However, this focus doesn't always effectively address the underlying problem, leading to instances when we inadvertently overlook the resolution of the customer's primary issue.
Delivery value is about solving a problem — not delivering features well-crafted.
In the dynamic startup ecosystem, where budgets are tight and customer needs evolve rapidly, relying solely on feature-driven development can be a recipe for inefficiency. A problem-solving approach should be prioritized. By focusing on delivering core value first, startups can gain traction, validate their ideas, and iterate on features based on real-world user feedback.
Empowering your team
Empowering teams should be driven by a commitment to solve underlying issues rather than merely delivering features. I saw product teams thrive when they are fully immersed in the context of their client, industry, and business — getting the knowledge to unblock their full potential.
The first advice: set all the context and be a good communicator. Your team doesn't want a leader who compiles all the solutions in his mind and just commands what needs to be done. Even if you have all the clarity, you need to give them the space to co-create the solution.
When working with a product backlog we face the commitment to include deadlines. As a leader, the worst thing you can do is set a one-directional deadline without consulting your team. You need to guarantee to include them in the estimation to minimize the risk.
Premature commitment can be prejudicial to achieving your objectives.
One way to minimize risk is to conduct continuous discovery of solutions before making commitments. It ensures that all estimations are considered with minimum uncertainty, and involving your team ensures that estimations are aligned with team capacity.
But empowering teams is not just giving them context and getting their opinion — you need to bring them a purpose. You need to explain to them why the work is important. In that sense, you need to establish something with a long-term view.
Develop a product vision that keeps you on track
There is a force in every company that becomes crucial to guide the teams towards the objectives — this serves as the north star in all decisions and gives us clarity about what is important. The product vision is a remarkable phrase that motivates all team members towards a common goal.
Product vision should be clear, concise, and inspiring. It should focus on solving customer problems and fulfilling their needs, describing the long-term impact the product aims to make. When all of your team is aligned with the product vision and values, it's more feasible to ensure coherence in the organization's strategic objectives.
Product vision should be flexible enough to accommodate changes based on rapid learning. Validate with potential customers early on and support it with agile methodologies to enable rapid development cycles.
Align with the overall corporate strategy and foster collaboration between departments. Consider scalability to accommodate the size and complexity of the organization.
How do we shape the future?
Everyone is thinking about how the future will be and what goals we need to achieve to be successful. I encourage you to think not about how it will be, but about what we need to do right now to be closer to the objectives. The power of now and empowering your teams around actions is the real force.
As a leader, you need to understand that even if you have a vision and roadmap — we achieve goals by acting.
How we have a structure to split the goal. How we encourage teams to take action. How as leaders we prioritize the most important things. How will the future be if we don't act?
Technology leader with 20+ years of experience scaling startups across Latin America, the Middle East, and global markets. Architecting Agentic AI and tech ventures from Dubai to the world.
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