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How to build a great product culture
Creating an awesome culture is the backbone of any high-functioning product organisation — but how do you go about it? In the first part of this series we take a look at the key building blocks to consider…
When we think about culture in organisations we often come across many nebulous explanations about what it is and what it means — “It’s the way we do things around here” or “It’s the perks we receive as employees”. Culture can be hard to define, and even harder to define when you think about it in a product context.
Why a great product culture is important
In my experience, in order for Product Managers and their teams to succeed in their work, they have to be supported by an environment that enables them to do their best work and make progress in their careers.
So often I meet Product Managers who are frustrated because it’s not clear to them how they can develop in their product organisation, what the agreed practices and ways of working are or how they will be rewarded for their work.
In this series I am going to look at the key building blocks that help make up a high-functioning product culture that enables Product Managers and their teams to succeed.
Let’s start with an overview:
Values & Principles: the rules and standards which form the basis of our culture
Having a shared set of product values and principles is a good way to build alignment and provide a solid foundation for your product culture. Ask yourselves: “What do we believe in?” and “What is important to us?”. It might be things like “We put the customer at the heart of what we do” or “We focus on outcomes over outputs”.
On top of values and principles we can layer:
Behaviours: what we expect to see exhibited and exemplified
These can cover everything from the behaviours you expect your product leadership to exemplify through to how you expect your Product Managers to behave when they interact with their teams and stakeholders, as well as what you might look for when hiring new Product folks into the organisation.
Is it important for your product leadership to act with integrity, to be inspiring, to create…
