The collaboration between business and technology while building digital products is still not as close as it should be. This lack of close collaboration and common understanding that product and software design mutually impact each other leads to badly designed systems that can constrain business evolution. In this talk, Codurance co-founder Sandro presents helpful techniques on how a more collaborative way of working can be achieved, in order to align product and software design. Link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGsW9qFb-_M The video was recorded at SCLConf 2019, an annual conference for software professionals that care about their craft. Learn more about SCLConf at https://sc-london.com/ https://twitter.com/SCLConf

1. Aligning Product and
Software Design
@sandromancuso

2. the alignment of activities to outcomes
measured by value,
constrained by guiding principles and
supported by continuous delivery technologies
#noprojects
Evolving Software Products

3. Product Backlog
(small intersection)
Need to align product and software strategy

4. The role of deliberate software design is to
continuously enable business agility.

5. DB
Queue
Product Architecture
Macro design
Micro design
• Enterprise architecture
• Solutions architecture
• Technical architecture
• Macro design
• Micro design
Levels of software design

6. Product Design phases
Ideation Strategy Planning Development

7. Product Design phases
Ideation Strategy Planning Development
Define business
goals and come up
with a viable
product vision to
satisfy these goals.
Create a high-level
evolutionary
business strategy
and technical
vision for the
product.
Create a detailed
implementation
plan according to
the delivery
capability, risks,
budget, deadlines,
regulations, etc.
Refine
requirements,
build features and
infrastructure,
test, and release
to production.

8. How do we make it iterative?
Ideation Strategy Planning Development
Define business
goals and come up
with a viable
product vision to
satisfy these goals.
Create a high-level
implementation
strategy and
technical vision for
the product.
Create a detailed
implementation
plan according to
delivery capability,
risks, budget,
deadlines and
regulations.
Refine
requirements,
build features and
infrastructure, test
and release to
production.

9. Agile Product Development

10. Aligning Traditional and Agile Product Development

11. Strategic product strategy with a reactive technical strategy
Should business decisions be made without technical inputs?
When should technical vision and strategy be created and refined?

12. Aligning Product and Software Strategy

13. Ideation

14. Business Model Canvas
Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder

15. Ideation – Product Definition
Objective: Define business goals and a viable product vision to satisfy these goals.
Value Proposition Design by Alexander Osterwalder

16. Value Proposition Canvas
Value Proposition Design by Alexander Osterwalder

17. Experimentation with Value Proposition Canvas

18. Objective: Identify if the product can be built, providing an idea of ongoing investment, risks and timelines
Common activities
• Identify the main functional areas of the product
• Experiments (PoCs & prototypes — prove hypothesis)
• Identify what to buy, build, and integrate
• Identification and mitigation plan for technical risks
• High-level indication of investment (ongoing costs and time)
• Understand how the product fits in the wider ecosystem
Ideation – Technical Feasibility

19. Objective: Create a unified technical vision between business and technology
Ideation – Technical Vision

20. Objective: Create a unified technical view with business and technology
Ideation – Technical Vision

21. Ideation – Business and Technology Interplay
Business and technology alignment
Shared and more realistic product vision
Context for pro-active and supportive technical strategy

22. How often and what to do?

23. Strategy

24. Strategy
Objective: Create a high-level evolution plan and technical vision for the product
Common activities
• Analyse and mitigate all major risks, constraints and uncertainties
• High-level analysis of the different areas of the system
• Integration with internal and external systems
• High-level product architecture
• High-level people planning and skills, team(s) size and organisation

25. Strategy – Product Roadmap
MVP 1 + MVP 2 + ... + MVP n MMF 1 + MMF 2 + ... + MMF n = MMP (MMRs)
MVP: Minimum Viable Product MMF: Minimum Marketable Feature MMP: Minimum Marketable Product MMR: Minimum Marketable Release

26. Strategy – Product Architecture

27. Strategy – Business and Technology Interplay
Common understanding of business and technical strategy
Technical architecture created to support the business
More realistic and sustainable product roadmap
High-level modularisation makes it easier to plan

28. Planning

29. Planning – Minimum Valuable Increment (MVI)

30. Planning - Milestones
Objective: Define the next milestone goals and respective Minimum Valuable Increments
Goal
Actor 1
Impact 1
Deliverable 1
Deliverable 2
Impact 2 Deliverable 3
Actor 2
Impact 3
Deliverable 4
Deliverable 5
Impact 4
Deliverable 6
Deliverable 7

31. Planning – Milestone technical strategy
Objective: Create a technical strategy to delivery the next milestone goals.

32. Planning – Business and Technology Interplay
Technical effort, risks, and dependencies impact prioritisation of MVIs
Easier to size MVIs when high-level technical details are known
Helps to distribute work across teams efficiently
Technical solution designed to support Continuous Delivery

33. Development
Objective: Iteratively evolve the product, one Minimum Valuable Increment at a time.

34. Development – Define and prioritise increments
Objective: Create a well-defined and prioritised series of Minimum Viable Increments (MVIs)

35. Development – Design and Implementation

36. Development – Design and Implementation

37. Development – Design and Implementation

38. Development – Design and Implementation

39. Development – Design and Implementation

40. Development – Business and Technology Interplay
Test and deployment strategies for each increment
Enables Continuous Delivery
Detailed design helps to identity risks, dependencies and unknowns
Enable safe evolutions of the code while keeping it maintainable
Pro-active and continuous technical improvement aligned with business value
Prevents accumulation of technical debt

42. Single product and technical strategy that is …
… continuously evolved by business and technology working as a single team.

43. In a software product, software design should
be an explicit part of the business strategy.

44. Thank you
sandro@codurance.com
@sandromancuso