Complexity of Product Teams
Organisms that survive are adapted to the complexity of their environment. Product teams that survive are adapted to the complexity of their business.
In the real world, business problems are complex. They are non-linear (the whole is not the sum of the parts), chaotic (small perturbations in inputs can lead to drastically different outputs), and are path-dependent (the current state is shaped by the journey taken to reach it). Problems within the complex sphere cannot be compartmentalised into tidy disciplines like marketing, design, psychology, or software. They are an intricate mix of all these domains, in no particular order or weight. The only insights we gain are the emergent effects of countless interactions of the parts within the problem’s scope.
Unlike living organisms, product teams are often poorly adapted to the complexity of their environment. For example, these teams are usually divided into Product Management, Design and Engineering, each with their own little farm. While the division seems logical, it only marginally improves productivity at the cost of innovation and meaningful solutions.
The adapted product team has no rigid roles. Everyone is involved (in various degrees) with all the facets of the problem. This adapted system uses the particular skills of its members to survive without abstracting away the complexity. Members of adapted teams don’t view their peers as black boxes but as an extension of themselves.
Adapted product teams survive through the innovation they create; specialist product teams just do their job.