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The Study ofProduct Team Performance, 2013

Presented byActuation Consulting, LLC. and Enterprise Agility, Inc.

Sponsored By:

®

AIPMM

Author: Greg GeracieContributing Authors: David Heidt, Steven Starke, and Ron Lichty

The Study ofProduct Team Performance, 2013

2The Study of Product Team Performance, 2013 ©2013 Actuation Consulting LLC


Six Key Factors of PerformanceActuation Consulting and Enterprise Agility conducted the second annual global survey of product teams. The goal of our research is to continuously improve our understanding of why some product teams excel while others struggle and to, once again, clarify the factors that influence the optimal outcomes.

What makes this survey so unique is the support it receives from a growing constellation of industry associations and market players – groups that generally don’t collaborate. In fact, the industry participation increased significantly this year; associations spanning product, project, business analysis, user experience, software, and information areas all supported this year’s effort.

We designed the 2013 study to further explore the dynamics of high-performing product teams by pursuing four interconnected threads. We created the first thread, demographic information, to understand respondent profiles, spans of responsibility, size of company, and market segment served.

The second thread, role clarification, we designed to determine what roles are most common on product teams, the relative importance of each role in relation to each other in furthering value creation, and how product teams interact with company executives.

The third thread allows us to look closely at the product development processes being used to create value as well as perceptions of which methods increase the profitability of the product.

With the fourth and final thread, we more deeply explore last year’s findings of five key factors that distinguish high performance teams from all others. These questions focus on business strategy, onboarding activities and the effectiveness of underlying processes, product launch resourcing and accountability, and where the product team’s cohesion breaks down.

Executive Summary

The 2013 study

was designed to

further explore the

dynamics of high-

performing product

teams by pursuing

four interconnected

threads: demographic

information; role

clarifi cation; product

development; and

the key factors that

distinguish high-

performing teams.


For consistency, we used the same methodology as last year. e-Focus Groups® conducted the survey on our behalf with the support of 13 professional associations and companies. These sponsors and distribution partners sent the survey to their members and clients. The survey ran for approximately 90 days. After the survey closed, we provided the resulting data to statisticians to conduct regression analysis.

Through this statistical analysis, we found that three key factors of high-performing teams reappeared from last year’s study, and three new factors emerged. Together, this year’s six factors are (last year’s listed first):

◊ An Aligned Strategy: the significance of the product team aligning with the company’s overall goals and objectives

◊ The Importance of Product Launch: successfully staffing and resourcing product launch activities

◊ Onboarding Processes: the surprising impact that emphasizing effective product team member onboarding has on the overall performance of the product team

◊ Product Manager Role Definition: the favorable impact that a well-defined product management role plays in product team success

◊ Business Unit Leader Engagement: the valuable role that business unit leaders play in enabling high-performing teams

◊ Understanding Landmines: elements that contribute to a breakdown of the product team’s performance

In addition to these statistically important factors, we also built upon last year’s exploration of the various product development methodologies currently in use. We retained last year’s question regarding what methods product teams are using to produce their products so we can evaluate and monitor changes in adoption or practice.

This year’s study added conditional logic to better understand the specific method being used. For example, the majority of last year’s respondents stated that product teams were relying on Blended methodologies. But last year’s survey construction did not allow us to understand which specific Agile methods teams were using. This year’s study enabled us to collect more detailed information about which Agile method is actually being used.

We also enhanced our questions on product development methodology to better understand participant’s perspectives of how methodologies and product profitability are related. We asked survey participants to share their view of which product development method most favorably impacts product profitability.

Executive Summary


Survey DevelopmentActuation Consulting and Enterprise Agility commissioned qualitative market research firm e-FocusGroups toconduct the survey. Actuation Consulting and Enterprise Agility defined the themes and content and drafted the survey questions. e-FocusGroups refined the questions, developed the web-based survey tool, collected and aggregated the responses, and provided a high-levelanalysis of the responses. Upon completion of the study, the survey data was passed to a professional statistician for rigorous analysis.

The survey was sponsored by the Association of International Product Marketing and Management (AIPMM), the International Project Management Association (IPMA), the Chicagoland Chapter of the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA), the Product Development and Management Association (PDMA), Planbox, and the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA).

Additional promotional partners include the Chicago Product Management Association (ChiPMA), the Project Management Institute (PMI) Chicagoland Chapter, Global Product Management Talk online radio, Lee R. Lambert of the Lambert Consulting Group, the Orange County Product Managers, Project Times, the Silicon Valley Product Management Association (SVPMA), and the User Experience Professionals Association (UXPA).

The survey sponsors emailed all of their members an invitation to take the web-based survey. The following titles were invited to complete the survey:

◊ Brand manager

◊ Business analyst

◊ Development manager

◊ Engineer

◊ Product manager

◊ Product marketing manager

◊ Product owner

◊ Program manager

◊ Project manager

◊ User experience professional

In the invitation, all respondents were assured that they and their responses would be anonymous. Once the survey responses were collected, we provided the data to a professional statistician for rigorous analysis.

Methodology


Our respondents identify themselves as either decision makers or product team members who play a central role in their company’s product development initiatives. Nearly all (94%) say that they play an active role creating or enhancing products or services within their organization.

More than a third of those answering our survey identify themselves as product managers (28%) and product owners (7%). Business analysts (14%), project managers (11%), and engineers (7%) make up another third of the respondents (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Which of the following titles best describes yourprimary role?

*The “Other” group primarily consists of senior executives and consultants.

When respondents identify themselves as playing multiple roles, the most popular titles they choose to describe their secondary role are project manager (19%), business analyst (13%), and product owner (13%).

Respondent Profi le

1.64%

3.83%

6.56%

6.83%

7.10%

7.38%

11.20%

13.39%

13.66%

28.42%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%

Brand manager

User experience

Development manager

Program manager

Product owner

Engineer

Project manager

Other

Business analyst

Product manager

Nearly all of the

survey respondents

play an active

role creating or

enhancing products

or services.

94%


Figure 2. Which of the following titles do you directly report to?

Most of this year’s respondents appear to be individual contributors or first-level managers, reporting directly to a manager (27%) or a director (24%). About one-fifth each report to a company officer (21%) or a vice president (19%) (Figure 2).

By far, the largest group of respondents (40%) report working for a company with annual revenues of less than $50 million. The second largest group (24%) work for larger companies – those with annual revenues of $50 to $499 million. The remainder say they work for companies earning $500 million to $2 billion (16%) or more than $2 billion (20%) annually.

Finally, the majority of respondents report working in a company with either a technology (43%) or a service (26%) focus.

Other

Vice president

A company of�cer (C-level executive)

Director

Manager

26.81%

24.13% 20.91%

18.77%

9.38%

Respondent Profi le


A Closer Look at the 2013 FactorsFactor One – An Aligned Strategy

Consistent with last year’s findings, the importance of having a corporate strategy that the product team can link to and align with remains a statistically significant indicator of a product team’s ability to achieve high performance. If the executive team has not constructed, communicated, or deployed the broader company strategy, the product team will have nothing to tether their product development activities to and no way to determine which activities to pursue and – perhaps more importantly – not pursue. In fact, the 2012 study illustrated that approximately 91% of respondents indicated that their daily activities were aligned with the company business strategy. However, a closer look at how this alignment was occurring indicated a heavy reliance on product roadmaps in the absence of product strategy.

This year’s study clearly showed that 37% of organizations have a coherent business strategy they stick to and effectively communicate. The majority of organizations (54%) that have a corporate strategy minimize its effectiveness by not effectively communicating it or changing it so frequently that it is perceived by the product teams of being of little use.

Without a clearly communicated corporate strategy, the product team is often forced to focus on tactical roadmap activities and deliverables. Over time, this can undermine the effectiveness of not only product managers and product owners but the entire product team. With no guiding corporate strategy, the team is unsure how the day-to-day tactical activities link back to the company’s strategic direction. The resulting disconnect negatively impacts performance.

Motivation plummets as team members struggle to perceive their contribution to the company and the company’s contribution to the surrounding competitive market place.

As demonstrated by last year’s study, low-performing teams typically lack ability to align day-to-day tactical activities with the company strategy. This linkage is usually created by developing a multi-year product strategy and a parallel multi-year technology roadmap that bridge corporate strategy and tactical day-to-day activities.

High-performing teams benefit from understanding the corporate strategy, tethering tactical activities to the corporate strategy via well-defined multi-year product and technology strategies, and leveraging the connection between day-to-day objectives and product, and between product and company goals and mission, to motivate higher performance. Product and development managers who lack knowledge of the corporate strategy have no grounding from which to effectively develop useful multi-year product and technology strategies, nor tools to motivate their teams. This leads to an inherent market disadvantage, as better aligned organizations capitalize

upon clarity of purpose and action.

Findings

This year’s study clearly

showed that 37% of

organizations have

a coherent business

strategy they stick to and

effectively communicate.


Factor Two – The Importance of Product Launch

Another finding consistent with last year’s study was that product teams that are properly staffed and resourced in the product launch phase deliver higher performance. Companies often spend millions of dollars on product development efforts and carefully monitor and control the whole process only to treat the product launch process as an afterthought. It is disheartening for product teams to watch their organizations fumble at the goal line.

Organizations that do separate the product development process from the product launch process acknowledge that planning and implementing a successful product launch is labor intensive. However, only a minority of organizations actually do this well – even though this is one of the most critical and vulnerable elements of the entire product production process.

Last year’s study pointed to the importance of having a single person responsible for product launch. This year’s study shows that only 37% of organizations actually take this step. Those 37% seem to focus on tasking the product manager with leading this activity – rightly or wrongly. Additional analysis needs to be conducted to determine whether this task assignment is allocated correctly or if the product launch is additionally hampered by overburdening a fully allocated product manager and failing to offset the time required to successfully manage the launch process.

High-performing product teams not only have just one person responsible for launch, they also appropriately plan, staff, and resource the activity for success.

Factor Three – Onboarding Processes

For two years in a row, the importance of onboarding product team members efficiently has emerged as a key theme in the regression analysis. Effectively onboarding talent is highly correlated to high performance on the product team.

Seventy five percent of responding organizations underestimate the importance of establishing streamlined processes that enable product team members to quickly become contributing members to the product team’s success. The data show that only 4% of organizations onboard product team members well enough to claim best practice. In fact, while most organizations have a process in place to onboard new employees to the organization, they fail to implement the same amount of rigor when onboarding employees

or contractors to the product team.

The traditional “sink or swim” mentality clearly shows its limitations in terms of decreased team productivity. As the new product team member comes up to speed, momentum stalls for a time and others are pulled away from their tasks to fill in as a way to try to maintain forward momentum – albeit at a slower rate.

High-performing product teams indicate that they place emphasis on onboarding team members to mitigate these risks and to ensure that only a minimum of momentum is lost by having well thought out processes in place as new members join the team. Additional analysis needs to be conducted to determine the types of onboarding practices that seem to be having the most success.

Findings

High-performing product

teams not only have just

one person responsible

for launch, they also

appropriately plan, staff,

and resource the activity

for success.


Factor Four – Business Unit Leader Engagement

The regression analysis indicates that reporting relationships matter. High-performing teams indicate that they are more likely to work closely with a business unit leader (ranging from a CEO to a general manager) than low-performing teams. Product teams with greater access to and two-way communication with the business unit leader are more likely to be aligned to the company’s goals and objectives and have access to the resources they need to be successful.

Implied in this finding is that the business unit leader must also view value creation activities as being of significant importance. High performance product teams benefit from this business unit leader perspective. In addition, we have all seen teams benefit dramatically when they have a highly placed impediment remover and path paver.

Conversely, business unit leaders who do not place high importance on product development activities and invest their time accordingly are more likely to have teams that are not performing at optimum levels.

The 23% of business unit leaders who maintain line of sight on not only the strategic but the tactical activities of teams charged with creating value are more likely to enjoy a reciprocal relationship in terms of increased performance.

Factor Five – Product Manager Role Definition

Interestingly, this year’s study illustrates a direct correlation between high performance and how well the role of the product manager is defined. Sixty percent of respondents believe that the role of the product manager is well defined in their organizations. When the role is well defined, product managers are positioned to lead the creation of value throughout a product’s lifecycle.

High-performing teams rely on product managers to align efforts with (and influence) corporate strategy (as we observed in Factor One), synthesize customer wants and

needs into realizable products and product plans, and prioritize features to optimally return the highest value to customers and the company.

Additionally, last year’s study illustrated that product managers and product owners are the only parties who stay with a product from its conception until its ultimate retirement. For example, while an organization may have a project manager work in tandem with the product manager, the project manager might lead the project only from the initiation of the project charter until the product or product capabilities become tangible and are ready for launch. This is typically when the project manager rolls off the product development effort to pursue the next project. Meanwhile, the product manager stays the course – continuing with the product throughout all phases of the lifecycle while other functions come and go.

Considering the importance of this role throughout the product lifecycle, it’s understandable why clear definition of responsibilities is required for high performance. Mapping out exactly what the product manager is responsible for, when they are responsible for delivering it, and who they need to interact with across the product lifecycle is required for any product initiative to operate at a level of high performance.

The regression analysis clearly shows that the more well-defined the product manager’s role is within the organization and the product team, the more likely the team is to be high performing.

Findings


Factor Six – Understanding Landmines

While the other five factors illustrate the dynamics of high performance, factor six points to the most common obstacles. Low-performing teams cite the following statistically relevant factors as undermining their ability to achieve high performance:

◊ under-resourced teams (34%)

◊ poor handoffs and transitions (22%)

◊ lack of executive leadership and direction (18%)

◊ poorly defined roles (17%)

Findings


Role Clarifi cationWhen asked to identify which roles are members of their product team, our respondents chose a variety of roles, but product managers/owners, engineers, business analysts, user experience professionals, and project managers were the most prevalent:

◊ Engineer 100%

◊ Business Analyst 79%

◊ User experience professional 78%

◊ Product manager 73%

◊ Project manager 74%

◊ Product owner 52%

◊ Product marketing 47%

◊ Program manager 32%

◊ Brand manager 15%

◊ Other 22%

Although most roles are widely appreciated for their unique contributions to the product team, respondents indicated that five roles are the most highly valued for their contributions relative to the rest. These roles are: the Engineer, Product Manager, User Experience Professional, Product Owner, and the Business Analyst.

We found that the product management role definition varies widely in the organizations we surveyed. Although approximately 60% of respondents indicate that the role of a product manager is well defined in their organizations, less than one-fifth of respondents indicate that the role is “well defined with full profit and loss responsibility.” The highest response (41%) was given to the choice “well defined but manages primarily through influence (no direct control).” Another quarter of respondents say the role is not well defined in their organization (Figure 3).

Figure 3. How do you define the role of the product manager in your organization?

Company size does appear to have an effect on this. The largest companies we surveyed (those with more than $2 billion in annual revenues) were most likely to say the role of product manager is well defined with full profit and loss responsibilities. In fact, the likelihood of choosing this response increased with company size. Conversely, the likelihood of choosing the response “The role is not well defined in our organization” was highest in the smallest organizations we surveyed (those with annual revenues of less than $50 million) (Table 1).

Survey Results

18.85%

41.21%

24.60%

13.74%

1.60%

Well de�ned with full pro�tand loss responsibility

Well de�ned but managesprimarily through in�uence(no direct control)

The role is not well de�nedin our organization

We do not have productmanagers in our organization

Other


Table 1. How do you define the role of the product manager in your organization?

Survey Answer

Annual Company Revenue

Less than $50 Million

$50 to $499 Million

$500 to $2 Billion

More than$2 Billion

Well de� ned with full pro� t and loss responsibility 16.3% 17.1% 18.9% 25.4%

Well de� ned but manages primarily through in� uence (no direct control)

33.3% 48.6% 47.2% 43.3%

The role is not well de� ned in our organization 31.0% 21.4% 24.5% 16.4%

We do not have product managers in our organization

17.1% 11.4% 9.4% 13.4%

Survey Results

2.56%

21.09%

23.32%

53.04%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

Other

Single executive stakeholder

We engage with one stake holder primarily andoccasionally with a team of executives

Primarily with a team of executives

Our results strongly suggest that product teams are engaging with a team of executives. More than half chose this option when asked whether their team engages with a single executive stakeholder or more broadly with a wide variety of executives. The remainder are about equally split between engaging primarily with one stakeholder and occasionally with a team (23%) and a single executive stakeholder (21%) (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Does your team engage with a single executive stakeholder or do you engage more broadly with a wide variety of executives?


When asked which executives their product team work closely with, they indicate (in order of percentage response):

◊ Chief Executive Officer or General Manager (23%)

◊ Head of Product Management (19%)

◊ Chief Technology Officer (19%)

◊ Head of Sales (14%)

◊ Chief Marketing Officer (14%)

◊ Chief Financial Officer (7%)

It’s clear that roles centered on product management have much influence on the executive team. When asked to choose the one role that has the most influence on their company’s executive team, nearly a third (31%) chose the product manager. The product owner came in second place with 22% of respondents (Figure 5). All other role choices received less than 10% of responses.

Figure 5. Which role has the most influence with your company’s executive stakeholders?

1.95%

3.26%

5.21%

8.14%

9.12%

9.45%

9.77%

22.15%

30.94%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

User experience

Brand manager

Business analyst

Engineer

Project manager

Program manager

Other

Product owner

Product manager

It’s clear that roles

centered on product

management have

much infl uence on the

executive team.

53%

Survey Results


Methods Used forProduct DevelopmentBlended (one that incorporates some waterfall and some Agile) is chosen most often (43%) by our respondents as the methods used for product development to develop products, regardless of company size. The next most popular choice is Agile (30%). Waterfall is a far less popular choice (13%) (Figure 6). In last year’s survey, the blended methodology was also the most popular choice (52%), but waterfall came in second (18%) and Agile received only 13%.

Of the respondents who identify using a lean methodology, a large majority (75%) identify using a startup lean method, while only 25% said they use another type of lean methodology.

Of the respondents who identify using a blended or Agile methodology, a large majority (83%) identify using a scrum method, while only 7% say they use Extreme Programming exclusively, and the remaining 10% identified another type of blended or Agile methodology.

Figure 6. Which of the following methodologies best describes the way your organization develops products?

2.63%

4.61%

6.58%

12.50%

30.26%

43.42%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50%

Lean

Other

Don't know

Waterfall

Agile

Blended (Some Waterfall and some Agile)

Blended (one that

incorporates some

waterfall and some

Agile) is chosen

most often by our

respondents as the

methods used for

product development

to develop products,

regardless of

company size.

43%

Survey Results


When delineating respondents by company revenue size, we see that differences do exist. More seasoned companies (those earning $500 million and more) are more likely to use waterfall than Agile or a blended approach, while respondents from companies earning $499 million and less report the opposite — that they are more likely to use Agile or a blended approach than waterfall. Agile use is highest in smaller and start-up organizations; 54% of those with less than $50 million in revenues report using this method. As revenue size increases, the use of Agile seems to fall and the use of waterfall increases (Table 2).

Table 2. Which of the following methodologies best describes the way your organization develops products (by company revenue size)?

Product Development Methodology

Annual Company Revenue

Less than $50 Million $50 to $499 Million $500 to $2 Billion More than $2 Billion

Waterfall 18.4% 15.8% 29.0% 36.8%

Lean 25.0% 25.0% 12.5% 37.5%

Blended (Some Waterfall and Some Agile)

34.9% 22.7% 16.7% 25.8%

Agile 54.4% 22.8% 14.1% 8.7%

Don’t Know 45.0% 25.0% 15.0% 15.0%

Our respondents appear to be, for the most part, using the methodologies they associate with success. Most identify Agile or a blended method (some waterfall and some Agile) – the methods they are most likely to use (Figure 6) – as the methodology that they associate with increasing the profitability of their product, although there are some minor differences (Figure 7). This is further demonstrated in Table 3, which overlays the two sets of responses. Looking at the data this way, we can see that for each self-identified methodology group with the exception of the groups using waterfall, the highest percent of responses to the “what method do you associate with increased profits” questions goes to the method the group says they currently use. Those groups using waterfall express confidence that any method other than waterfallwould make their product more profitable.

Survey Results


Figure 7. Which of the following product development methodologies do you associate with increasing the profitability of your product?

Table 3. Product development methodology used and methodology associated with increased profits, by company revenue size

Methodology You Use

Methodology You Associate with Increased Pro� ts

Waterfall Lean Blended (Some Waterfall

and Some Agile) Agile

Waterfall 13.2% 18.4% 50.0% 15.8%

Lean 14.3% 42.9% 0% 14.3%

Blended (Some Waterfall and Some Agile)

6.1% 10.6% 46.2% 31.8%

Agile 0% 9.8% 13.0% 73.9%

Don’t Know 5.3% 26.3% 42.1% 5.3%

5.63%

8.61%

12.58%

33.77%

39.40%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45%

Waterfall

Other

Lean

Blended (Some Waterfall and some Agile)

Agile

Survey Results


Business StrategiesOur survey respondents do not report a high degree of alignment. When asked if their organization has a coherent business strategy that the product team understands and can act upon, only 37% of respondents said they feel they’re very aligned. Unfortunately, more than half report problems – they have a strategy but it’s not well communicated (28%), they have a strategy that changes so frequently that it’s not useful (26%), they are not aware of the strategy (5%), or they don’t think they have one (5%) (Figure 8).

Figure 8. Do you feel your organization has a coherent business strategy that the product team understands and can act upon?

We asked respondents to tell us about their process for onboarding new product team members. What we learned is that organizations continue to underappreciate the impact that effective onboarding has on product team productivity.

Do our respondents find their onboarding methods effective? It does not appear so. When asked how they would rank the effectiveness of their company’s process of onboarding new product team members: Nearly half (48%) say there was room for improvement. Another 16% rank their performance as hit or miss, and 11% said they fail miserably. Only 21% rank themselves as very effective, and a mere 4% said it was a best practice.

4.51%

5.21%

25.69%

27.78%

36.81%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40%

I’m not aware of the business strategy

I don’t think we have one

We have a business strategy that changesso frequently it is not useful

We have a business strategy but it’snot well communicated

Yes, we’re very aligned

Our survey

respondents do not

report a high degree

of alignment.

37%

Survey Results


Diving further into staffing, we asked about product launch practices. Most respondents (63%) say they do not have a single person accountable for managing product launch and go-to-market activities.

When asked which role they feel is responsible for managing the product launch and go to market activities in their organization, product management is the most popular choice by far (40%). All of the other choices rank much lower (Figure 9).

Figure 9. Which role do you feel is responsible for managing the product launch and go to market activities in your organization?

40.38%

16.35%11.54%

13.46%

12.50%

5.77%

Product Management

Product Owner

Program Manager

Project Manager

Product Marketer

Other

A large majority of

our respondents feel

that their product

launch activities

are not properly

resourced, brought to

market effectively and

properly staffed.

A large majority of our respondents feel that their product launch activities are not properly resourced, brought to market effectively and properly staffed; 64% answered “no” when asked this question. Respondents list a variety of causes for ineffective launches, including:

“Poor levels of trust within and across the organization.”

“We have a very small team to do everything there is in a product launch. Product management has no support resources and must wear many hats and juggle many balls.”

“We govern by committee so there is no one product owner setting direction. We don’t have one person accountable for the direction or for handling conflicting priorities. Instead the committee sets direction and often everyone below them scrambles to get the work done.”

“There is no direct ownership of products. Upon launch, it transitions to another department to run with, but there’s a lack of motivation/drive to make sure it’s profitable and communicated effectively to the masses.”

“Lack of understanding of that part of the product management process (and product management in general).”

64%

Survey Results


Finally, the survey results provide valuable insight into what product professionals believe can be done better at their organizations. When asked where the effectiveness of their product team breaks down, the most popular response (34%) is “not enough resources.” Another 22% fault the hand-offs between the functions; 18% blame lack of executive leadership, and another 17% say that poorly defined roles cause the break down (Figure 10).

Figure 10: Where does the effectiveness of your product team break down?

9.62%

16.67%

18.38%

21.79%

33.55%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40%

Other

Poorly de�ned roles

Lack of executive leadershipand direction

The hand-offs between the functions

Not enough resources to get thejob done properly

When asked where

the effectiveness

of their product

team breaks down,

the most popular

response is “not

enough resources.”

34%

Please contact us if you would like more information about the study or if you would like assistance in implementing any of the factors outlined in our findings.

Survey Results


About Actuation ConsultingActuation Consulting’s mission is to advance the profession of product management, and we’ve been working tirelessly toward this goal since our founding in 2007. We began our business providing advisory services to clients nationwide. Since then, we’ve become a leader in product management training and consulting.

Actuation Consulting is a global provider of product management training, consulting, and advisory services to some of the world’s most well-known organizations. We provide popular training courses for product managers and product teams and publish the world-wide Study of Product Team Performance© annually. We have also authored the global best seller Take Charge Product Management© and led the development of The Guide to the Product Management and Marketing Body of Knowledge© (ProdBOK).

Although product managers are ultimately responsible for the success of their products, no product manager can do it alone. We’ve learned that product management skills matter — but the skills are even more effective if the entire product team works as an integrated unit with clearly defined activities, roles, and deliverables. We have designed two training tracks to help individuals and organizations improve product management skills and product team performance.

Actuation Consulting’s professionally produced training programs combine our proven expertise in product management with the thought leadership that has made our book Take Charge Product Management a global bestseller.

Visit us today at www.ActuationConsulting.com or call us at 312-775-2373.

About Enterprise AgilityThrough integrated approaches to program management, process design, requirements engineering, and Agile/lean methods, Enterprise Agility (EA) enables organizations to identify and drive product development, maintain and interpret product performance metrics, and ensure rapid product development while maintaining superior stakeholder usability.

EA’s multi-disciplinary approach incorporates industry best practices and leading standards in the areas of:

For more information about Enterprise Agility’s assessments, competency center frameworks, hands-on leadership services, training, and advisory services, contact David Heidt at [email protected] or 773-497-7110.

◊ Business architecture

◊ Project / Program management

◊ Business process management

◊ Business analysis

◊ Product design

◊ Lean and Agile development

◊ Technology architecture

◊ Organizational learning

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