What’s Your Collaboration Style?
Recently, I’ve been reviewing common product role interview questions. As part of interview preparation, I created a notebook filled with common interview questions along with notes and references for answering them. I organized these questions into categories like “Product Discovery,” “Prioritization,” and “Agile Frameworks.” It shouldn’t be surprising that the largest collection of questions is the “Collaboration” section, with questions like these:
“What is your approach to building and maintaining relationships with other teams?”
“How do you handle different opinions when collaborating with stakeholders?”
“What does a good relationship with stakeholders look like? How do you establish one?”
“How do you keep teams motivated?”
While hard skills, specific product management experiences (like bringing something from 0 -> 1), and mastery of product development and discovery frameworks can be valuable, so much of product management is about soft skills. Primarily, cross-team collaboration and stakeholder management. Someone can learn all the frameworks in the world and have deep technical expertise, but without the ability to collaborate, it will be an uphill climb to be effective.
As I reflect on my own approach to collaboration, hoping to establish an articulate answer to one of these practice interview questions, here is what I came up with:
Reinforce the Common Goal
Sometimes teams are unsure why they are being asked to do certain things. Sometimes they may be reluctant to collaborate because they are concerned about resources, including time, people, and even reputation. This is why there should be continued reinforcement of the larger business goals. Aligning a team’s work to these larger goals can clarify the common goal and help teams to buy in.
How do you do this? You communicate. You explain the decision-making process. You make it part of the culture to connect business goals and priorities to the work you are asking teams to do. People need to know why they are doing what they are doing. If teams know how they are delivering value for the organization, this helps boost alignment and morale.
Be Flexible
I transitioned into product management because I had industry experience and was familiar with types of products the company built. I quickly realized that I was going to rely on the expertise of engineers, data analysts, and others to be productive in the role. I developed deep respect and appreciation for the insight, knowledge, and patience of others as we worked together. I was also developing flexibility. I didn’t come into product management with the mindset of telling teams what to do or how to do it. I understood I didn’t always have the answers.
With this understanding, my interactions with teams became very collaborative. I asked them questions about how our processes worked and where our product vulnerabilities were, while also allowing space for them to ask questions of me about priorities, methodologies, and expected timelines. They understood that I was comfortable enough to admit what I didn’t know, and they were comfortable telling me if I missed an important requirement or if timeline expectations were unreasonable. This dynamic and communicative relationship fostered trust and allowed us to handle roadblocks and deliver projects on time.
Meet People Where They Are
Speaking of flexibility, an important thing to acknowledge about processes and frameworks is that teams and organizations have to be on board with them. Otherwise, it’s hard to have people follow them and produce the desired outcomes. That’s not to say that processes and frameworks aren’t helpful or even required at times, but it’s crucial to make an effort to meet people where they are when implementing them.
How do you meet people where they are? Well, these are the questions I ask myself:
How do people like to communicate? Teams and individuals have different communication needs, and it’s helpful to be able to communicate in ways that work for them. Some stakeholders might want regular meetings to get updates. Others may prefer to read communication on their own time. Some prefer instant messages, while others prefer phone calls. As much as possible, communicate in ways that stakeholders prefer.
Is the team already operating well? Why fix what isn’t broken? If a team is effective, implementing changes to processes should be considered very carefully. Otherwise, you risk lowering morale (and unnecessary training costs).
Do you really understand stakeholder pain points and concerns? Take the time to understand team processes and ways of working. If there is pushback to a proposed initiative, there may be a very good reason. Perhaps the team sees an easier way to achieve the goal. Or perhaps there is a factor you didn’t consider.
Asking these questions can help you avoid friction and misalignment so you can work productively across teams and stakeholders.
Learn, Don’t Blame or Shame
The retrospective is a key Agile ceremony. It is part of processing feedback, getting better, learning, and iterating. For a retro to be effective, though, people have to be open to feedback. They have to be vulnerable. They have to give and receive constructive criticism. They can’t be defensive. This is not easy.
One way to achieve a positive, productive dynamic is by avoiding blaming or shaming people for making mistakes. Mistakes can happen. Plenty of times, they are not the result of one person. Focusing on forward progress is a more effective path. As a group, we can ask useful questions: How are our processes working? Do people see opportunities for handling an issue in the future? How confident are we about meeting this goal? Getting people to work together and exchange ideas helps establish a culture that allows retrospectives to be valuable rather than uncomfortable, quiet slogs.
Also, reflect on what is appropriate to address in a group versus what should be addressed individually. Uncomfortable conversations should be done tactfully and sensitively.
Avoid Surprises
“Early and often” is a motto to remember. Communicate with stakeholders early during a project. Make roadmaps and other product documentation as widely available as possible. Talk to stakeholders while refining requirements and user stories. Remember to loop in the internal teams that will support the feature and provide them with appropriate documentation. This communication keeps people informed, engaged, and alleviates the risk of building the wrong things inefficiently.
Put Collaboration on Autopilot
Build habits and processes that automate collaboration. Whether this involves having regular Agile ceremonies, scheduling one-on-ones with key stakeholders, or creating organization-wide documentation best practices, establishing “set it and forget it” collaboration methods that fit your team will help things run smoothly and open up moments of unexpected discovery.
Be an Observer, Ask Questions
One time, I was working on a complex project. The team assigned was unfamiliar with the dataset we were working with. While I did my best to provide clear requirements and set them up for success, it became obvious that there was a roadblock. People didn’t seem to have answers to my questions. They didn’t appear confident when reviewing the requirements. Well, I was confident that I needed to do something to alleviate this roadblock.
I hypothesized that the issue was unfamiliarity with the dataset. So, I arranged a knowledge-sharing session with the team that supported this data. I created a Confluence document, outlined the requirements of the project, identified outstanding questions, and moderated what became a very fruitful discussion between the teams. The team responsible for the project came away with documented resources, answers to key questions, and a path forward.
Part of successful collaboration is being able to trust your instincts when you observe a potential pain point or the hesitancy of a stakeholder. Following up and proactively addressing these issues can save a project.
It’s OK to Have a Sense of Humor
Moments of levity can help bond teams, break the ice, and give teams a brief reprieve from the stressors of work. Behave appropriately and know your audience, of course. Take your work seriously. But it’s ok to acknowledge that not everything is an emergency or extremely serious.
Say Thank You
Show appreciation to your teams. Successfully delivering a project is not a given. One of the quickest ways to gain goodwill is to simply say, “Thank you.” “I appreciate your work.” “I see you went above and beyond.” “I see your contribution.” This is an opportunity to provide positive feedback for teams to note for future projects.
This is also a way to help morale during challenging times. I tried to do this by bringing in bagels, taking people to lunch, or writing individualized thank-you notes.
When all else fails, expressing gratitude requires so little and delivers so much value.
