How to Overcome 6 Key Product Leadership Challenges

No Transactional Power Unlike a line manager, you usually don’t manage the development team and stakeholders as the person in charge of the product, and the individuals don’t report to you. You consequently don’t have any transactional power: You cannot tell people what to do; you cannot assign tasks to them; and you are typically not in a position to offer a bonus, pay raise, or other incentives. In other words, you are not their boss. At the same time, you depend on the individuals. You rely on them to design, implement, market, sell, and support the product. Additionally, some of the people you lead might be more senior than you. They might have worked longer for the company, and they might be very influential and well connected. In order to overcome this challenge, build trust with the stakeholders and development team members. The following tips will help you with this: Empathise with the individuals and make an effort to understand their perspectives, needs, and interest, for example, by practicing active listening. Speak and act with integrity: Say what is true and make your actions match your words.Show people that you value their ideas and concerns and involve them in product decisions.Get to know people and allow them to get to know you.Strengthen your expertise. The more knowledgeable you are, the more likely it is that people will trust and follow you. Leading a Large and Heterogeneous Group The second challenge you face is leading can be comparatively large and heterogeneous group: Together, the development team and stakeholders are often more than nine people—the maximum number of individuals line managers are commonly recommended to lead. What’s more, the dev team is cross-functional and may include UX and UI designers, developers, and testers, alongside other roles. The stakeholders come from different business units, for example, marketing, sales, support, and service for a commercial product. As people have different backgrounds, they are likely to have different perspectives and needs. While this can be a source of creativity and innovation, it can also give rise to arguments and conflicts. In order to succeed in leading such a group, I recommend that you keep the stakeholders and development team stable. Why? It takes a while for a group of people to get to know each other, build trust, and be able to effectively collaborate. Additionally, every time a team changes, the team performance tends to dip: The new members have to get up to speed, new connections have to be made, and new friendships have to be built. Additionally, increase your ability to constructively deal with disagreements and learn to resolve conflicts so that nobody is left feeling frustrated or hurt. Finally, agree on shared goals or outcomes. Use them to establish a shared purpose, to direct and align people, and to give the individuals the autonomy they need to do their piece of work—be it creating a marketing strategy or designing and building a product increment. Limited Influence on Group Selection While you might know who would be best suited to work as a stakeholder or team member, you are typically not in a position to hand-pick people. Instead, line management staffs the development team and selects representatives from the business units as stakeholders—no matter how likeable you find the individuals and how well you get on with them. To maximise the chances of finding the right people, team up with the Scrum Master and engage with line management and your sponsor. A great technique to acquire the right people is self-selection: Clearly communicate the roles you need to fill and the skills people will require. Then let the individuals decide if they want to be on the team or not. To effectively lead people who you may find difficult or unlikeable, strengthen your capacity to empathise. Come from a place of curiosity and care, as Oren Jay Sofer recommends, and cultivate an op