Topic

Product Engineering

A collection of 11 issues

Feature passports are the bare minimum

Founders need to focus on shipping new features. Revenue depends on delivering more value to users, so the pressure to deliver is real. What often gets overlooked is the state of the systems those features rely on. Legacy modules that need attention, old shortcuts that slow teams down, and parts

Feedback is your development team's fuel

Quick feedback is one of the strongest levers in product development. Teams slow down the moment feedback becomes delayed or hard to get. It starts on the developer’s machine. Engineers need to run the application locally, test changes, debug issues, and immediately see the effect of their work. If

The most important job for a startup founder

Many startup founders struggle to get their development team to deliver. Progress feels slow, so they start asking for daily reports and introducing standups to know what the team is working on. It seems like a reasonable way to stay informed. Unfortunately, by micromanaging, they unintentionally force the team to

Don't build an app just to be in the app store

Many founders want a mobile app because “every company needs one.” With limited budgets, that often leads to a shortcut: a wrapper app. A wrapper is a native shell that simply loads your web application in a web view. It gets you into the App Store quickly and shows progress.

The illusion of free money by whitelabelling software

We’ll whitelabel our application and get our money back! It sounds like an easy win: build a tool for yourself and then sell it to others to recoup the investment. But this idea is often gravely underestimated. Creating a product for the market is an entirely different challenge from

Build the solution that costs the least effort

By now, product teams understand the importance of user research. We know we need to talk to users, understand their problems, and avoid falling into the trap of “build it and they will come.” But even with sound research and a solid understanding of the problem, solutioning can get clouded,

Focus should be your number one priority

When founders come to me frustrated by the slow pace of development, the first thing I look at is the number of tasks they have in progress. Creating focus for your development team is the first thing you should do if you feel the team is not delivering. Set a

We are right, it's not our problem

In complex products involving multiple teams or vendors, troubleshooting often turns into a delicate dance. Everyone has their priorities. When something breaks, the first instinct is to react defensively and protect your domain. There were occasions where we asked a third party whether there was an issue on their end,

Are engineers in meetings a waste of time?

My default approach to meetings is to shield engineers from them. Engineers hate interruptions that break their flow. However, having engineers present in one type of meeting can save development time. In smaller teams I work with, we write feature passports with the client to keep meetings minimal. The idea

Outsourcing Your Product Development? Here’s How to Stay in Control

You have a great product idea and decide to outsource its development. But how do you ensure your third-party team is doing a good job? And how can you set them up for success? Own Your Codebase and IP The first and most critical step is to own the product’