The Easiest Way to Align Stakeholders (and Solve the Right Problems) - Problem Framing

Ever felt like you’re guessing which features your customers really need, afraid that you might be pouring time and resources into the wrong solutions? Let's dive into how Problem Framing can save you from these headaches. This approach, which got its start at Google in 2018, is a game-changer for aligning stakeholders and ensuring that your efforts are targeted right from the start.

If you are a product leader, your job often involves keeping your product roadmap flexible and responsive, much like improvising in a jazz performance. It's likely that your plans have had to pivot not just once, but multiple times over the past few months, each shift driven by a mix of internal enthusiasm and external pressures.

Let's say a marketing stakeholder comes to you, all fired up about a new feature. They're convinced it's the golden ticket, the feature that will catapult user engagement through the roof. It's your job to weigh their excitement against the practical realities of your product's direction—balancing what's shiny and new against what's actually viable and necessary.

Then there's the competition. Imagine if a competitor rolls out a groundbreaking feature that has the whole industry talking. It might cause your team to second-guess your current strategy and wonder if you should incorporate similar features. Suddenly, you might find yourself adjusting your plans to stay competitive.

Additionally, shifts in your company’s strategic direction can complicate things further. Perhaps the leadership decides to change the business model—from a product-based to a service-oriented approach, or from premium to freemium. Such fundamental changes require you to quickly reassess and realign your roadmap to fit these new objectives, a task that can be both challenging and stressful.

In all these situations, having a method to manage these changes effectively—not just reacting to them—can help ensure that your product development stays on track and aligned with your long-term goals.

Change is a constant in product development, but how do you handle it without losing your way?

Enter Problem Framing

Problem Framing is not just another corporate buzzword; it's a lifeline. It forces you to clarify exactly which problem is worth solving and why.

This method is about bringing together key stakeholders—those who have decision-making power and a vested interest—to pinpoint and agree on the most important issues before jumping to solutions. It acts as a master plan for your product, ensuring that each new idea, feature addition, or strategic shift aligns well with your overall goals.

Think of Problem Framing as the blueprint for your product’s roadmap. Without it, your product might end up like a fancy house that started without a blueprint —where rooms are added randomly. It might look impressive in a presentation, but it doesn't make much sense to live in.

Breaking Down Problem Framing Into Three Stages

1. Discovery (1–3 Weeks)

Imagine you’re planning a dinner for friends. You wouldn’t just pick a restaurant without knowing everyone's dietary needs, right? Similarly, the Discovery phase is about gathering all the essential data—user feedback, market research, and insights from your team. Even if you have a dedicated research team or your designers are on the job, as a product leader, it's still your responsibility to connect all the dots. You need to know what data you want and what’s actually relevant because you are the one holding the big picture. Ensure you gather what you already have and cover any blind spots by conducting just enough research. This phase sets the stage to prevent those all-too-common surprises that can derail your development process later on.

2. Workshop Preparation

It's no secret: many product managers “hate” workshops. Often, they seem like nothing more than superficial games with post-its, which is frustrating. But not all workshops are created equal. This Problem Framing workshop leverages real customer data and carefully balances your stakeholders' goals and needs, making it fundamentally different from a mere brainstorming session. Here, you're not just throwing ideas at the wall to see what sticks; you're crafting a focused narrative that everyone can invest in. Using tools like customer journey maps not only helps visualize the data but ensures that when you walk into that room, you're equipped to lead discussions that are rooted in reality and aligned with strategic objectives.

3. Workshop Facilitation

The term "workshop facilitation" might sound a bit daunting, especially if it doesn’t appear anywhere in your job description. You might think it’s a skill reserved for professional facilitators, but at its core, facilitation is about active listening, building common ground, and ensuring everyone has a clear picture of the goals and the process. And let's face it, as a product manager, you are constantly in the middle of people—customers, product teams, stakeholders who are just people with their own needs, goals, and deadlines. In many ways, you're already mediating and facilitating every day. You're probably tired of meetings that only lead to more meetings. Effective workshop facilitation cuts through that cycle by making each session count, ensuring decisions are made, and everyone leaves with a shared understanding and clear direction.

During the Problem Framing Workshop, you guide stakeholders through a structured exploration of the problem space. This typically includes defining the problem clearly, understanding its context, and identifying underlying assumptions. You facilitate exercises that help pinpoint the root causes of issues and collaboratively develop a shared understanding of user needs and business goals. This process culminates in prioritizing the problems that are most critical to address, setting the stage for ideation and solution development in subsequent phases.

Why Does This All Matter?

Even if your roadmap is likely to change, establishing a shared understanding of the critical problem to solve allows your strategy to adapt without losing focus. When stakeholders understand how their objectives align with broader goals and are validated by customer insights, they are less likely to push arbitrary features. Instead, they're more likely to question, "Does this serve the problem we agreed on?"

In conclusion, Problem Framing offers a structured approach to aligning everyone on the most critical problem before diving into solutions. It ensures that your product development can remain flexible, yet focused on real user needs, simplifying stakeholder communications and enhancing overall project efficacy. Remember, change is inevitable, but losing sight of what's essential doesn't have to be. With Problem Framing, you retain a clear vision, making navigating stakeholder demands significantly more manageable.

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