The 4 States of Product Teams
There are at least four states that a product team can be in. As a product leader, if you can understand these states, you can find ways to change the team state to build better products and deliver more value for customers.
Team states are defined by two dimensions. The first is the pace at which new products & features are developed and delivered to customers (”shipping”). The second is the impact that those products & features have for customers, in the market, and on your company’s trajectory.
The state of a team is a combination of a bunch of different ingredients: the market you’re going after, company culture, exec leadership, product strategy, organizational incentives, and the members on the team. Team state is rarely caused by any given team member, or any one factor.
Teams naturally move between states as the market, company, strategy and internal incentives evolve. Some states are stable and can remain in a state forever (e.g. not shipping). Some are unstable, with structural reasons why they will not persist (e.g. teams shipping high-impact products are prone to talent drain)
