Sunday Rewind: Minimise the gap between maker and user by Henrik Kniberg

This week’s Sunday Rewind is a 2019 #mtpcon London keynote from organisational consultant Henrik Kniberg on how creating great products requires us to reduce the gap between makers and users.

Henrik says that reducing the gap means limiting handoffs, using lots of different data sources, building empowered autonomous teams, committing to radical transparency, and focusing on curiosity rather than pride.

Releasing regularly reduces risk

Henrik uses product practice at Lego, Minecraft and Spotify as examples to explain this point.

Use different sources of feedback to make decisions

Henrik says product managers should use an approach that fits their culture (based on whether you want to see people as data or individuals).

Break things into smaller pieces

Starting a big project is daunting but Henrik’s advice is to find a single element, feature, or industry to build against rather than tackle everything at the beginning.

Autonomous teams make better decisions

To drive the most autonomous teams, you need to reduce the number of handoffs between them and the people using their products. Quality problems almost always arise because the people who make the products can’t see them being used properly.

Radical transparency helps teams to make good decisions

If you don’t know what’s happening in the rest of your organisation, it can limit your understanding of how your work affects everyone and everything else. Demos can ensure everyone collaborates.

Curiosity is better than pride

Asking questions about users and their context is better than focusing purely on what’s being delivered. It forces makers to build the right products rather than what they think is the right product.

Watch the original talk: Minimise the gap between maker and user by Henrik Kniberg