There’s a familiar tension in the air. Leadership is getting antsy, asking ‘What have you shipped this month?’ and the pressure to show constant activity is mounting.
In uncertain economic times, the focus often shifts from strategic bets to tangible, immediate output. The roadmap can quickly devolve into a feature list—a checklist to prove the team is ‘busy.’ We all know the danger of the feature factory: building things that don’t move the needle on core business metrics. Yet, the pressure to fill a release log is real, creating a conflict between looking productive and being productive.
This isn’t just about process; it’s about survival. Wasting cycles on low-impact features is more dangerous than ever when every dollar counts. As product leaders, we have to hold the line for an outcome-oriented approach, tying every initiative back to a measurable impact on revenue, retention, or engagement. But how do we manage stakeholder expectations when they’re demanding a steady stream of visible ‘wins’?