Disrupting Large Company Culture With Startup Product Thinking

Gaurav Sachdeva at UXDX APAC. Video: https://youtu.be/mTzLzWwI91Q

Readable transcript: edited from the recording's captions for readability (fillers and false starts removed, punctuation and section headings added). Wording is the speaker's own. Timestamps are positions in the video. Names marked [?] could not be verified against the audio.

Acceptance and recalibration

[00:00:02] Any journey, whether it's a new product journey, a transformation journey, or the next travel experience that you're going to take in your personal life, must start with acceptance and some form of recalibration. You must ask yourself: where are we, and where do we want to get to? In the case of SPH, we had to accept that we are transforming. The media business is big-time disrupted. Our print newspaper revenues are falling. Most folks are reading and consuming their news and media from Google or Facebook or from other social media. So we had to first accept that we are no longer a monopoly, and in that process focus the entire team and the organization towards outcomes and the mission.

[00:00:57] In that process you will have to empower employees, engage customers, transform your products and optimize your operations. But at the same time you have to be very strategic, very intentional and systematic about it. What we typically observe in monopolies is that a culture of complacency sets in, a sense of comfort sets in, and that mindset has to be gotten out of.

[00:01:26] That's where we are. Particularly for me, I think it's not only acceptance of where you are and where you need to be, but at the same time recalibration, and a promise to yourself: recalibration of your speed. I came into SPH from the rocket ship of Grab. We had just completed Uber's acquisition in Southeast Asia, and here I was in a team which was learning to ship products the way product designers and product managers would in any modern technology company. We were a media company, so there needed to be recalibration, because in such an environment it is very easy for bad habits to slide by. I strongly believe in atomic habits and being one percent better. How do you drill that into an organization? How do you make people respond that way? That is a recalibration on your part.

Start on the ground

[00:02:33] So where do we begin? The first and best place to begin is on the ground. Do your roses, thorns and buds exercises. I was in a leadership position, and what you learn on the floor, from engineers on the ground, from designers on the ground, from editors on the ground, from journalists on the ground, is just invaluable. That is where you will get the first principles of what you can do next to make things better. Translating your sprint retrospective fundamentals and frameworks into a format where you're trying to figure out the lay of the land is the first step you must begin with, and I can guarantee you'll get pointers for how to make further progress.

[00:03:24] That's because with acceptance and listening comes the openness of mind and the senses to really call out what's holding us back. That is really the key. If you cannot identify and call out what's holding you back, you will never be able to act on it.

Change the narrative to outcomes

[00:03:40] The second part of that journey is to change the narrative. Make the entire organization outcome-focused and audience-centric, and build a problem-solving mindset in them. You can apply this to a team culture, to an organization-wide culture, or even to your small scrum team or small product team. The principles remain the same whether you're in a startup or in a large organization. This is really key, because once you focus the entire team on a common business metric, on a common goal that you want to achieve, everybody starts moving in that direction. It's easier said than done, but that's where we have to begin.

[00:04:28] And the next thing: being the beholders of product and design, you have to stick to the tenets of building strong products. In an organization like the media company I work in right now, where I lead the product and design teams, you have to focus the entire team on building the right products. Make them focus on who the customer is. Make them focus on why you're doing what you are doing. Be extremely data-driven and make sure that you have metrics. And, as has been said, fail early, test and learn, and iterate.

Who, why and the north star

[00:05:04] At this point I can't emphasize enough the need to build the right products that customers love. Focus on the who: who your customers are, what their needs are, what their context and possibilities are, and do not forget the limitations of their environment or the technology they may be using, or what their business needs to succeed. Why is really important, because unless you know why it makes sense for your user to solve that problem, and why that outcome is important, you're not going to be able to maximize your chances of success.

[00:05:40] And finally, know your north star metrics and know your business model. Unless you are able to connect what your customers want with what your business needs, you will not be able to build, let alone ship, something that is going to be useful for them. And if you don't have metrics, please start there. Start in your team, and then mobilize that through examples to your entire organization, working with your leadership teams.