Why Do We *Still* Have Product Teams? ?? A call to unite Services and Product in B2B SaaS.

Using legacy product teams to steer your B2B SaaS is like hanging on to your Blackberry in 2023.

It's just not a good fit for the times.

There's a huge overlap between Service Design and Product Design. Both are all about customers and outcomes. But it's where these two meet that matter most.

When fused together, they can transform customer outcomes.

Once upon a time, we just had software. ??

It came in a box, with a manual, and one price tag. ?? ??

You used it like a tangible tool at a tangible workstation. ??

And it was only a product. ??

Product Management made perfect sense back then. All the emphasis was to get you to grab it off the shelf and buy it.

Enter SaaS. ? ??

Thanks to cloud computing, subscription plans, and mobile apps, software became super accessible. You didn't have to be chained to a desk to use it.

So, SaaS started feeling more like a service than a tool. For instance, SaaS enabled us to...

?? Go somewhere (Uber)

?? Find a place to stay (Airbnb)

?? Or even a one-night stand! ?? (Tinder)

?? Opinion Warning ??

In over 10 years at B2B SaaS Startups, leading Professional Services teams, and since founding UnlockTheROI (a company born and bred in B2B Services and Startups), I have formed a strong opinion on Professional Services at B2B Startups:

Professional Services are often misunderstood in tech companies. Rarely do I see PS included in Product Management. They're usually separate, which is a big miss.

At one startup, the product team was brilliant at building software with great UI and technical acumen but they often missed what our services crew saw daily: the real-world grind of our software in the field.

A true goldmine of insights went untapped.

Eventually, we brute-forced those gritty, on-the-ground experiences straight into Product Managers and Developers. And it helped... for a little while.

But we were still two separate tribes, worshiping different metric gods - one bowed to product metrics, the other to revenue.

I always wonder what would happen if we all rallied under one flag, where the software team solved software problems while the services team solved the human aspects of those same products and, in harmony, delivered the best possible outcomes to the customer.

Imagine we were a landscaping service. Focusing too much on software (the tool) and not including Professional Services in your SaaS Product Roadmap is like obsessing over the lawnmowers ?? more than the tidiness of the lawns we’re cutting. ??????

I believe customers want outcomes more than they want beautiful tools.

Legacy vs PS

I see Traditional Product Management and Design as a way to get someone to BUY:

• Functionality (like a tool)
• Packaging
• Market fit

(Don’t get me wrong, these are super important!)

But Services? They're all about the customer:

• Experience-based
• Focusing on outcomes, not just tools
• Driven by what the customer needs

However, as a counterpoint, I know a lot of product managers do think big picture. I've seen them bring in service people into the design and development process.

While that's a step in the right direction, I am proposing that they work together to identify and reverse engineer outcomes for customers. Putting aside the assumption that software is the best and only path available.

So what can be done?

Let's bring Product Teams and Professional Services together.

One team, united around customer needs, for customer outcomes. ??????

Product teams often end up making the best... product.

But we need go beyond just great software.

To integrate services and product at your SaaS, let's take these steps:

1. Host Cross-Functional Workshops: Facilitate understanding and collaboration between teams.
2. Create Integrated Roadmaps: Align objectives and milestones of both teams around customer outcomes (not software features).
3. Launch Joint Training Programs: Share knowledge and experience.
4. Start Cross-Team Projects: Bring Product people into the field, bring services pros into collaborative projects to engineer outcomes.
5. Robust Feedback loops: Continuously share service delivery experience with Product Managers.
6. Leadership Support: Ensure leadership champions the effort and addresses challenges to bust the silos.
7. Share Success Stories: Highlight positive outcomes to motivate and guide teams.

These steps will harmonize Product Management, Software Development with Service Delivery, to recenter on customer outcomes.

Let’s talk about this. Are you ready to harmonize Services and Product teams at your Startup?

Need help harmonizing your Product and Professional Services roadmap? UnlockTheROI can help!

Go to www.unlocktheroi.com and Request Your 4-Week Battle Plan to get started.