Technical Product Management from a Human Perspective
Why thinking through how people will use your ‘killer app’ is so important
by Timothy Coleman - 22/Mar/2024
Context
Tonight I was cycling back on a Human Forest bike (similar to Uber/Lime) from seeing some friends. I stopped at a bus stop and opened my phone to check when the next bus would arrive, as this would get me home quicker. My phone battery died.
This put me in a very difficult position as I couldn’t check when the next bus would be, and I also couldn’t end my bike ride. I tried turning on the phone again and after a few minutes it turned itself off again. What was I going to do…?
After a few minutes of being stationary and thinking about what to do, I heard the sound which the bike makes when the ride ends, and noticed that the wheels had locked. At least now I wasn’t going to continue to be billed.
Observation
I have often wondered what would happen in this scenario, worst case I would have actually cycled the whole way home, but what if it was too far? Thankfully, it was some very clever person/team’s job to think through these scenarios and plan ahead.
This is one of the main challenges for designers of systems.. thinking through EVERY possible scenario and accounting for it. I am often baffled by clients who want a new product built and actually don’t think these things through (or don’t want to).
Sure there might be a right time to leave thinking through certain scenarios for further down the line, but it is really important to actually have discussions around expected functionality when building a new product or service, as annoying as it can be.
Offering
One of our main offerings at Unegma is to offer consulting services aimed at helping both startups and established companies to begin the process of laying out the groundwork for either new or existing products and services, especially online digital.
We pride ourselves on over 10 years of experience working with startups at the technical level, and so we have a deep understanding of how developers work and think, and we help either with early stage planning, or with later stage management.
Thankfully a helpful guy called Paweł told me that the next bus was in 6 minutes and I managed to get home without worrying about leaving an unfinished ride accumulating minutes. Thanks Human Forest for thinking this through, and I hope I don’t get a fine!