Product Development Flow Working Group

Attributes

Property	Value
Date Created	August 31, 2020
Target End Date	January 30, 2021
Slack	#wg_product_development_flow (only accessible by GitLab team members)
Google Doc	Working Group Agenda (only accessible by GitLab team members)
Docs	TBD
Epics/Issues	Main Epic / Issue Board
Label	~wg-product-development-flow
Associated KPIs/OKRs	TBD
GitLab group for working group reviewers	@wg-product-development-flow
GitLab group for working group contributors (MR authors)	@wg-contributors-pd-flow

Problems To Solve

For more details please reference the product development flow survey slides.

Doesn’t Encourage Cross-Functional Collaboration

• How can we promote optimal cross-functional involvement in the product development flow (e.g. where would we benefit from having TWs be informed earlier or where can QEs participate earlier)?
• How can we ensure tracks and phases don’t silo activities and continually encourage cross-functional contribution #everyonecancontribute?

Too Many Steps

• How can we reduce the number of “required” steps in the product development flow without losing key steps needed for convergence points (such as workflow states and release notes aggregation)?
• How can we better enable teams to work efficiently by providing the right amount of details in tandem with opportunity for personalization for their specific needs (e.g. an activities/outcomes model rather than just a step by step)?

Too Prescriptive

• How can we reduce verbosity in the product development flow (e.g. provide a better balance of visual snapshots and written descriptions)?
• How do we better focus teams on delivering value by enabling them to strike their own balance between when to build new features and when to improve existing features (e.g. detail out the Improve phase in an alternate style as a test run)?

Business Goals

Iterate on the product development flow to shift away from a “step by step” and more toward being a container/playbook of strategies/tactics to provide teams with:

1. Various activities/outcomes to employ at each phase to identity what to build or improve to solve a problem.
2. Minimal, required processes teams need to follow at each phase to maintain efficient, transparent and predictable workflow cross-functionally.

Protocols and Processes

Creating Epics & Issues for the working group board

To propose an idea or solution that addresses one of the defined problems - follow the below steps to ensure effective asynchronous collaboration:

1. Create an issue to address your proposal and add it to Product Development Flow as a Framework epic
2. We use this issue board as a single source of truth. Issues should be moved through the board from left to right
3. Assign newly created issues to the Facilitator who is currently @fseifoddini for prioritization

MR review process

• Contributors will generate MRs and tag the Contributor group ‘@wg-contributors-pd-flow’ for feedback first. The Facilitator and Contributors will then review and align if the MR is merge-able (non-controversial) or if it needs more feedback before the merge
• Next, the Facilitator or the MR author will tag in specific people and/or tag in the whole Reviewer group (which includes Executive Sponsors) ‘@wg-reviewers-pd-flow’ for feedback before the merge
  • If unique action is needed from any individual, especially Executive Sponsors, they will be directly pinged. Otherwise, getting pinged as a Reviewer is a standard review/feedback before the merge cycle.
• Our goal is to minimize noise for Reviewers (inclusive of Executive Sponsors) and focus feedback efforts to move forward efficiently. If you want to follow every issue/MR, you’re welcome to do so via our WG board

NOTE: Please pay attention to your To-Do list! We’ll not hold the train on MRs for more than 24 hours, specially non-controversial ones.

Exit Criteria

Review and Optimize the current Product Development Workflow

• Define the Required and Optional workflow phases.
• Optimize the existing labels currently required in each phase.
• Review the finalized Outcomes/ Activities section in different workflows to incorporate different issue types - feature, bug, experiment, etc.
• Build in early engagement and collaboration with all counterparts in each phase as needed.

Define what success looks like for the PD-FLOW

• Define goals and supporting metrics
• Define qualitative as well as quantitative ways to track, measure and iterate

Dogfooding

• Identify a Section/ group to dogfood the new flow.
• Document and iterate on suggestions and feedback.

Downstream Process Review

• Identify any downstream process changes that might need review.
  • Quad Planning process

Matrix and Dashboards

• Document all dashboards that need to be updated.
• Define what matrix should be measured and how.
• Identify any new dashboard needs.

Communication

• Communicate the new product development flow change broadly.
• Conduct an AMA to answer all questions / concerns.

Roles and Responsibilities

Working Group Role	Person	Title
Executive Sponsor	Anoop Dawar	VP, Product Management
Executive Sponsor	Christie Lenneville	VP of UX
Facilitator	Farnoosh Seifoddini	Principal PM, Product Operations
Functional Lead	Vincy Wilson (QE)	Manager, Quality Engineering - Growth & Govern
Functional Lead	Jackie Bauer (UX/Product Design)	UX Manager, Enablement & Growth
Functional Lead	Jeff Crow (UX Research)	Senior UX Researcher, Growth
Functional Lead	Michael Karampalas (Product Management)	Principal PM, Growth
Functional Lead	Justin Farris (Product Management)	GPM, Plan
Functional Lead	Craig Norris (Technical Writing)	Technical Writing Manager
Functional Lead	Thomas Woodham (Engineering)	Engineering Manager, Secure
Member	Wayne Haber (Engineering)	Director Engineering, Threat Management
Member	Nadia Udalova (Dev)	Product Design Manager
Member	Keanon O’keefe (Plan)	Senior Product Manager
Member	Tim Hey (Growth)	Principal Product Manager
Member	Eric Schurter (Create)	Senior Product Manager
Member	Mark Wood (Plan)	Senior Product Manager
Member	Sarah Waldner (Monitor)	Senior Product Manager
Member	Fabian Zimmer (Geo)	Senior Product Manager
Member	Daniel Croft (Release, Package)	Senior Manager, Engineering
Member	Jason Yavorska (CI/CD)	Director Product Management
Member	Thiago Figueiró	Engineering Manager, Threat Management
Member	Dan Jensen (Manage)	Engineering Manager, Analytics & Compliance
Member	TBD (Data)	TBD

Working Groups

Working Group	Person	Title
Contributor	Farnoosh Seifoddini	Principal PM, Product Operations
Contributor	Wayne Haber (Engineering)	Director Engineering, Threat Management
Contributor	Vincy Wilson (QE)	Manager, Quality Engineering - Growth & Govern
Contributor	Jacki Bauer (UX/Product Design)	Product Design Manager, Growth & Fulfillment
Contributor	Michael Karampalas (Product Management)	Principal PM, Growth
Contributor	Justin Farris (Product Management)	GPM, Plan
Contributor	Nadia Udalova (Dev)	Product Design Manager
Contributor	Mark Wood (Plan)	Senior Product Manager
Contributor	Fabian Zimmer (Geo)	Senior Product Manager
Contributor	Daniel Croft (Release, Package)	Senior Manager, Engineering
Reviewer	Anoop Dawar	VP, Product Management
Reviewer	Christie Lenneville	VP of UX
Reviewer	Jeff Crow (UX Research)	Senior UX Researcher, Growth
Reviewer	Craig Norris (Technical Writing)	Technical Writing Manager
Reviewer	Keanon O’keefe (Plan)	Senior Product Manager
Reviewer	Tim Hey (Growth)	Principal Product Manager
Reviewer	Eric Schurter (Create)	Senior Product Manager
Reviewer	Sarah Waldner (Monitor)	Senior Product Manager
Reviewer	Jason Yavorska (CI/CD)	Director Product Management
Reviewer	Thiago Figueiró	Engineering Manager, Threat Management
Reviewer	Dan Jensen (Manage)	Engineering Manager, Analytics & Compliance

Meetings

Meetings are recorded and available on YouTube in the Working Group - Product Development Flow playlist. Due to the subject matter of this working group and the high probability that every synchronous meeting will discuss sensitive customer information, the playlist is private and accessible by GitLab team members only.