How Product People Elevated the Product Team’s Excellence for a CryptoDocs Solution

The Client: CryptoDocs Solution Company

Our client operates within the document management solutions industry, launching its email attachment encryption and tracking tool in 2022.

Their tool works as an email extension for both Microsoft Outlook and Google Gmail giving senders the power to stop recipients from downloading or sharing attachments even after they have been sent. It lets users revoke sent attachments and see each time someone opens downloads or shares attachments with real-time reporting. Every attachment is automatically tokenized and encrypted with enhanced security.

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The Mission: Interim Product Manager

The CryptoDocs Solution Company hired us for several key tasks: identifying and implementing improvements in product development processes, suggesting team restructuring to support new practices, defining key performance indicators for their product, fostering a data-driven decision-making culture, supporting Product Owners and Technical Analysts in product management best practices, creating user personas and customer journey maps to enhance user experience.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 The team consisted of:

• 2 Product Owners (PO)
• Technical Analyst (TA)
• VP of Product and Engineering

Upon joining, we encountered a set of challenges that are not uncommon in dynamic business environments. These included aligning divergent expectations between management and the product team, revitalizing team motivation, and embracing a sales-led approach. These challenges provided valuable learning opportunities and set the stage for meaningful transformations in the team's approach and methodologies.

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Our Main Quest

Launch: Onboarded Very Fast

Upon joining the client, we hit the ground running by quickly onboarding and getting up to speed on the company's strong and improvement areas. This was made possible by our ability to conduct thorough stakeholder interviews, which allowed us to understand areas for improvement in product development processes. After conducting interviews, we created an Organizational Opportunities List with problem definitions, priorities, sources, solutions, and costs of delays.

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We presented the Organizational Opportunities List to our client's management for their input, which was instrumental in crafting a mission plan. This plan, developed with a focus on prioritized areas and solutions, was then aligned with all key stakeholders, ensuring a unified approach to addressing the core challenges faced by the team.

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Explore and Conquer: Solved for the Client

Optimizing Product Development: Collaborative Process Enhancement

• In our initiative to enhance our client's product development processes, we engaged with Product Owners (POs) and Technical Analyst (TA) to construct a comprehensive map of the existing processes, covering stages from research to launch. This involved detailed discussions to understand their challenges in each phase, which were documented on a process board.
• We then conducted a thorough analysis of these processes and challenges, leading to the development of tailored solutions.
• Collaborative sessions with POs and the TA were organized to refine these solutions, incorporating their past experiences and ideas.
• A strategic plan was prepared with clearly defined action points and assigned responsibilities, prioritizing implementable actions by considering existing blockers.

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Establishing a Metrics-Driven Framework for Product Evaluation

We were assigned to define metrics for the product to drive product development. As a first step, we created a Customer Journey Map (CJM) for the Enterprise Plan with the whole team and integrated metrics into each stage.

Utilizing the AARRR methodology, we developed a comprehensive metrics table specifically for the Enterprise Plan. This process also involved prioritizing metrics by focusing on key steps in the Customer Journey Map (CJM), and the pivotal features.

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Advancing & Documenting: User Experience Research

• We identified a need to refine the approach to product development to better resonate with users and stay competitive in the dynamic document management solutions market. The primary considerations were:
  • Enhancing and documenting user-centric practices: We aimed to strengthen the team’s understanding of user needs and preferences and to document the team’s knowledge about users, to create products that truly solve customer pain points.
  • Strategic positioning in the market: We aimed to further understand the market landscape and strategically position its products for success with a desire to maintain a competitive edge.
• In response to these aspirations, we facilitated several key initiatives to position CryptoDocs Solution Company for sustained growth and to document the team’s knowledge.
  • User Persona Workshops: We organized and facilitated workshops to define and understand the various user personas associated with their product. With attendance from diverse stakeholders including the founders, Customer Success, and Sales, this process aimed to create a foundation for user-centric product development.
  • User Flows and Customer Journey Maps: Comprehensive user flows and customer journey maps were developed to visualize and optimize the end-to-end user experience. This exercise identified pain points and opportunities for improvement throughout the user journey.
  • Survey and Interview Frameworks: We designed survey and interview questions to gather qualitative and quantitative insights from both existing and potential customers.
  • Competitor Analysis: A thorough analysis of key competitors was conducted to identify market trends, benchmark product features, and uncover areas for differentiation.

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Our Side Quests: Collaborating with the Product Team

In our role as Interim Product Managers, we provided pivotal support to the Product Owners (POs) and Technical Analysts (TA) in several key areas:

‍Enhancing Stakeholder Collaboration and Project Clarity

• Addressing the challenge faced by POs in obtaining stakeholder feedback and approvals for a major initiative, we conducted a thorough review of existing documentation, including design files on Figma, initiative outlines on Confluence and detailed requirements on Jira.
• We identified a critical gap: the absence of a comprehensive user flow with designs. To resolve this, we developed a user flow with designs and technical aspects. This helped with identifying any open questions, missing designs, content, and requirements.
• Our efforts enabled the PO to effectively address outstanding issues and secure the necessary sign-offs from all stakeholders, streamlining project progress and enhancing cross-functional communication.

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Establishing Customized Documentation Templates

To enhance their documentation and workflow efficiency, we closely assessed the product team’s needs and existing documentation. This led to the creation of a suite of tailored templates designed to streamline various aspects of POs’ and the TA’s work. We developed:

• A user story ticket template for Jira.
• A comprehensive Confluence feature page template to document personas, problems, feature descriptions, and success criteria.
• An internal user manual template, ensuring up-to-date feature documentation.
• Templates for interview preparation and documentation, including objectives, questions, candidate profiles, pain points, and findings.
• A structured format for conducting and documenting ideation sessions post pain point identification.

We also conducted training sessions to ensure the team could effectively utilize these tools, thereby fostering a more efficient and cohesive working environment.

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Mission Achievements: Delivered Outcomes

💡 Compiled an extensive Organizational Opportunities List and devised a detailed implementation plan aimed at refining and optimizing product development processes.

💡 Developed a comprehensive metrics framework for the product with the Enterprise Plan, utilizing the AARRR methodology.

💡 Documented comprehensive user personas, flows, and customer journey maps. Prepared targeted surveys and interviews, and a competitor analysis.

💡 Empowered the product team with customized documentation templates, and training sessions.