How can a feature team measure their impact on the business?
Byte-size content for sizable minds.
First, it’s important to identify which category the new product feature belongs to as there can be a whole spectrum:
Growing usage
New product innovation
New features
Improvements to features
Platform work
Maintenance
In general, #1 is easiest to measure in terms of business results; #6 can be the hardest. As you move down the list, the projects also become more Engineering-centric. You can use top-down or bottom-up in defining your success metrics, and I find that the further you are on the list, the more you have to make a bottom-up approach.
For example, my team is currently building a platform-level work that will build the foundation for constructing a virtual home. This, on its own, will not directly bring revenue but is required for us to build a sustainable subscription business. In this case, our success metrics are mostly defined as follow:
Goal: Build platform solutions that will enable subscription business.
Success criteria:
On-time delivery by X
Minimal issues: number of tickets is X per month
Improve user experience from X to Y (refer to app reviews, customer support, survey, etc.)
Improve customer satisfaction from X to Y (refer to app reviews, customer support, survey, etc.)
Enable the subscription business that will deliver $X per month.
In this case, we started with a more specific, measurable goal (#1, #2) and then connected these with other retention metrics (#3, #4), and finally, with business results (#5).
For the project team, you’d want to focus on the specific outcomes that can measure the quality of work produced by the engineering team. Then, you may add the other metrics so that it will resonate better with other teams (UX, Marketing, Product) and your leadership. The key here is to connect the dots so you can communicate this effectively to the stakeholders.