The Cranky Product Manager

Stage 4 Product Proliferation

Once upon a time, long, long ago, DysfunctoSoft had a simple little price list. It could be described in a paragraph. Buy our server and pay $XX,XXX per machine. Buy our companion client-side tool and pay $YYY per instance. Simple.

And then came the inevitable. Customer A started whining: DysfunctoSoft, we like your product. But it is too full-featured for us. We don't want to pay for functionality we won't use.  We want to pay less.

Instead of recognizing the whining as a simple price negotiation tactic, what do you think the big cheeses of DysfunctoSoft decided to do? Did they tell the sales person to do a better job of selling the product that actually existed? Did they attempt "value pricing" or offer Customer A a discount so the price would fit the project's budget?

No. Of course not. Because those options are just too freakin' simple. And too cheap. You see, DysfunctoSoft always likes to do things the arcane way.  The expensive way. The way that is most likely to confuse the fuck out of customers and the sales people and pretty much everyone.  The way that is most likely to increase the cost of BOTH sales AND product development by tenfold.

So what did they do?  The big cheeses of DysfunctoSoft ordained that a NEW product be created, a variation on the original.  This NEW product shall have less functionality than the original, and shall be offered at a lower price. 

And it worked. The deal closed.

And then the very next customer, Customer B, said: You know what, we like your stuff, DysfunctoSoft. But the original product is too much for us, and product variation A doesn't do enough.  We need something in between and we don't want to pay for functionality we don't use.

And so the big cheeses met on Mount Olympus yet again. In between sips of ambrosia, they commanded that Yet Another Product be created, against the strenuous objections of the predecessor to the Cranky Product Manager. Product B would have less functionality than the original and more than Product Variant A, and offered at a price in between the two. Customer B liked. And Customer B bought.

And you can see where this is going, right? 

N years later, DysfunctoSoft now has product variations A through ZZZ.  All slight variations of each other.  Each has a moniker meant to distinguish it from the rest, but instead it serves to confuse the frig out of everyone: "Lite", "Starter", "Ultimate", "Standard", "Enterprise", "Developer", "Advanced", "Professional", "Professional Plus", "Basic", "Premier", "Express", "Personal", "On-Demand", "Workgroup", "Home", "Business", "Desktop", "Premium",  "Basic N", "Unlimited", "Datacenter", "Foundation", "Framework",  "Mobile", "Community"...  The list goes on and on.  Naturally, there is no consistency in the naming.  That would make too much sense. What the frig do all these terms  mean anyway?  Especially when the "Unlimited" and "Ultimate" variants aren't as powerful as the "Enterprise" or "Pro Plus" or whatever. And how the hell are the Lite and Basic and Express and Starter editions different? 

Not only that, each of these products can be licensed in a myriad of ways: per instance, per customer site, per server, per processor, per concurrent user, per named user...  It is difficult to think of a licensing method that DysfunctoSoft does not support. 

Results?

The price list is now enormous, pushing 200 pages or so. No one can understand it. Especially not Sales Droids.  They join DysfunctoSoft and then quit/get fired within a year. And then it's time to train a new Droid. It takes them MONTHS to finally internalize this nutso product line architecture.  Without their guidance, customers can't understand what to buy or how much it costs. Forget a consumer sale, a self-service sale, or one driven by website research.

Product Development is getting crushed underneath the weight of all these product variations. Although they all largely use the same code base, there are significant differences that have impact throughout the behavior of the products.

And because the names are hard coded into the products, manuals and marketing collateral, despite a concerted effort NOT to hard code them, it is now impossible to change the names to more sensible alternatives.

The QA effort required to test all these products on all the support platforms has gone through the roof.  It seems that for any new release 60% of the effort goes into making the licensing more intricate and trying to automate this crazy product variation structure via license keys or elaborate build systems.

What else?  Support costs have skyrocketed.  As have documentation and training costs. Marketing costs too. The Cranky Product Manager is sure the effects do not stop there. Oh what joy it must be to handle the accounting for such a needlessly massive product line. Or the financial forecasting. The auditors probably have a grand old time billing DysfunctoSoft after sifting through its cornucopia of transactions attributable to each product and licensing option combination.

The Cranky Product Manager truly, honestly believes that DysfunctoSoft's latest troubles are primarily due to the explosion of products that are not truly differentiated.  It's treading water, trying to keep its head above the continually crushing waves of a massive code base.  There is no time to actually create value for your customers when you can barely maintain what you already have. 

The Cranky Product Manager knows that DysfunctoSoft is hardly alone. Even companies like Proctor & Gamble are lured to madness by the siren of product proliferation and endless line extensions, paying dearly in the end for their lack of discipline.  Every software company the CPM has ever worked with has suffered the same illness. But those companies were still in their early years, suffering from Stage 1 or Stage 2 Product Proliferation.  Alas, DysfunctoSoft has an older product line, and is now suffering Stage 4 Product Proliferation: malignant, inoperable and infecting all organs in the body.

Perhaps it is time for the Cranky Product Manager to start working on her resume.

The Joy of Sales Meetings

The air is brisk. The holiday chocolate is all gone. And, at last, the gluttonous end-of-year feast of discounted software licenses is complete.

It must be that time of year. Time for the Annual Worldwide Sales Meeting.

And what would a monstrous sales meeting be without...

Over-the-top parties, complete with ice sculptures, minor celebrities-for-hire, free-flowing booze, cigars, cigars, and more cigars.  Where else can you get the free show of the Sales Gods and Goddesses groping each other?  Or see that gaggle of 20-something Marketing Blondes throwing themselves at the married, yet playboy-esque, CEO?  Where else can the Cranky Product Manager be  essentially forced to dance with two to five male Sales Engineers and Product Managers at once, all because -- as geeks -- they are too intimidated to ask the Marketing Blondes or Sales Goddesses?

The Endless Awards Ceremony. It seems that everyone in Sales and Professional Services - even the spreadsheet jockeying Sales Ops guys -- gets some kind award: "Rookie of the Year for the Western Chicagoland region", "MVP for the Southern Florida region", "The Billability King/Queen", "Best Proposal Award," "The Cold Caller Award", "The Leading Lead Qualifier," "Best Forecasting Spreadsheet," and on and on and on.... and on and on...

And then, the real awards. Real awards with real prizes for all the Sales Droids that managed to actually do their jobs and achieve their quota. Congratulations -- you did what DysfunctoSoft hired you to do! Here's your all-expenses-paid trip to Aspen! Bring your spouse and go skiing for an entire week!  And no need to deduct it from your vacation time!

Ugh. Boring. 

But more importantly, where's the award for the Cranky Product Manager, beeyotches? Why are the only people ever formally recognized at DysfunctoSoft, in any fashion, all in Sales and Professional Services?  Why no awards for Engineering, Marketing, or Customer Support -- or, more importantly, for Product Management?  The Cranky Product Manager wants HER tiny freakin' statuette to display in her cubicle, goddammit.  She wants HER one-week trip, with her SPOUSE, during the WORKING WEEK, to the most luxurious resort in the Bahamas.  Why is she perpetually denied?

The Networking - A unique opportunity to meet all those brand spankin' new sales reps, the ones that replaced all the fired sales reps with whom you loving cultivated relationships at last year's annual sales meeting. Make it fun! Randomly populate a 5x5 matrix with the names of the new reps. In addition to helping you remember their names, when the Sales Rep firing-fest begins you can play "Bye Bye Bingo" with your fellow PMs!

The Training - Ah, yes. Training. Your raison d'être. The only reason why you, as a Product Manager, are even present at Sales's celebration of itself: to train the account reps, sales engineers and consultants on your products.  Too bad they are all too drunk or hung over to remember a single thing you say.  And for the more technical sessions, too bad that no matter how many times you and your boss and their bosses remind them ahead of time, 70% of them will not even have your product installed on their laptops.  And if you correctly predict and allow for this reality by designing a lecture-style class, then 80% of them will complain that the class was not hands-on. Fan-effing-tastic.

The Roommates - OK, the Cranky Product Manager needs to know. Is her cheap-ass company the only one that will not spring for single-occupancy hotel rooms at sales meetings? Every year, the CPM ends up rooming with Hilda the Professional Services Barbarian.  Why? Because although Hilda's snoring can shake paint off the walls, at least she does not watch TV, make loud phone calls, or hog the bathroom for hours at a time. But most importantly, she does not try to engage the CPM in conversation of any kind.