The first key to establishing a successful product organization is adopting a product-centric mindset, which leverages an approach to developing goods, services, or experiences that emphasize delighting the customer or end user while maximizing value to the enterprise. This marks a major shift in how companies operate internally, cater to customers, and attract top talent.

Organizations interested in adopting a product-centric mindset often encounter early roadblocks by failing to define foundational elements—such as misaligning business strategy, struggling to decouple from legacy project management operating models, and measuring outcomes versus milestones.

Leaders are attracted to the customer focus, agility, accountability, and transparency that product organization promises but can miss out on these benefits without rethinking how they’re structured, how ownership is split between teams, and how people work together. To reap the rewards of product organization, companies need to put in place a clear reporting structure, crisply define ownership between cross-functional teams, and establish ways of working to promote teaming. We recommend companies prioritize thinking about what kinds of organizational and operational changes they need to make on the journey to reimagine product organization.

The most effective product teams are cross-functional by design and may be composed of a product manager, business representative, engineer, and designer. While the methods and tools of communication may vary; however, it is critical to establish clear responsibilities for each of the product team roles to optimize coordinated efforts and handoffs.

Without clearly establishing the responsibilities of each role, the organization risks duplication of work, breakdown in communication between teams, lack of autonomy across product groups, and an ambiguous accountability structure.

The most effective product organizations establish ways of working and strive for consistency. Leaders should introduce a product delivery playbook, consolidate the tool stack, and codify procedures for road map prioritization and budget requests to ensure consistency across the organization. Many will quickly find, however, that attempting to establish consistent governance structure, reduce friction across teams with competing priorities, and change the culture to embrace an iterative, agile product-centric mindset is extremely difficult.

Once a company has defined the business case strategy, established the product organization, and organized the operating model around processes that impactfully build product-centric capabilities, it needs to look at how it supports employees. Product management is in demand, and organizations are constantly being challenged with retaining and attracting top talent. Within Deloitte’s center of excellence, we help companies define and communicate the product management career path and growth opportunities for their employees. A successful product organization will create a culture that focuses on empowering the individual by offering opportunities for leveling up skillsets, advancement, and career growth.