How to create a team structure based on innovation and experimentation - Chapter 3
This is a six chapter journey where I will share my process to get into an ideal structure.
Hi readers, my name is Michel Hauzeur, and I am a soccer lover and a father of my little warrior called Mila and Baloo (rescued dog)
Currently Product Design & Innovation Leader at Nearsure with 14+ years of experience in product & tech. I’m also a Co-founder of La corte de los Búhos, a Digital Transformation consulting company in Latam.
Mentor in the Product League and Product Makers Mentors program for 2+ years.
And 2023 Product-Led Alliance Award as Product Leader of the Year winner.
Six chapters journey:
Chapter 3: Team Building Validation (This article)
Chapter 4: Team building implementation
Chapter 5: Center of Excellence definition
Chapter 6: Innovation and Experimentation through team building
Before starting, I want to thank you for reaching the third chapter!
Let´s continue…
Chapter 3: Team Building Validation
Section 1. Team Structure Design
In Chapter 2, I talked about “The Opportunity Solution Tree” and how we came up with the opportunity, solution, and experiment to run after a couple of analyses.
Let´s recap:
Problem: The studio is not generating enough revenue
Outcome: Reach an ARR of 5 Million.
Opportunity Selected: Design an ideal structure to support the company's goal.
Solutions Selected: Implement a team structure based on practices and innovation
Experiment: Implement a structure based on Career Paths, Growth, and Innovation.
Before presenting you with the structure we built for this experiment, I want to share the challenge I went through by passing from a team of 10 people with just one practice, into a team of 35 with two practices.
In 2023, at the end of the year, the company decided to integrate the four companies of the group to become a stronger company in the market and bet for growth by having in just one organization the best strategy to cross-sell services across clients, and to offer a bigger value for potential ones.
In this process, I started seeing the opportunity to show my vision about how we can start being more active and more attractive for clients regarding product design and development, what start liking the C-level and the board.
Some people were re-assigned to another role and others just left the company, and in this process, the design leader was one of those who decided to leave. As part of my vision, I dreamed about having a team where Design and Product can work together, to define, design, develop, launch, grow, and iterate together products, initiatives, and strategies.
When the vision was accepted, the first thing we did was to define who was going to be the new practice leaders. Once they were selected, the next step was to understand, across the four companies, how many people from product and design we would need to call them into the team.
After that analysis, we reached 35 people, 15 from product management, 17 from design, and us the leaders (Product, Design, and Studio Leaders). For around a month we co-create with the leaders about team building, and the ideal structure that will support the business and our studio goals.
An additional insight to include in this storytelling is in the Product Management Practice, we have not only Product Managers, but we also have Project Managers and Scrum Masters.
Section 2. Team Structure
To come into this structure we define that:
So far, we will only have two (2) Practice leaders (Product Management and Design). If we feel at some point we need to separate Project Managers and Scrum Masters into a new practice, that will depend on the number of people, studio vision, support, and career path.
The purpose of the team structure will be:
Create a sense of community to support and learn from each other.
Career path focus.
Support the business units of the company and sales.
Position the team across the company and in the market.
Innovation and experimentation.
Working on a clear career path means:
Applying assessments that will help us analyze our actual seniority level.
Create a career plan for each team member and create a semester plan.
Create a structure of mentors.
Create training paths and workshops.
Support the training paths on problem solutions.
The first version that we released includes:
One Studio Leader
Two Practice Leaders
Mentors program (1 mentor for 5 team members)
The interaction was one of the biggest challenges we faced in getting into the results, so then we decided that every group should interact with each other, regarding some specific topics:
Studio Leaders & Practice Leaders: Strategy, Sales, Accounts, Team Growth, and Team Vision
Practice Leaders & Mentors / Coaches: Career Path and Team Growth.
Practice Leaders will be aligned with Team Members. Align team members against practice and studio vision, mentor program, and accounts.
Mentors / Coaches & Team Members: Career Path, Accounts, and Support.
Team Members: Support
Product Practice & Design Practice: Practices Vision, Studio Vision, Accounts, Support, and Mentor Program.
Studio Leader & Team Members: Studio Vision, Practice Leaders, Mentor Program, and Support.
A rainy day in Central Park, 2024.
Section 3. The Results
During the first month of implementation, we define the mentor program and select the candidates. Then we trained the Mentors / Coaches about the purpose of the new structure and our vision. We also assigned five team members for each Mentor / Coach. Today we have 5 Mentors / Coaches for each practice.
Regarding the interaction, we define the cadence of the meetings for each type of group, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or even bi-monthly. But I can say, we are still figuring out what is best for each group.
From a goal perspective, we have covered, the sense of Community, the Career Path, and Business Support, but we are still missing a Training program and Innovation focus.
Then we need to iterate again the structure to reach those two goals we are missing.
To understand the next iteration process, please continue reading Chapter 4.
Thanks for reading!!!
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