What is prioritization?
Definition of Prioritization
Prioritization in Product Development is when a product manager evaluates several activities to decide which tasks should be done and in what sequence.
A Key Term in the world of Prioritization is a Product Backlog. A Product Backlog is a term used to define the functions you and your company must complete. A product’s backlog may be depicted as a range of activities, some of which are essential and practical, and others which are more luxurious and aspirational, on a roadmap for the development of the product. It is necessary to evaluate and rate the tasks to establish their value and developmental order in the long run. There are a variety of approaches to prioritizing a backlog.
The Purpose Of Prioritization
The initial concept can grow complex and confusing, even if the fundamental assumption is straightforward. In addition, Tasks can quickly accumulate, and a development plan might become clumsy. Product backlogs mustn’t become dumping grounds for nebulous ideas or vague notions unrelated to the product when it comes to product backlogs.
As a result, Applying an effective prioritization method can bring structure and organization to a chaotic situation and assist intelligent resource allocation while remaining true to the organization’s overall strategic objective. It is possible to create schedules and establish deadlines.
Furthermore, As humans, we have so many goals in our personal and professional life. As a result, we must prioritize which objectives to address first.
To determine how objectives should be classified, make a list of all of your goals. Determine how much time you want to devote to each objective and when you want to complete it.
Prioritization Techniques and Procedures
One technique for dealing with backlog prioritizing is to arrange your tasks so that those at the top of the list will be the ones used in the development team’s subsequent sprint. Because the sprint itself is time-driven, it inherently enables the assignment of deadlines to the tasks in question.
Another method of prioritizing is to organize ideas or tasks into tiers based on their importance. It will always be beneficial to capture any notions from brainstorming sessions when having early discussions with other team members.
On the other hand, a tiering system will determine which ideas should be prioritized for inclusion in the Product Backlog. The backlog can remain athletic and realistic as a result of this strategy.
Ensure that time has been set out – and that it’s done regularly – to examine the Product Backlog. The availability of resources, the changing nature of the marketplace, commercial competition, and changes in the organization’s strategic objectives are just a few of the factors that can significantly impact how you, as a manager, should prioritize a task.
Additionally, and maybe in conjunction with creating the tiered structure described above, keep more aspirational, outlandish, notional, long-term, abstract, imaginative, or obscure thoughts in a secure record distinct from the others.
This will eliminate the temptation to put every concept into the backlog and make it even bigger and fatter. Additionally, set time to go over the log and think about whether you might wish to promote items to the next stage of development.
Take, for example, the usage of a scoring system. It is possible to use a process like this to help preserve the strategic alignment of work and thereby assess the overall economic worth of the activity to an organization. Making decisions about backlog jobs can create issues such as resource allocation much easier to direct, which can be beneficial.
A robust framework built around the company’s commercial objectives can further streamline the prioritization process by streamlining the entire process. This can also benefit from defending any decisions taken before a broader group of stakeholders and the leadership team. When developing a scoring system for product development, it is essential to consider time consumption, cost, and expert knowledge. Other elements that are distinctive to a company’s specialization should constantly be entertained.
Types of Prioritization
There are many different ways to prioritize tasks in Product Management, and there are constantly new ways to learn and use them.
Furthermore, no technique can ever be as significant as the discussions between staff members and the benchmarks established as part of the prioritization process itself.
Here are some essential prioritization methods:
A) Quadrant of Value vs. Complexity
According to this framework, the company evaluates a task based on how difficult it will be to implement it compared to its value. This is a tool that product managers frequently employ. If work is simple to accomplish and has a sizable monetary worth, your company management will give it a high priority.
B) The scoring system
This strategy is most effective when determining what is most crucial to a company’s strategic objectives (outside of simply making money). Similarly, your team and management can use it in conjunction with the value vs. complexity type of comparison.
When a scoring system is dynamic, you, as a manager, can change the criteria for applying the scoring at any time. This is very important when all of the circumstances affecting an organization are constantly changing. A scoring system can also help you gain more objective knowledge of the variables driving the priority of your tasks.
C) The Kano framework (also known as the Kano model).
According to the Kano principle, you should look at your product from the consumer’s perspective and appreciate what they think about it. Specific characteristics of the goods may provide the consumer with satisfaction (like performance). As a result, other product characteristics that typically necessitate expenditure may become less significant. The product may only have the bare minimum of features to join the market (threshold). The consumer may only have a few characteristics that will have a disproportionately high interest. After asking them what “price” they would place on a specific product component, obtaining feedback from consumers or other stakeholders is the basis for pricing.
D) Marketing Stakeholders or consumers
It can be given a fixed total expenditure amount, after which they can assign a price to each aspect of the product they wish to purchase. The traits with the highest costs are given the highest priority in the ranking.
E) Consumer Ranking
The goal of this prioritization strategy is to get input from consumers, who will be able to rank each aspect of the product based on their level of appreciation or happiness with it and their overall contentment with the product. According to the customer satisfaction data, priority would be given to those features that had the lowest ratings.
F) Brainstorming sessions
A group of people uses this strategy to pool all of their ideas. Next, they would put the pictures together based on their commonalities, which they would do in partnership.
Once the concepts have been assigned to groups, the team would give names to the groups and then rank the groups according to their perceived value. As a result, common characteristics emerge, which can then be prioritized.
A story map is a visual representation of a story. Story mapping is a technique that is more commonly employed in agile-oriented Product Management and uses the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) concept. A minimum viable product (MVP) is a product that has only the characteristics necessary to attract early-adopter users.
These stakeholders are in a position to validate the product’s features. This information allows the product development team to concentrate on specific product components with the confidence that the consumer has previously expressed an interest in them.
This strategy, in particular, is advantageous because the product can be delivered to these early adopters at different intervals to gather their input on the development. Additionally, it assists in keeping the entire plan on track and generates valuable statistics.
How To Use Prioritization
To figure out what has to be done immediately, you need to browse through your to-do lists and ask yourself a few questions.
Is this a pressing priority because it has a deadline approaching, and there will be consequences if not completed on time? For instance, your company must meet a labor commitment by tomorrow night. It would help if you terminated these things immediately.
Is it a critical priority, which means this must be completed, but there is no immediate deadline? For example, suppose you have a job responsibility that will take around a day and is due next week.
Is this a nonobligatory priority? This means that there are no consequences if not completed and most likely not.
