From Cost Center to Revenue Generator: Redefining the Value of Product

Ship experiences that deliver strategic wins, prove the value of product, and secure key alliances with executive leadership.

If there was one thing I could have learned at the start of my product career, it would be that advocating executive leadership about the value of product and design is (mostly) a waste of time.

The more that sentence stings, the more you’ll want to keep reading. But know, what follows comes not from judgement or looking down my nose, but out of empathy. I’ve been in your seat. I’ve spent a 24-year career advocating for product with far too little traction than I’d have expected or hoped for... until recently.

The gist? Prove the value of product, then evangelize for greater investment and scale. Not the other way around.

Product leaders are worn down

Over the past couple of years, I’ve talked with dozens and dozens of leaders in Product, Design, Research, and Engineering. To simplify, I’ll refer to that quad as “product.”

Roughly 75% spend a minimum of 30% of their time pitching, advocating, and educating others on the value of product. They do this with their managers, stakeholders, executives, and business colleagues.

While those conversations and presentations produce varying degrees of progress, 80% of these product leaders report feeling frustrated and worn down. The time they devote to advocating does not produce nearly the results they expect or hope for.

Many have said to me some version of:

“I just want to do great work and stop talking about it.”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said the same.

Again, as someone who built a business and produced lots of content dedicated to proving the value of being product-led, customer-centered, and design-driven, I can vouch for the disproportionate amount of work required to unveil the value our work delivers to our executive and business stakeholders. That is, until a few months ago.

From approval-seeking to value-driven

During a conversation with a well-respected Product leader, a light bulb went off. She shared stories, spanning multiple companies, where she poured countless hours of her’s and her team’s time into reporting and communicating the work they were doing in an effort to get her executive stakeholders to understand their value, fund their projects, and provide air cover so that they could keep at it. But it wasn’t working. It never had.

The reports were skimmed, at best. And the value lost in a sea of words and metrics that failed to paint the picture of time-well-spent on a shared vision and mission.

And what now seems like the most obvious thing in the world became abundantly clear after our chat…

We, as product leaders, place our focus on winning the hearts and minds of our executive leaders so that we gain their buy-in to becoming product-led. But we’ve reversed the order of how product orgs gain funding and traction.

First, we need to show the value of product. Then we gain executive confidence and support… to keep going, to build the “perfect,” mature product org we’ve always imagined – continuous discovery practices, customer panels, data-informed experiments, evidence-driven prioritization, all of it.

You might be thinking: ‘Well, no sh!t! But I’m handcuffed until I get their approval.”

That’s a big-time false belief.

Here’s the blessing and the curse: Your business stakeholders don't have the time or background to immerse in the details of which products you build, let alone how you build them.

Sure, some like to meddle too much during discovery and design. But at the end of the day, they’re paying attention to one of two outcomes (sometimes both): That the products you create grow market share or help save the company money.

Do they think about doing right by the customer? Probably.

Do they care that the product team is operationally empowered? Maybe.

What I'm more certain of is that our business allies devote most mental cycles to keeping the business in good standing. That’s where their core responsibilities lie.

Which products and services the company ships to maintain company health is what they’re relying on you to answer.

Redefining product's role

If the mission is for product to be a vehicle that drives business value, then we need to stop talking about the value of product and start showing how product is a tool to improve company cash flow.

Stop asking for permission. Stop waiting for the perfect set of priorities. Start where you are.

Start with the solution-muddled directive that no one on the team understands or wants to devote their expertise to. Use your domain and process knowledge to help your stakeholders speak to the root of the problem to be solved. Help them articulate its value to the business, or otherwise co-discover the poor investment it is for the business to make.

Simultaneously, bring forward two or three alternative opportunities for the business to invest in. Opportunities that align with business objectives, you’ve validated with the market, and show a direct path to revenue (or cost savings).

Opportunities that put wins on the board and earn you the attention and respect of your executive leaders. Now, they see you as a partner — an ally to help them, not only solve problems, but define and prove them, too.

When you’re a partner, you secure powerful champions in your corner - executive allies that confidently fund your product vision. You gain allies that no longer see product as a cost center but as a revenue generator. A real union between product and business. 🤝

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🙇 What’s coming up for you as you read this?

🙋 What questions do you have?

🙅 What objections?

Get in touch. Let’s talk about it.

Happy to show you what we’re up to and give you ideas to accomplish your product leadership goals.