Engineering often defaults to a 'project mindset,' focusing on churning out features and measuring velocity. True alignment with product requires a 'product mindset,' which prioritizes understanding the customer and tracking the value being delivered, not just the output.
Most engineers only interact with customers during negative events like outages or escalations. To build customer empathy and a product mindset, leaders must intentionally create positive touchpoints. This includes sending engineers to customer conferences or including them on low-stakes customer calls.
Avoid the trap of building features for a single customer, which grinds products to a halt. When a high-stakes customer makes a specific request, the goal is to reframe and build it in a way that benefits the entire customer base, turning a one-off demand into a strategic win-win.
To get product management buy-in for technical initiatives like refactoring or scaling, engineering leadership is responsible for translating the work into clear business or customer value. Instead of just stating the technical need, explain how it enables faster feature development or access to a larger customer base.
When knowingly incurring tech debt to meet a deadline, trust between product and engineering is key. Don't just hope to fix it later; establish a formal agreement for an 'N+1 fast follow-up' release. This ensures time is explicitly scheduled to address the shortcuts taken.
A single roadmap shouldn't just be customer-facing features. It should be treated as a balanced portfolio of engineering health, new customer value, and maintenance. The ideal mix of these investments changes depending on the product's life cycle, from 99% features at launch to a more balanced approach for mature products.