## Summary Organizing your product team is a core function for a product leader. Many companies start with the simplest model: the first PM focuses on the first product and new PMs join the team as new products (or product components) are created. That can work when the product portfolio unfolds neatly on market segments with highly cross-functional teams that dynamically adapt practices over time. The reality is that markets evolve in unpredictable ways and teams & practices can grow resistant to change over time. In this post I lay out some general principles followed by some examples of different organization models and process frameworks that should all be tied together as a coherent system to realize your strategy. Organizations don’t exist in vacuums — they need to maneuver through the market landscape on their way to their objectives. Before you jump into solutions, you should first understand the environment you are operating in using one of the framework laid out here: [[General Purpose Strategy Frameworks]]] ## Principles 1. Optimize around objectives. There is no one-model-fits-all option out there for every organization — each model is an optimization for a set of inputs & outputs. 2. Ownership is essential. Your org model must foster accountability, empowerment, and clear decision-making. 3. Consider the market context. What environment is your company operating? Are you part of a mature market with established players and value chains where there there clarity in the cause-effect of your decisions? Or it is more complicated? 4. Strive for simplicity. Avoid dependencies between teams where possible. The non-linearity nature of relationships across projects & teams dramatically increase the risk of failure as more resources are added to the organization. E.g. Probability of success for a project with 10 components (e.g. people, teams), each with a 95% success rate results in a 60% likelihood of success for the total project: 0.60 =0.95^10. 5. Need for speed. Align your organization’s velocity & clock frequency with the needs of the market. Time is the least forgiving, least recoverable factor in any competitive situation. Unless you are in a heavily regulated environment where speed is equated with recklessness, figure out a way to organize your company that makes everything fast. 6. Frameworks are fabrics. Weave each role across your entire organization. Everyone should know how their work relates to others so ownership is clear and they can easily pass the baton when necessary. 7. Instrument the process so you know when you need to shift models as organizations must adapt to the market conditions or die. 1. What are the output/impact metrics for each team? 2. How do those fit into the overall objectives for the business? References [https://hbr.org/2014/01/what-vuca-really-means-for-you](https://hbr.org/2014/01/what-vuca-really-means-for-you) ## Org Models There is no single one-size-fits-all for organizational models which is why I’m connecting organizations & frameworks together. You need to consider the entire system when designing your team and it all starts with your organizations purpose, the ecosystem & market conditions it needs to operate in, and the people you are leading. ## Management by Objective Peter Drucker introduced Management by Objective when he published [Practice of Management](https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Management-Peter-F-Drucker/dp/0060878975) in 1954. Asana put together a good review in [Management by Objectives (MBO): Definition and Process \[2024\] • Asana](https://asana.com/resources/management-by-objectives) which lays out the 5 key elements: ![[Pasted image 20250831220258.png]] ⁠ Key to managing these objectives is setting clear incentives that everyone can see. *Show me the incentive and I'll show you the outcome — Charlie Munger* ## Slime Mold I first read Alex Komoroske’s [Slime Mold deck](https://komoroske.com/slime-mold/) while working at Verily back when we were still part of Google. At first I bristled at the dated stereotypes of the military as a top-down organization but it look like Alex has updated the deck with a caveat (slide 14): ![[Pasted image 20250831220335.png]] ⁠ In general, I think Alex’s framing gets a lot right and it’s important for to understand where on this spectrum your team needs to be: ![[Pasted image 20250831220347.png]] ⁠⁠ ## Strategic Corporal A popular concept when I was in the Marines was the [Three Block War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Block_War) and the strategic corporal: The strategic corporal is the notion that leadership in complex, rapidly evolving mission environments devolves lower and lower down the chain of command to better exploit time-critical information into the decision making process, ultimately landing on the corporal, the lowest ranking non-commissioned officer, typically commanding a fire team of 4 individuals or a squad of 12 individuals (three fireteams) My experience in the Marines confirmed that this is an effective approach for navigating dynamic environments. With that, it requires the following throughout the organization: 1. Deep trust 2. Strong principles 3. Clear mission 4. Great training A key element here is that your entire organization can move quickly when you can push decisions and execution deep into your teams and away from executive leadership. This quote from General James Mattis connects this back to leadership: If I were to sum up the leadership techniques I constructed on the basis of the Marine Corps’s bias for action, it would be simple: once I set the tempo, the speed I prized was always built on subordinate initiative. This governing principle drove home the underlying efforts that would make speed a reality. Speed is essential, whether in sports, business, or combat, because time is the least forgiving, least recoverable factor in any competitive situation. I learned to prize smooth execution by cohesive teams (those that could adapt swiftly to battlefield shocks) over deliberate, methodical, and synchronized efforts that I saw squelching subordinate initiative. In fact it was always subordinate initiative that got my lads out of the jams I got them into, my mistakes being my own.” ## Squad Model Eric Kim gets into great details in this post: [Why the Squad Model is Not Working For Your Product Organization](https://medium.com/practice-product/why-the-squad-model-is-not-working-for-your-product-organization-8538ebcdd14d) ⁠![[Pasted image 20250831220459.png]] ⁠ ## Team Topology [Team Topologies](https://teamtopologies.com/) is a consultancy based on a 2019 book by Manuel Pais and Matthew Skelton ([amazon](https://www.amazon.com/Team-Topologies-Organizing-Business-Technology/dp/1942788819/ref=sr_1_1?dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.fkrIHqMAVF-HH87KlVLrbKSN1TPtgWgT3FP1br0hJyWhN8MOE3PWuf1f50LZZGqOdGjEWJ35M0jV02F-ScsZHoQ_dIrJLjR6OJHoP95MDHW9JWa0yuYbscLVW6T_0LasyqM7WRbVmJrv5HVtyWaZN7RIn_wqj6cjtVZR17WvDVv4_I9ew19Yv56cxL1zb4k0hOXv1gT3tjj6IUqwgNcnfeZTDbtuVQZ3Z_-JngPtEIY.ayo0W9BxxzQ-M3R87duTUfIvubuD9iJ4nWJvwR_fTAs&dib_tag=se&hvadid=590014080623&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9002012&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=8846931245703535844&hvtargid=kwd-723035983914&hydadcr=21753_13345179&keywords=team+topologies&qid=1731510078&sr=8-1)). I haven’t read the whole book given the mixed reviews - [https://thedataplatform.substack.com/p/issue-26-team-topologies-book-review](https://thedataplatform.substack.com/p/issue-26-team-topologies-book-review) ⁠ ![[Pasted image 20250831220535.png]] ⁠ References [Team Topologies at Footasylum - Platforms, Flow, and Wardley Mapping — Team Topologies - Organizing for fast flow of value](https://teamtopologies.com/industry-examples/team-topologies-at-footasylum-platforms-flow-and-wardley-mapping) ## Functional Versus Mission Andy Grove covered the distinctions between Functional versus Mission-oriented teams in High Output Management. *Functional teams increase leverage, mission-oriented teams increase speed*