In today’s hyper-fast and intensely competitive market, a continual stream of ideas is necessary to keep the innovation of your product ahead of the competition. With attention spans being shorter than ever, Product Managers have to stay on top of continual releases keeping users coming back for more. This makes the management of ideas a core aspect of a Product Managers role.
The Product Managers role in idea generation
The success or failure of a product is largely due to the Product Managers role in developing ideas. Ideas are the key to innovation, so in large part, without ideas, we wouldn’t have products. With this in mind, Product Managers should create an Ideas Management system to help encourage a steady stream of idea generation. Here are a few suggestions:
- Hold regular Brainstorming meetings with the team
- Create a shared online folder for the team to store ideas
- Create a physical box in the office, similar to a suggestion box
- Celebrate ideas that move into development
- Do an idea challenge and reward the best ideas
- Offer guidance and suggestions for ideas
Crowdsourcing Ideas
Crowdsourcing ideas can be both internal and external idea generation. The best ideas for products often come from the users themselves. A good Product Manager will have an idea management system that stores internal ideas, and also keeps track of external ideas that have been collected. External ideas can come from one on one conversations with people that are current or potential users. They can arise from surveys or online submissions forms. You can post idea challenges on chat forums and blogs. The goal is to generate as many ideas as possible and to have a method for managing and tracking the ideas for easy retrieval at a later date.
Evaluate Ideas
Once you have a good number of ideas that have potential, it’s good to meet with the team and ask some fundamental questions.
- Is there a need for this product or feature?
- Will users pay for this?
- Does this already exist in the market?
- Is this a priority?
An ideal idea management system tool, will be transparent and will have a system for organizing ideas, categorizing, attributing supporting information, and voting on the ideas. All ideas should be saved in case they work well for another product down the road that has yet to be developed.
Creating a competitive advantage with Ideas
The more ideas that you receive, the more likely you are to find the next idea that will set your product apart from the competition. Implementing an idea management system that is open, transparent, and available to all team members increases the likelihood that ideas will be submitted regularly. The more involved the team is with the system and the more access they have to submit ideas the more likely you are to receive the next groundbreaking idea for your product. Receiving a steady stream of new and original ideas can put you ahead of the competition.
Conclusion
Every product that ever existed started with an idea. Developing a product is the art of taking an untangle thought and bringing it to life. The Product Managers role is to have the insight to see what ideas will make good products. For this reason, Product Managers should see ideas as the lifeblood of the organization and create a management system that treats them as such. The innovation of the organization depends on it.
