CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 16

COVER ARTICLE

multiple tenancy. They answer deep, arcane
questions first. Then, when they're nearing
the end, they plaster a graphical user
interface on it as if that will somehow make
it easy to use." One of the biggest mistakes
CTOs make across industries is "beginning
the development process by analyzing
costs, machinery, tech requirements, and
infrastructure without carefully scrutinizing
which features are actually important to the
customer and which are only important to
the innovator," says Tacke.
Oppenheimer proposed a different
approach: starting with a clear
understanding of the problem they were
trying to solve. "We designed the entire
user experience first," he says. "Only then
did we start writing code. Leveraging
this user-experience-first methodology
has allowed us to discover requirements
early enough to change the roadmap of
our product and add new functions,
if necessary."
That understanding is fueled by a
combination of user insight and invention.
Oppenheimer says: "Insight is a deep
understanding of the problem-what
the user is trying to do. And invention is
thinking about how that can be done and
beating those ideas up through multiple
iterations." Ultimately, Loggly came up
with a core product principle: "revealing
the data that matters." Says Oppenheimer:
"It didn't happen instantly. We had a
first-generation product that customers
were using and those were the people
we learned from. That was the common
thread that wove through all the problems
we were trying to solve for customers."
And it's the principle that guides further
product development.
"Only as we started to live with the product
and recognize the innovations that most
enthralled customers could we distill this
as the essence of what we were trying

16

to achieve," Oppenheimer says. "Even
though you start with the end-user
experience in mind, it can be years before
you completely grok it."

SCALING
CUSTOMERCENTRICITY
Keeping the customer-centric approach
going-once fully-featured products
are released or as a company grows-
is a challenge, but it's critical. "When
you go from initial concepts to having
a real product you're making money
on," says Jamensky, "and you have
customers who are asking for support
and enhancements, you still need to
look for new, innovative ideas. You have
to make sure you maintain a balance."
Accordingly, Jamensky describes a threepart product strategy: what customers
are asking you for; the market strategy
that customers won't ask you about; and
the underlying platforms that will have to
be refreshed. "You have to think about all
three as you evolve," he says.
Companies also need to embed the
knowledge of the customer into the
entire product-development organization
as much as possible. "It's no good if I'm
the only one who touches the customer
and translates that into a business
case," says Jamensky. Today, there are
half a dozen product engineers who
work directly with Embotics customers.
"Customers love it because they're not
talking to someone who is three steps
removed," Jamenksy says.
Scaling design-thinking approaches
to product development means baking
the approach into business processes.
"We're not building space shuttles here,
but as you go from 3 people to 13 to 100,
you need processes and organizational



CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3

Contents
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - Cover1
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - Cover2
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 1
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - Contents
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 3
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 4
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 5
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 6
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 7
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 8
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 9
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 10
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 11
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 12
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CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 16
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CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - 65
CTO Straight Talk - Issue 3 - Cover4
https://magazine.straighttalkonline.com/cto/issue4
https://magazine.straighttalkonline.com/cto/issue3
https://magazine.straighttalkonline.com/cto/issue2
https://magazine.straighttalkonline.com/cto/issue1
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