82 lines
3.0 KiB
Plaintext
82 lines
3.0 KiB
Plaintext
---
|
|
title: "Product market misfit: Adventures in user empathy"
|
|
weight: 2
|
|
---
|
|
|
|
Mitch from aviatrix -a former software engineer who has now switched over to product managment.
|
|
|
|
## Opening Thesis
|
|
|
|
Opening with the Atari 2600 E.T. game as very bad fit sample.
|
|
Thesis: Missing user empathy
|
|
|
|
* A very hard game aimed at children without the will to trail and error
|
|
* Other aspect: Some of the devalopers were pulled together from throughout the company -> No passion needed
|
|
|
|
### Another sample
|
|
|
|
* Idea: SCADA system with sensors that can be moved and the current location get's tracked via iPad.
|
|
* Result: Nobody used the iPad app - only the desktop webapp
|
|
* Problem: Sensor get's moved, location not updated, the measurements for the wrong location get reported until update
|
|
* Source: Moving a sensor is a pretty involved process including high pressure aka no priority for iPad
|
|
* Empathy loss: Different working endvironments result in drastic work experience missmatch
|
|
|
|
## The source
|
|
|
|
* Idea: A software engineer writes software, that someone else has to use, not themselfes
|
|
* Problem: Distance between user and dev is high and their perspectives differ heavily
|
|
|
|
## User empathy
|
|
|
|
* The art of taking on the perspective of one's users/customers
|
|
* Without this your product will fail
|
|
|
|
## Stories from Istio
|
|
|
|
* Classic implementation: Sidecar Proxy
|
|
* Question: Can the same value be provided without a sidecar anywhers
|
|
* Answer: Ambient mode -> split into l4 (proxy per node) and l7 (no sharing)
|
|
* Problem: After alpha release ther was a lack of exitement and feedback
|
|
* Result: Twitter Space event for feedback
|
|
|
|
### Ideas and feedback
|
|
|
|
* Idea: Sidecar is somewhat magical
|
|
* Feedback: Sidecars are a pain, but after integrating istio can be automated -> a problem gets solved, that already had a solution
|
|
* Result: Highly overvalued the pain of sidecars
|
|
* Idea: Building istio into a platform sounds easy
|
|
* Feedback: The platform has to be changed for the new ambient mode -> High time investment while engineers are hard
|
|
* Result: The cost of platform changes was highly undervalued
|
|
* Idea: Sidecar compute sound expensive and networking itself pretty cheap
|
|
* Feedback: Many users have multi-region clusters -> Egress is whery expoenive
|
|
* Result: The relation between compute and egress cost was pretty much swapped
|
|
|
|
### What now?
|
|
|
|
* Ambient is the right solution for new users (fresh service mesehes)
|
|
* Existing users probaly won't upgrade
|
|
* Result: They will move forward with ambient mdoe
|
|
|
|
## So what did we lern
|
|
|
|
### Basic questions
|
|
|
|
* Who are my intended users?
|
|
* What exites/worries them?
|
|
* What do they find easy/hard?
|
|
* What is ther biggest expense and what is inexpensive?
|
|
|
|
### How to get better empathy
|
|
|
|
1. Shared perspective comes from proximity
|
|
1. Where they are
|
|
2. What they do -> Dogfood everything related to the platform (not just your own products)
|
|
2. Never stop listening
|
|
1. Even if you love your product
|
|
2. Especially if you love your product
|
|
3. Invite critical feedback
|
|
|
|
### Takeaways
|
|
|
|
* Don't ship a puzzlebox (landscape) but a picture (this integrates with this and that)
|