About Me
If you are interested in finding about more about me, please feel free to read my thoughts below.
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Hi / Moi / Tere / Hej / Hallo / Hola / Ciao / Olà / Namaste / Привет!
Welcome to my About Me! page, if you are pondering whether to
work with me or not - or simply out of curiosity!
Brief Intro
I'm Surath - which was the name of an Emperor in ancient Bengal (in East India); It literally means "the one with a great chariot". Maybe in the modern day context it translates to "the one with a great ride"? Anyways, before self realisation kicked in or I could have a say, my name was officially printed in my birth certificate & other ID documents - Now, I just try my best to live up to it! 😊My family name is Chatterji - which also has a history; But let's just say, I chatter, mostly in my head - to myself! I have often found it useful to iterate what I hear - sometimes to self-reflect, sometimes to understand the situation better I am in and sometimes simply to log data as a reference which might be handy in the future.
I am based in Helsinki, the capital of 🇫🇮Finland 🇫🇮, the nation that boasts of best education system ... and of course, Nokia! 📱
Elevator Pitch
- I am a technical Product Owner, Software Development Manager, Business Consultant & Lecturer.
- I enjoy hybrid roles where I can keep one foot on business/product whilst the other on tech, allowing me to bridge the gap between C-level Execs and Engineering team.
- I am process driven and prefer working with teams who have not lost their sense of humour.
Executive Summary
Checklist
✅ Experienced technical product & project manager with 13 years of experience within IT, Games, e-commerce & Telecom industry✅CSPO - Certified Scrum Product Owner ®
✅7 years of formal university education specialising in Computer Science, Games & Graphics
✅ Hands-on coding experience assisting me in daily technical decisions, debt management, architecture & mentoring (still coding on weekends!)
✅ Shipped mobile, AAA products on consoles and PC as well as distributed SaaS & PaaS products with micro-services architecture
✅ Led multiple products/teams including subcontractors and offshore collaboration
✅ Managed cross-functional highly technical teams of sizes 15-20
✅ Lecturing & conducting workshops about Product, Project, People & Process Management
✅Lived in 3 countries; worked with multinational / multicultural teams
✅ Multilingual: 5 human and bunch of computer languages
✅ Entrepreneurial: Founded startup, leading a small but talented team. Mentored multiple startups and University spin-offs
✅ Investments: Active in real estate, stocks, ETF, Debt Market, Funds and startups
Interests
✅SaaS, PaaS, Cloud Computing, Big Data, Game & Graphics Development, Internet, e-commerce, Social Media✅ Leadership, Team building, Mentoring, Product Ownership, Stakeholder & Expectation Management, Customer Relationship Management, Technical Debt Management, Project management, Agile Methodologies, Process Management, Business Consulting, Guest Lecturing
✅Seeking for good investment opportunities in startups (Ideally: As a team member)
Product Ownership and Management
❏ I draw influence from various sources and thought leaders; below are some worth mentioning:- Henrik Kniberg - A Product Owner and Agile Coach (Spotify, LEGO) is a notable mentor when it comes to agile product management. This beautiful presentation by Henrik demonstrates how I prefer to work as an agile Product Owner, regardless of the size of the organisation or team.
- Below is Henrik's metaphoric illustration of how lean startups / teams should approach a Minimal Viable Product (commonly abbreviated as MVP). This went viral and some actually criticised this accusing of oversimplification. But in reality, the illustration demonstrates how lean development should adopt and end-to-end approach for solving the Customers' pain points. The CRM Team published a video in 2016 to explain Henrik's thoughts behind his illustration.
- Janna Bastow - Founder of ProdPad and Mind Your Product. Both the blogs are infinite source of wisdom and inspiration not only from Janna but her incredible teams.
- By the way, ProdPad has taken a new and out-of-the-box approach for empowering Product Managers along with a highly engaged community. Definitely worth checking out if you haven't yet.
❏ I have worked on an array of Products (both B2B and B2C) across a variety of verticals viz. Games and Game Services on the cloud, Ads platform, e-commerce, Telecom, Analytics involving Big Data. Some of these Products are:
- Customer Driven: When I needed to listen to the Customers' WANTS
- Customer Centric/Focussed: When I needed to listen to the Customers' NEEDS
- Customer Driven: When I needed to listen to the Customers' WANTS
- Customer Centric/Focussed: When I needed to listen to the Customers' NEEDS
❏ Two very important attributes I have honed on over the years:
A. None of the Products you ship are your "babies"
In other words: Don't get emotionally attached to your Products!
- There might be times when certain Products or Features does not hit the target KPIs as anticipated, during the early stages of the Product life cycle - which is when you might need to consider whether or not to pull the plug.
- As everything else, every Product has a lifespan (as seen in the figure below)
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| Image from Wikipedia |
B. The Art and Science behind Customer Surveys and Interviews
- Asking the right question to the right audience (Early Adopters or Customers or Prospects) at the right time is a combination of both Art and Science.
- I typically go through several iterations before I consider a Survey for a Product or a Feature to be ready - typically loop in various internal Stakeholders and try to get their thoughts on the questions (everyone has a different perspective)
- One very important thing to bear in mind when drafting Surveys is not to ask any leading questions
- Also, I try to refrain from conducting the Interviews to eliminate bias
❏ Technical Debt & Management:
The matrix below demonstrate how I tend to classify Technical Debt that can be potentially paid off during slack time
❏ As Product Owner, I regularly sync with stakeholders from other orgs:
Business Development, Marketing, Sales, Account Management / Customer Success and of course, Engineering/R&D & UX/Design.
❏ Additionally, I periodically check-in to ensure product alignment with the vision of the C-level executives and the Board.
In other words, I practice a lot to be able to switch my brain to speak the lingo/jargon that is understood by the stakeholders depending on which team I am meeting.
Technical Project, Process & People Management
❏ My technical interests encompasses in building complex & scalable distributed systems with hybrid infrastructure & fullstack components. I prefer to have end-to-end understanding of the product I am working on which allows me to have a holistic vision and design effective KPIs and analytical design to track the performance of the products.❏ Although, as a hands-on developer back in early days of my career, I used to be a Native coder myself, I have fallen in love with Cloud Computing, Big Data, Analytics designed on top of micro-services architecture.
❏ I believe in the fact that Data == Revenue and vice versa. Therefore, my current interest lies in Products that based on Big Data where the data can cater not only for mining, segmenting, funnelling & analysing Customer trends and behaviour but also leveraging the same to identify unidentified Customer problems and UX anomalies. I enjoy coming up with innovative out-of-box solutions for these Problems (aka Hypotheses). I test the minimal viable versions of these features/products with a closed group of Beta Customers (not likely to churn; early adopters) to gather invaluable feedback early on. This helps me to ensure our Key Assumptions and early KPIs are on the right track.
If not, I tweak the specifications based on early Customer feedback and keep iterating till these prototypes start delivering the segment of the core or auxiliary value proposition to the Customers, depending on the stage of the core Product.
❏ It's also worth mentioning that I enjoy striking & participating in technical debates with my highly skilled & technical Engineers which I guess is a natural trigger of my technical background.
This, on surface might not mean a lot - but with one foot on Business & Product whilst the other on Engineering, I have found myself in sweet spot where I can stay close to reality and effectively manage expectations of Customers and Stakeholders. It also helps me in reviewing Engineering budgets and making sure the Product/Feature Scopes are realistic and preventing feature creep.
❏ Building smooth CX / UX is not an option, but a must, in my opinion!
A very well built Engineering stack delivers zero value unless it is layered with good User Experience. Therefore, I prefer to work closely with the UX team ensuring the value proposition is surfaced and CX is spot on. I have discovered a lot of value in running UX experiments in a iterative fashion.
❏ I actively participate in defining and rolling out various processes for the entire Production pipeline as well as recruitment viz. Requirements gathering, Feasibility Study, Over-arching VoC framework, Specifications, Forecasting, Analytics & Marketing planning, Sales Training, Budgeting, Software Design & Architecture, Development, Integrated Testing along with Continuous Deployment & Ops as well as Retrospectives.
❏ I love Automation - my rule of thumb is: If you have to do anything more than once, automate it.
❏ I try to keep myself apprised of the current and next-gen programming languages and paradigms which assists me during reviewing PRs and staying in alignment with R&D.
❏ People, or, specifically, the talented People I work with, fascinate me the most. Projects come and get delivered - but what remains a constant is the People:
- who surround you empowering you to deliver your vision,
- helping you to get back on track when you get strayed,
- drying up thousands of whiteboard markers while brainstorming with you in the meeting rooms,
- breaking hundreds of keyboards while punching in the robust & effective design and code.
Eventually, they are the Heroes & Heroines I get to work with in bringing any Product from a concept to reality.
There is only one mantra: People are smart and no one likes micro-management.
- Pitch your vision to them, give them a solid specification and be open to all sorts of questions throughout the journey of development.
- Watch them build the Product whilst you ensure that it is aligned with the vision and the specifications.
Culture - "My Personal Opinion"
Disclaimer:- I love working with People who are smart, open-minded, friendly and welcome constructive bi-directional feedback. I like to believe the best coworkers tend to identify issues proactively, take ownership, strike logical debates and brainstorm on whiteboards to reach concrete decisions and action points. The only way is moving forward!
- I despise toxic work culture where collaboration translates to silent backstabbing; where insecurity and hunger for stake becomes the primary driver for organisations within a company; where office politics and favouritism breeds partiality.
❏ I am passionate about breeding a robust, healthy and fun work culture - an Environment where People look forward to coming to every morning. Hard work is vital and a key ingredient for success
- But "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy!"
- Hence, "... teams who have not lost their sense of humour" is something I look for.
❏ Team Empowerment is based on two key ingredients: Trust and Ownership.
- I enjoy working in a Culture where People comes before Products, Projects and Processes
- Where one's inputs are appreciated and the Culture imbibes the feeling that one's opinions are heard and acknowledged.
"You have a cool idea or feature in mind? Please share it with me and allow me to figure out what the value proposition is for the Customers."
This approach has not only enriched the Team Culture but also given me a process for gathering great Ideas and Features which I didn't think of, not being in the other person's shoes.
Weaknesses
❏ I am logical and analytical - Yes, it has proved to be a weakness, if I have to counter an idea or vision which is not based on logic or driven by analytical reasoning.❏ I am process driven - Many teams likes to function in a "cowboy" fashion and I believe that they think that is synonymous to being "agile". I don't function well in that kind of an environment.
PS: There is no mention of unstructured workflow in the Agile Manifesto.
❏ I am always open to feedback/criticism - Both constructive and "not so" constructive - I have a thick skin. However, I feel any sort of criticism/feedback should be backed with examples / scenarios / logic. I have difficulty to absorb criticism / feedback which are either baseless / not backed or merely monologue statements.
❏ I have analysed and reflected: I am not a big fan of office politics and favouritism! I enjoy working with teams where one can prove his / her worth with KPIs, regardless of one's function.
Also, when humans feel insecure they tend to adopt certain unethical measures to climb the ladder or sustain their importance in the corporate world - No, not something in my books!
❏ Finally, this is a tough one: To an extent, I don't enjoy working with micro- and nano-managers. If you assign me a task, please allow me to present my POA, my first iteration, then my second and so on. At every stage, I will check-in with you and gather your criticism/feedback - but ....
(I have learnt some lessons, learning everyday & many more to learn; I have stories to share!)
Weekends
❏ I consider myself very fortunate to have a Mini Me! I enjoy building random stuff with Lego blocks with him. Sometimes, we play the guitar together, go for a swim, nose-wrestle and dance whilst listening to Batdance.❏ I also like to get my hands dirty with some hands-on coding, hacking, modding for my hobby projects. Here is a product I work on and off to try out weird ideas.
I do have a small indie team called Weekendies and our projects are usually video games developed for various platforms. We consider these projects as stress busters and a platform to hone on our respective skills without hurting anyones budget. So far, these Weekendies guinea pig products have proved to be one of the biggest drivers behind my confidence for product decisions, because I can be as fearless as I want to be - I have nothing to lose!
If you have reached here without skipping my braindump, I hope I was able to convey some of my personal attributes: Who am I and what keeps me going!
Your well wisher / potential co-worker,
Surath