2. Co-creation and Buy-in

In product management, securing buy-in from stakeholders—whether it's for resources, budget, or their time—is critical to the success of any initiative. Co-creation, involving stakeholders in the development process, can be a powerful strategy to achieve this. In this document, we will discuss the importance of co-creation and buy-in, along with practical examples of how to engage stakeholders effectively.

What is Buy-in?

Buy-in refers to gaining the commitment and support of stakeholders for your ideas, initiatives, or projects. Whether it’s internal stakeholders like team members, managers, or external ones like clients, partners, or suppliers, getting them to "buy into" your vision is essential for moving forward. Buy-in often involves stakeholders investing time, resources, or even aligning their own goals with the success of your initiative.

A Practical Example: RD Station Partners

In my career, a clear example of the importance of stakeholder buy-in was during the development of RD Station Partners, a product designed for agencies and partners who resold our solution and added services to it. Since the product was focused on partners rather than end customers, there were a significant number of internal stakeholders involved.

These stakeholders included:

• The Partnership Program team
• Hunters (salespeople who recruited new partners)
• New Business Consultants (who helped agencies acquire new customers)
• Success Managers, Implementation Consultants, and Support teams
• The Education team (which provided marketing education)
• Finance, International Expansion, and other teams related to the primary RD Station Marketing product

Internally, nearly everything we did affected multiple teams, making it critical to map out who these stakeholders were and how they were impacted. It was essential to segment them into different groups and communicate effectively to ensure their buy-in and support.

Mapping and Engaging Stakeholders

When working with stakeholders, you need to segment and map them according to their interests and areas of expertise. For example, when working with external partners (agencies), you might interact with different people within the same agency—such as founders, salespeople, planners, success managers, and even social media or SEO experts. Each of these roles might have different needs or priorities within your product, and it’s vital to engage them accordingly.

Internally, mapping stakeholders can be as simple as maintaining a list of key contacts. In our team, for instance, we kept a pinned message in Slack listing the individuals responsible for each major area, so the team could quickly identify who to engage with depending on the project’s impact.

Co-creation: Bringing Stakeholders on Board

To secure buy-in, co-creation is one of the most effective methods, particularly for stakeholders who hold significant power and interest in your project. The idea is that when stakeholders are involved in creating a product or solution, they become more invested in its success. A well-known saying illustrates this point: "No one criticizes their own child in public." If your initiative becomes "their child," stakeholders are more likely to champion it.

External Stakeholders

When engaging external stakeholders, several tools and methods can help foster co-creation:

1. Product Councils: A product council consists of a select group of key customers or partners who regularly meet with your team to provide feedback and discuss future initiatives. This group offers valuable insights from their perspective, allowing you to align your roadmap with their needs. For example, at RD, we hosted quarterly meetings with partners where we presented new product ideas and received their feedback.

2. Community Engagement: Building a community around your product can be a great way to gather ongoing feedback. Customers and partners often share their thoughts more freely in casual settings, such as forums, social media, or community events, offering invaluable insights into their real needs.

3. Beta Programs and Usability Testing: You can involve customers in beta tests or usability studies, providing them with early access to features and gathering feedback to improve the product.

4. Customer Voice Programs: Having a dedicated team or person responsible for collecting and analyzing customer feedback can help ensure their voices are heard and factored into the development process.

5. Co-design Sprints: Invite customers or partners to participate in design sprints, where they collaborate with your team to build solutions or new features. This not only helps refine the product but also strengthens relationships and secures buy-in from key stakeholders.

Internal Stakeholders

For internal stakeholders, other co-creation tools can be useful:

1. Press Releases and Customer Letters: Writing a mock press release or customer letter about your product’s future can help stakeholders understand the impact it will have and engage them in refining the messaging and strategy.

2. All-hands Product Meetings: Gather key team members for periodic all-hands meetings to discuss the product’s progress, roadmaps, and challenges. This keeps everyone aligned and invested in the success of the initiative.

3. Internal Feedback Mechanisms: For example, setting up a form where sales or support teams can provide feedback on customer needs or product gaps can be a useful way to involve internal teams in the product development process.

4. Design Sprints and User Story Mapping: Involving internal experts in design sprints or user story mapping sessions can help uncover new insights. For example, you may have a subject matter expert in SEO or marketing who can contribute valuable knowledge during these sessions.

Co-creation Techniques

Several structured techniques can help facilitate co-creation:

1. Lean Inception

Lean Inception helps teams define a minimum viable product (MVP) in a focused, week-long session. Starting with a vision, the process leads participants through a series of steps that narrow down to a practical plan. Lean Inception is ideal for clarifying an MVP after a discovery phase or as a way to conclude a discovery by mapping out the next steps.

2. Design Sprints

Design Sprints, another week-long process, help teams develop and validate a prototype in five days. This process applies best practices in strategy, innovation, and design thinking, guiding participants through defining a problem, creating solutions, and testing a prototype with real users.

3. Crazy 8’s

This is a brainstorming technique often used during a Design Sprint. Participants rapidly sketch eight ideas in eight minutes, either iterating on a single concept or generating eight entirely different solutions. Crazy 8’s is useful for focusing creativity and generating diverse ideas quickly.

4. User Story Mapping

User Story Mapping is a versatile tool for both co-creation and communication. It visually maps out user stories and epics along two axes: time (the chronological flow of user activities) and detail (specific features or tasks). This process helps teams and stakeholders align on the most important deliverables for an MVP or release.

Benefits of Co-creation

Co-creation offers several advantages:

• Higher Buy-in: Stakeholders who are part of the creation process are more likely to support and advocate for the product’s success.
• Better Product Alignment: Co-creating with stakeholders ensures that their needs and priorities are considered in the final product.
• Collaboration and Innovation: Engaging multiple perspectives leads to more creative solutions and helps avoid blind spots in the development process.

Conclusion

Co-creation is a powerful way to secure stakeholder buy-in and build products that better serve their needs. Whether through formal processes like Lean Inception and Design Sprints or informal collaboration like product councils and community engagement, involving stakeholders in your product’s development leads to stronger support and more successful outcomes. By facilitating these conversations and leading through collaboration, you can significantly improve your chances of product success.