6. Tools and Processes - Example 1

We’ve now reached the last pillar of Product Operations, which focuses on tools and processes. This pillar is all about making the product management machine more efficient by implementing the right tools and standardized processes. When I refer to the “product machine,” I’m talking about the entire product cycle—from creating a vision, discovery, execution, and collecting results. This machine is fueled by the first two pillars we’ve already discussed, but it also requires rituals and processes to function as smoothly as possible.

Focus of the Tools and Processes Pillar

This pillar touches on a few key areas:

1. Onboarding and Developing Product Managers (PMs): Scaling the onboarding process and PM development through standardized rituals and templates.
2. Managing Product Tools: Tools such as Jira, Figma, or others used by the product team to ensure efficiency.
3. Standardizing Processes: Implementing more structured processes to streamline how teams work and collaborate.

Standardizing Rituals and Templates

Let’s start with rituals. These rituals can range from squad-level retrospectives to larger, company-wide rituals, like roadmap communications that involve not only the product team but the entire company—and sometimes even customers. Product Operations plays a key role in standardizing and scaling these large rituals that require coordination across many teams while leaving individual squads autonomy to manage their own rituals in a way that works best for them.

We’ve also helped establish PM Talks, which is a bi-weekly ritual where product managers share interesting cases and request feedback from other squads. This initiative came from a PM within the team who suggested more structured collaboration. Product Operations stepped in to help organize the sessions, manage the invites, align the objectives of the meetings, and ensure that the topics were communicated effectively.

Managing Product Tools

When it comes to tools, Product Operations manages the existing set of tools or helps optimize their use across the product team. We don’t control or restrict the creation of new tools but ensure that global tools like Jira or Figma are being used effectively. For instance, at VTEX, we hired a specialist to provide Jira training that was tailored to our company’s specific needs. This training was recorded so any new PM, engineer, or designer joining VTEX could quickly get up to speed on how to use Jira in the context of our workflows.

Example 1: Product Ticket Escalation Process

One of the most impactful initiatives within this pillar was the creation of a product ticket escalation process. This process was developed to address the pain points that the product and support teams were facing when dealing with customer inquiries and issues.

The Problem

At VTEX, we handle customer support through tools like Zendesk, where customers submit questions or report bugs. The Growth team is the first level of support, but they don’t always have the technical knowledge to solve every problem. When they need help from the product team, the escalation process was chaotic. Instead of following a centralized workflow, escalations happened over Slack, WhatsApp, or even direct phone calls to engineers.

This disorganization led to a number of issues:

• Overworked product engineers who had to manage multiple communication channels.
• Delayed responses to high-priority customer problems that impacted sales and customer experience.
• A lack of visibility into the overall escalation process, making it impossible to track patterns or address recurring issues effectively.

The Solution: Centralized Escalation Workflow

We created a centralized Slack channel for escalations, called Escalations, using a workflow that integrates with Zendesk. Here’s how it works:

1. Slack Integration: The workflow links to a form in Slack that guides the Growth team through the necessary steps for escalating a ticket. This ensures that only the most critical issues are escalated and includes clear prioritization rules.
2. Automated Alerts: Once the form is submitted, the system automatically alerts the product team, sending notifications to the right people, including on-call engineers. If necessary, the workflow triggers phone calls to ensure that engineers respond promptly to high-priority escalations.
3. Data Collection: Each escalation is stored in a database, not just in Slack, ensuring that we have a complete record of all escalations. This data allows us to track metrics like response times and identify root causes for recurring issues.

This new system has made it much easier to track and resolve escalations. Most importantly, we now have data that informs how we can reduce escalations over time by addressing common issues at the first support level.

Results and Insights

The data from the escalation process has been invaluable. For example, we discovered that nearly 50% of escalations could have been resolved by the support team if they had the right information. This insight led us to work closely with the Education team to improve training for the support team, ensuring they have the knowledge to resolve more issues independently.

Additionally, we’ve seen a significant improvement in how quickly and efficiently high-priority tickets are resolved, thanks to the clear prioritization and automated alerts in the new workflow.

Conclusion

The tools and processes pillar of Product Operations is all about making the product team more efficient by standardizing rituals, managing tools, and streamlining processes. In the example of the product ticket escalation process, we created a centralized workflow that not only improved communication between teams but also provided the data needed to drive continuous improvement.

By focusing on these tools and processes, Product Operations helps create a more efficient, scalable product management machine that can handle the complexities of growth while ensuring that teams are empowered to work autonomously.