Friction between product management and product marketing teams is all too common.
When this happens, the teams suffer, the business doesn’t grow, and the customer is left unhappy.
So, how do you bridge this gap and get two distinct teams to shift their mindsets and reach new levels of revenue and business growth?
Today, we are joined by Akanksha Tayla, a B2B SaaS product executive, formerly the chief product officer at Service Channel, and in leadership roles at a Gen AI startup, GE Digital, and Deloitte Consulting.
She provides hard-earned insights from product successes and failures from a highly strategic executive standpoint. Read on to learn how cross-functional leadership can spur teams to thoughtful collaboration and achieve a unified vision for long-term growth.
UnboundB2B: What do you think makes a successful cross-functional leader?
Akanksha: Regardless of your level, you can be a leader without needing to be a team leader.
Even an individual can be a leader and a great cross-functional leader. For successful cross-functional leaders, the first thing you need is soft skills like empathy, active listening, and personal connection with the people you work with.
The second thing you need is the big picture business understanding, which includes:
- The finance view
- The P&L (profit and loss) view
- The revenue view
- Segmentation
- Direction and vision
- Planning for growth
Then, it’s about understanding your function, aligning with the big-picture thinking, and determining how you can deliver on that vision as a boundaryless cross-functional leader.
The third thing you need is this mindset: nothing in the business is somebody else’s problem. If you see a problem, raise your hand to solve it in partnership with the right people.
That’s how you make a multiplicative impact that goes beyond traditional boundaries and fosters collaboration and innovation.
UnboundB2B: Is there one executive or function that sets the standard for cross-functional collaboration at the leadership table?
Akanksha: Every function needs to collaborate with everybody, but the two executive functions that are critical for cross-functional collaboration are the CFO (Chief Financial Officer) and the CPO (Chief Product Officer).
Almost everybody needs to work with finance, from the CEO to the CMO and CRO. Likewise, the CPO is reaching across functions while asking questions like:
- What are we launching?
- What are we building?
- What are we investing in?
- How are we communicating with the market?
- What channels are we using?
- What segments are we going after?
Answering these questions requires a strong partnership with product management, product marketing, and other functions. So, finance and product management are the ones that act as hubs of cross-functional leadership to bring the business vision and financial plan to life.
UnboundB2B: How do you think about owning a revenue number regardless of your function?
Akanksha: Product management leader success is about owning a revenue number. You have to own this mindset and then transmit it to your teams who you can transform into revenue agents.
The first step is making the right decisions to create that revenue and partnering with the right executives to prioritize product initiatives.
The second piece is making sure your cross-functional teams are using their daily time to serve the company’s revenue objectives. Your goal should be to keep your eye on the revenue ball, ensuring your sales team understands the value of the product team, and vice versa, as you align towards common revenue goals.
People tend to think of product launches in terms of “we released a feature, let’s celebrate.” That’s great, but it isn’t enough. I always compare product launches with rocket launches.
During a rocket launch, the team doesn’t stop to celebrate when the rocket takes off. Instead, they celebrate when the rocket has reached “escape velocity” and gets into its orbital path, which is their primary goal.
Product launches should be the same. It’s not enough just to release a feature or two, but for the product to reach “escape velocity,” or convert into revenue. Plus, no single person can say they’re responsible for the launch. You see scores of engineers, teams, monitors, the command center… It’s truly a cross-functional team effort, just like launching a product. The product management team, when they wear the revenue hat, can make it even stronger.
UnboundB2B: How do you train yourself and your teams to prioritize understanding customer problems over focusing on the product or campaign first?
Akanksha: A common problem for product executives is they come in to transform teams from feature function teams to commercially intense innovation-focused teams. With this challenge, how do we hedge our bets on what’s important to customers?
To me, the answer is the five C’s of product management:
- Curiosity: Everyone, not just product managers, should be curious. Curious about every problem, customer insights, and identifying major customer pain points for the team to solve.
- Conviction: Conviction about building on customer insights and seeking the solution from user experience and customer truth to prioritize high-impact initiatives and investments.
- Clear-Eyed Perspective: Being clear-eyed is seeing what you need to see, not simply what you want to see, so we don’t hyper-fixate on feature functions when we should be focused on customer value.
- Culture of Craftsmanship: We make it our goal to do everything exceptionally well, just as a craftsperson carefully creating something beautiful.
- Culture of High Say: Do Ratio: Your actions match your words. What you say is what you do. I keep this front of mind when I set up teams. This action-oriented language inspires commitment and rallies us to focus on the problem at hand.
UnboundB2B: What challenges do product and marketing leads face when working together?
Akanksha: The first is speed. Fast-paced environments cause miscommunication and misalignment.
The second is language. Different teams might have different languages. A shared language and attitude is crucial for fruitful collaboration.
The third issue is horizons. What is the product management team looking out to as their horizon? Is it four months? A few quarters down? It’s important to ensure we’re on the same page on horizons and outlooks.
The fourth is trust. All functions need to be able to trust that they’ll perform their respective roles effectively. Just like a football team trusts its quarterback to do his job and linebackers to do theirs.
The fifth is understanding the full financial view. If both teams understand the revenue outcome goal, and the potential impact, the rest becomes easier.
Are your product teams aligned with a shared vision for growth and customer success?
Creating cross-functional collaboration is more than just a nice-to-have. It’s essential for sustained business success. With the right strategic, big-picture thinking, careful planning, and thoughtful tactics, product marketing and product management teams can work together to deliver exceptional user experiences that lead to stronger brand loyalty, increased revenue, and long-term growth.
This article is an edited expert from the conversation with Akanksha Talya, a B2B SaaS product executive, formerly the chief product officer at Service Channel.
For more insights on product management, product marketing, and cross-functional leadership, watch the full episode of the Real Talk, Real Results podcast with Akanksha Talya.
Ethan Harrington
12 December 2024
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