The Agile Product Operating Model (APOM) is a set of principles that combines contemporary product management strategies with agile ways of working, providing organisations with a solid basis for consistently delivering value. It embodies a product ethos, aligning the entire organisation around well-defined and measurable outcomes.
Shifting from Project to Product Ethos
Project thinking typically centres around fixed milestones and rigid planning, measuring success narrowly by adherence to timelines and budgets. While projects themselves are not necessarily an issue, an over-reliance on a project mindset restricts flexibility, hinders team adaptability, and distracts from a clear and consistent focus on delivering genuine value.
In contrast, a product ethos focuses on continuous delivery of value, clear definition of desired outcomes, and responsiveness to customer and market feedback. Products act as vehicles through which organisations strategically invest, manage resources, and consistently deliver value. Ideally, every product should have clearly defined boundaries, recognised stakeholders, distinct users, and measurable value, aligning the entire organisation around real customer requirements.
Projects can still have a place within a product-centric model. Consider cross-product initiatives, such as GDPR compliance, which impact multiple products. In this scenario, product leadership carefully balances these overarching needs with specific product goals, integrating compliance teams as key stakeholders who actively influence the Product Backlog to ensure alignment and value maximisation.
Defining the Agile Product Operating Model
An operating model itself isn’t new—it provides a holistic framework describing how a company delivers on its strategy. APOM specifically adapts this concept for products, embedding agility into the organisational fabric. Each product operates under its tailored Agile Product Operating Model, capable of evolving in response to insights and market dynamics.
The Agile Product Operating Model integrates Professional Scrum, product thinking, and contemporary product management practices to enable organisations to swiftly adapt, evolve, and deliver valuable, customer-focused products. Each product within this model incorporates:
- Business Roadmap: Clearly connecting the product to broader business strategy.
- Technology Roadmap: Defining how technology will evolve to support strategic goals.
- Operational Stability: Transparent service levels for clarity.
- Governance and Flow: Management and control of changes.
- Total Cost of Value: Understanding the economics of value and cost.
Core Components of APOM
The Agile Product Operating Model consists of interconnected elements reinforcing one another:
- People and Organisation: Clear roles, responsibilities, and organisational structure.
- Measures and Incentives: Data-driven performance indicators and communication of success.
- Agile Processes: Methods for collaboration, communication, and iterative delivery.
- Governance: Clear decision-making frameworks, oversight, and control mechanisms.
- Culture and Behaviour: Core values, beliefs, attitudes, and rules influencing actions.
The Agile Product Operating Model is not a prescriptive or one-size-fits-all approach; instead, it offers flexible guidance enabling organisations to craft their own product-centric operating model. Organisations don’t ‘implement’ APOM—they actively shape and continuously adapt their version of it, reflecting their unique circumstances and evolving requirements.
Evidence-Based Decision Making
Transparency and visibility underpin effective decision-making. By making critical information readily accessible, organisations empower teams and leaders to make informed decisions, break down silos, and foster a culture of open communication and continuous learning.
Evidence-Based Management (EBM)
is fundamental to the Agile Product Operating Model, ensuring decisions are grounded in measurable outcomes and purposeful experimentation. By openly sharing these outcomes, teams can effectively manage, measure, and optimise product value. EBM promotes continuous improvement, precise measurement of value, proactive risk management, and strategic investment decisions, prioritising empirical evidence over intuition or bias.
The Agile Product Operating Model isn’t merely about agility for its own sake; it leverages existing agile investments, aligning teams and stakeholders around products as primary drivers of sustainable, measurable value.
