When we moved to our new apartment a few years ago, we decided to have real plants outside. We have a large balcony and what I call “our garden” is actually a stripe of plants running along its rails. I absolutely love it. Israel has nice weather most of the year, and I sit outside a lot. Looking at the plants with the blue sky as the background fills my heart with joy time and again.

Little did I know, though, that this small “garden” requires heavy maintenance! The leaves are falling which requires constant cleaning, there are bugs (and birds that come to eat our fruit), the plants sometimes get sick, there is unwanted grass that hides the flowers, and so on and so forth. So I found myself having a gardener come and maintain the garden regularly. 

I’ve had a few over the years, it’s not easy to find a good one that wants to stay for a long time. The good ones succeed and move to other services, my small garden isn’t a main revenue stream for anyone. Others are less helpful. Here is one example:

It was a Thursday morning, I let the gardener in and went out for my morning routine (on Thursday mornings I run at the local park). When I came back they were already gone. The plants looked nice, but when I approached them I saw that there was mud on the floor. Nothing that I couldn’t handle, but I would have preferred not to. It takes literally 2 minutes to clean it (there is a water hose right next to where the mud was). Then, I went to see the fertilizer. We talked about replacing some of the equipment there. I saw that they only replaced part of it, which was different from what I remembered we agreed on. I also saw that they didn’t throw away the older parts which they replaced, and they were just lying there. 

One more thing that I noticed was that there was actually no fertilizer in the system. I was surprised (it’s not so easy to see if it’s there or not) so I asked them. Their answer was “we didn’t say we will refill the fertilizer. It was empty also the last time we were there” – the last time was two months back, so my garden didn’t get any fertilizer for a long time now, which in retrospect could explain many things I saw. But hey, you are the gardener! If you see that there is no fertilizer in the system, the least you can do is warn me about it so that I would take care of it. But honestly, what I really expected is that you take care of it for me (give me heads up, get approval for the extra cost and do it).

The difference between a disappointing experience and a perfect service is literally 10 minutes of work, so it’s not about what it takes. It’s about having the right mindset and seeing these things as part of your responsibility.

There are many things that you can take from this story regarding your product – for example you can identify cases where you are leaving your customers with significantly less value, but a small change that is easy to make would get you to a whole new level of satisfaction.

But today I want to talk about what you can take from this story to another area that is critical for your success as a product leader – how you work with stakeholders.

Working with stakeholders is often perceived as a necessary evil. As product leaders, your success depends entirely on them (to develop, market, and sell the product, for example). And their success depends on you, too. Since it’s not always easy, and each stakeholder cares about different things, we often feel swamped and just want to get them out of the way.

But since these relationships are so important, you don’t want to let your momentary lack of comfort set the tone. Here are three guidelines that you can follow to make sure you are keeping a decent level of service at all times.

Don’t Leave a Mess

Ideally, you want your stakeholders to feel well when they work with you. That’s not to say that you should always agree on everything, and definitely not to say that you should please them and say yes to every request they make. But they should feel that you are a good partner, that you understand them, and that you truly try to help them, even if you can’t always give them what they want.

It’s not easy to maintain the relationship at such a level at all times (but definitely possible if you are willing to do what it takes). So sometimes things will feel more rough than usual. That’s ok.

A few levels below that is the very basic guideline that you shouldn’t leave a mess in your encounters with your stakeholders. They shouldn’t clean after you, they shouldn’t feel that you have made it worse for them, and they shouldn’t do your job.

Here are a few examples of professional messes that you want to avoid:

Leaving them to figure out the answer themselves (for example on questions about roadmap or certain capabilities). If you want to RTFM them, make sure the manual is clear, answers their needs, is easy to understand, and that they know where to go (send them the link and explain how to use the manual – for example, refer them to the specific part that they will find their answer in). 

Making a big deal out of something that they shared with you. Let the discussion between you be a safe space. If you see something problematic, tell them first before going to tell others (see also next guideline). You want to make sure they can trust you, otherwise they will just stop sharing openly.

Neglecting your responsibilities. If you said you would do something, do it. If you are going to miss the deadline, communicate it in advance and let them participate in the discussion about the impact and options from here. If one can expect that you will take care of something, do it without them having to ask (see also the third guideline).

If You See a Problem, Raise It

This should go without saying, but it doesn’t unfortunately. There are many reasons why: Sometimes, you are so busy that even saying something about something you saw is too time-consuming. In other cases, you might feel that this is a sensitive matter that could lead to conflict so maybe you prefer to avoid it. If the problem is in your domain, you might not want to get everyone’s attention right to it, and if it’s not, you might feel you are stepping on people’s toes.

It all makes sense, and it’s ok to decide that some things are not on you, at least some of the time. But if something impacts the desired outcome if it’s not handled (like in my fertilizer example above), having to justify why you didn’t say anything earlier when eventually the outcome wasn’t what people expected, could be much harder.

Product success is always a team effort. Everyone needs to be aligned and do their part in order for everyone to win. Remember that you win or lose together, and own your product success end to end.

If It Makes Sense, Fix It

Of course, if the problem that you see means that you wouldn’t be able to do what you said you would do, you need to own it. Ideally, raise it for people to know that there is an issue, explain what you are going to do to fix it, and own the impact. If this means a delay in a release date, make sure that everyone who depends on this date is not only aware but also has an alternative plan that would still lead to the results you originally wanted to achieve.

But some areas are not as black and white. For example, with my gardener example – should they have filled the fertilizer despite the fact that we didn’t agree on it in advance? My expectation was definitely yes (with my approval for the extra cost in real-time), but the gardener didn’t see it that way. While he was technically right, he still didn’t give me what I really needed (despite the fact that it was super easy for his team to solve on the spot).

Where are the areas in your organization where you are technically right not handling them, but everyone would have felt better if you did? The ‘everyone’ in this question should generally include you, because otherwise, you would become the one to take over all the things that no one wants to do, and do not necessarily relate to your job. So it should make sense.

But this guideline relies heavily on how you see your job. As a product leader, your job isn’t only to build a good product. It is to bring the product to business success. And that brings an entirely different perspective on what really falls within your responsibility. 

If you haven’t seen yourself responsible for business success up until now, perhaps you should re-read this article with that in mind. It should open new ways of thinking and things you can do with your stakeholders so that everyone is not only happier but also more successful, together.