“ Every business will
become a software
business ”
The CEO of Microsoft

How a Publisher Became a
Technology Company
The Epic Journey

Leading technology transformation and product development.
Mobilising innovation for blue chips and start-ups
Extensive global experience including Hong Kong and London
Build product and technology teams, adopt Agile & Lean enterprise wide and
establish innovative high scale platforms.
Everitt | Head of Product and Technology
at Pacific MagazinesWill

Who is Pacific
Magazines?

How did they lose their
tech mojo ?
The Lost Decade
Focused mainly on print with
no digital DNA.

So what did we do ?

We focused on four areas
ProcessProduct People Technology

Product
Process People Technology

Product
We defined a product
strategy and started
experimenting

Product
“ Visionwithout action
is a daydream.
Action without vision
is a nightmare”
Japanese Proverb

Product
Focus on the things that
really matter

Product
STOP
low value work, work not aligned to
strategy, ineffectual work

Product
START
experimenting. we need to try things
and see what works well

Product
CONTINUE
once we find something that is proven
effective we should do more of it and
ensure that there is a process to share

Product
We defined a
product
strategy

Product

Product
• Consumer trends are heavily increasing on mobile,
people are time-poor and want to consume content
on the go. A mobile first strategy is key to success
with focus on unique value propositions.
• Premium, trusted and brand safe environment with
best-in-class digital experiences to increase
engagement. With increased traffic from search and
social, there is a need to make Article the new
homepage.

Product
• Video is a key enabler to capitalise on today's market
trends. User’s expectations of content and the
richness of the experience it provides have grown
exponentially.
• The video advertising spend growth rate is at, and
continues to grow at, a double digit figures. The
dollars are there - so we needed to provide inventory
to capitalise on this demand.

Product
• Placing the audience at the heart of everything we
do. Maximise the value of our audience to improve
monetisation. Developing concepts targeted at
audience growth among high value consumers.
• Data is the key asset. Finding it, analysing it,
consolidating it and monetising it is paramount. Get
data in one place and create services to dynamically
expose information.

Product People Technology
Process

We introduced a framework
to define clear
agile product roadmap
Process

“ If I had 9 hours to chop
down a tree, I’d spend the
first 6 sharpening my axe”
Abraham Lincoln
Process

Process
Product CouncilProduct Lifecycle
Product InnovationProduct Roadmaps

Process
• Focuses on deliver often and early
• Defines how to we prioritise, start, engage, deliver
and measure
• Lite stage-gate framework with iterative approach
based on Scrum and Lean Startup principles
• Full transparency with clear delivery ownership
Product
Lifecycle

Process
Product
Roadmaps
• Clear and prioritised product roadmap aligned to
strategy
• Quarter based planning and priorities with high level
FY roadmap
• Provides transparency on future plans and what is
being worked on / delivered
• Defined process for roadmap and funding approval

Process
Product
Council
• Forum of uber product owners and stakeholders to:
– Review product strategy and roadmap
– What are we currently working on? What is
ahead of us?
– Presentation of any conflicting priorities
– Final decision of prioritisation
• Enables a joined up approach to decision making

Process
Product
Innovation
• Innovation framework focused on
– new ideas and taking risks
– new products through to market launch –
quickly / iteratively
• Innovation activities - ‘hackathons’, lightning talks,
department ideation, collaborative meetups and
innovation partnerships
• User driven innovation - experimentation sessions,
consumer feedback, research & prototype testing

Process
Transparency,
openness and shared
understanding of team
goals.
Review everything and
continuously look for
improvement.
Welcome change and
be prepared to course
correct at any time if it
means we are building
a better product.
Open Inspect Adapt

Process
Product Lifecycle
- Micro team
- Just enough to understand
PoC
- Workshops
- Risk based approach
- A set of hypotheses
- Small team
- Build out Beta backlog
- Workshops, paper
prototypes, and code
- Build business case
- Minimum set of features
- Deliver Beta / MVP
- Working software
- Validate business case
- Enhance Beta / MVP
- Production strength
software
- Measure key KPI’s
- Business case
Inception Proof of Concept Beta ScaleConcept
- Create the vision
- Project brief completed
- Waiting for prioritisation

Process TechnologyProduct
People

People
We brought in new talent,
re-booted the organisation
and established
a supportive culture.

People
“ To improve is to change;
to be perfect is to
change often ”
Winston Churchill

People
Atomic
Delivery
Squad
Extrapolate to
create
product & tech
functions
Goals
• Clear ownership of delivery
• Articulate stories / requirements
• Effective tracking with transparency
• Upfront solution architecture
• Platform stability
• Strong visual design

People
Atomic Delivery Squad
Engineer
UX & Design
Tech Lead
Product Owner
Iteration Manager
/ BA

People
● Owns product lifecycle
from inception to market
launch
● Sizing, planning and
tracking
● Story definition
● Delivery to expectation
Delivery
Iteration Manager / BAIteration Manager / BA
● Optimised engineering
process
● Accurate sizing and
standard process
● Knowledge sharing, cross
team collaboration and
technical innovation
● Adoption of test
automation
● Solution architecture
Engineering
Engineer
Tech Lead
Product
● Develop product roadmap
and quarterly plans
● Engage with stakeholder
groups to gain
requirements
● Gatekeeper for all product
requirements and
prioritises based on ROI
● Delivery of best practice
UX and visual design
● Data driven decision
making
Product Owner
UX Designer

People
Enable
Empower the team and give
people space and autonomy to
do it on their own
Reward
Celebrate success and
recognise and reward
achievements

People
Talent
Onboard and develop smart and
passionate ‘doers’ who are highly
skilled and good culture fit
Test &
Learn
Foster test and learn, support
‘failing is learning’ and
encourage decision making

People
Grow
Mentor and coach teams. Set
goals and discuss regularly.
Align
Define and align roles and
responsibilities to strategy

ProcessProduct People
Technology

We introduced the right
operational infrastructure to
support rapid development.
Technology

Technology
“ Everything should be made
as simple as possible,
but not simpler.”
Albert Einstein

Technology
Flexibility Agility RealFast
• Utilise real life user data
to drive product
development.
• Analytics requirements
must be designed into
every system
component.
• Ensure digital content
on platforms where
possible is channel
agnostic. Understand
where content needs to
be delivery technology
specific.
• Greater ability to adapt
to changing landscape
• Offer fast and frequent
delivery - the ability to
deliver features fast
• Automate everything
and enable continuous
delivery
• Embrace cloud based
infrastructure and
open-source
technologies to
optimise costs.
• Introduce robust cost
and security review
processes as part of
our devops practices.
• Commitment to
delivery
• Reduction of waste and
maintainable and high
performance software
• Adopt an iterative
approach.
• Speed to market and
early discover is
paramount.
• Innovate and take risks
- don’t be afraid of
failure.
• APIs will support rapid
product innovation.
• Future proof to provide
a solid, reusable
foundation for cost
effective delivery of
new and emerging
audience facing
services
• Enable with open APIs
so easy to enter new
delivery channels. Build
secure, scalable, and
standards based
RESTful APIs
• Leverage a shared set
of core capabilities and
data.
• Design loosely coupled
technology
components that could
be replaced in the
future to minimise
vendor lock in.
• Reduction of waste and
maintainable and high
performance software
Simplicity
• Focus on simplicity -
simple systems to
build, use, maintain and
integrate.
• Stable, reusable
platforms
• Highly responsive and
engaging user
experiences across
mobile and desktop
platforms leveraging
modern frameworks
and native mobile
SDKs.
• Common Platforms for
all capabilities - deliver
core and standard
platforms, then
innovate on them.
Technology Strategy & Goals

Technology
Continuous Delivery
Automated integration and
deployment
Cloud Enabled
Automated Infrastructure
Creation in AWS
Reuse
Strive for re-use across teams
Test Automation
Automated tests - unit and e2e -
triggered from build server.

So what were the
results ?

we released a strong digital product range with
highly engaging user experience
We had clear roadmaps which everyone signed
up to with regular innovations days
We created a high performing team that drove
agile adoption
We established a scalable and high quality
platform with speed to market
Product
Technology
People
Process

So in conclusion

All companies need to find
their inner technology mojo
This is to ensure you survive
the fast changing future

by focusing on
you are able to become
High performing
Tech savvy
Roll like silicon valley start-up
Product Process People Technology