Elevate Talks: Michael Rozenberg (ustwo)
Michael Rozenberg works as a Delivery Lead and Product Owner at ustwo Nordics. Before joining ustwo he spent a decade working with Lean and Agile transformations. At ustwo he is focusing on product, process and studio strategy in order to take deliveries from the studio of dreams to the next level. He’s one of our special guests at Trimarchi, a huge tech & design conference, on November 4 in Mar del Plata, Argentina. Tickets available here!
To begin with, could you please introduce yourself?
Hi, I Michael, Delivery Lead/Product Owner at ustwo Nordics for over two years now. I’m also a wannabe designer and a typical millennial I guess, ha ha! I’m currently living in Copenhagen together with my girlfriend which means I am the one who have to commute over the bridge to Sweden every day to get into our studio. I usually have some projects on the side and have been trying to learn Spanish over the last 6 months so feel free to test me out (and correct me). And if there’s any good surf close by the conference I’d also love to know!
As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
I was always drawn to computers and played a lot of computer games. Technology was definitely an early interest. I was also frustrated by poor product designs that I came across which got me thinking about becoming product designer. At the same time, I’ve played four instruments and practiced over fourteen different sports, so I guess my strategy was to test a lot of different things.
What and where have you studied?
I have a MSc. in Information and Communication Engineering from Lund University in Sweden. I also did a year of product design at Central Saint Martins in London. But more relevant to my work I think is the numerous courses I’ve taken related to personal leadership, team dynamics and coaching.
Was it a tough choice?
No, it felt like a good fit… maybe also a safe one? I’ve always liked technology and the degree was a good choice to keep options open. But since I always want to have the cookie and eat it at the same time I do wish I could have completed my BA in Product Design as well.
You spent a decade working on Lean and Agile transformations. Why do you believe they are important for today’s businesses?
If you strip away all the buzz words and consultants wanting to sell you the latest flavour I think Lean and Agile focus on some very basic and human traits that are vital to effective and joyful collaboration and culture building. To me you can boil it down to communication, visualisation, small steps and iterative approaches.
We all know everything keep speeding up, making the world ever more competitive. You also have the trends of UX design and a stronger focus on true user value. In that landscape I don’t see any business survive without being really good at both internal and external communication. Visualisation, taking concrete fast small steps and evaluating the results are all tools to help us communicate more effectively to realise what we need to do. Actually, since we are working on complex problems, this is the only approach that works to solve them.
Can you tell us a bit about your job positions at ustwo?
My position as a Delivery Lead is a combination of an Agile Coach and a Product Owner. The focus shifts depending on the projects and the clients but you could say it contains three parts: Product, Project & People.
In the early phases of a new project I take part in the pitch process. Depending on the type of product I might lead the pitch or one of our design strategists might do it. I also work closely with business development to size the projects both in terms of staffing and budget.
Once a project starts I am responsible for the budget, for helping the client with product strategy and the backlog, and for creating the release plans. I also work with the team on a daily basis, facilitating workshops, meetings, retrospectives and anything else that needs to be done in order for the team to be able to do their job. Ideally there’s two of us on a project allowing one of us to focus on people and process, and the other to focus more on product strategy and research.
As a Delivery Lead you almost always have a lead designer on your team but I try to always participate in user research as well. If there’s time left, those of us that has a design background might support with that, others that come from development or QA might pitch in more in those fields.
I think it’s a fantastic position to be in when you have time to think and really help the client make the most of their product. But it can also be quite challenging on projects where resources are tight or we don’t get to follow the product post launch and see how it is received in the market.
What is special about your product creation process?
I don’t know if we are unique in our product creation process but we have a few tricks to kick start it.
First and foremost we always try to get the client and all of the stakeholders into the studio for 1–2 days of exploration and alignment around what we are building and what the expectations are. We also cover who we are and how we want to work together. This saves a lot of energy down the road when at least everyone who was there has a shared view of what we trying to accomplish.
The second thing we are really good at at ustwo is to move quickly. We try to have something up and running within a sprint and believe in doing rather than talking. That way we learn fast and can also involve the client fast. I think having our own cross functional teams in the studio, people who share our culture and our ambitions really help in that respect. We don’t need to spend so much time on getting together as a team and can handle everything from research, design and development inside the studio.
Finally, and maybe most important, we are not afraid to fail. I know a lot of people say that but I truly feel that ustwo provides a safe to fail environment. I have failed a couple of times and the support from my peers and the leadership team has been amazing. This really allow us to experiment and test things out.
What are the best and worst things about working in Sweden?
Hm… best is probably our approach to teamwork. The strong focus on consensus and flat hierarchies really support collaboration. This helps in unleashing the collective genius and staying human. We also have the best paternity leave policies in the world (I think?). The worst thing is that we suck at conflict management! We are just too nice. I mean, the lengths we are prepared to go to to avoid conflict is insane. Things take longer time, are not properly handled or we just end up in some kind of middle state which tries to please everyone but in reality is really suboptimal for all.
Could you show as a picture of your desk?
Absolutely… it’s usually more messy though…
What are your expectations from Trimarchi?
To meet a lot of funny, inspiring and thought provoking people. It’s always rewarding to meet people with other experiences, cultures or views and since it’s also my first visit to Latin America I am sure there will be a lot to learn. I also hope to pick up some solid tips and trix between the musical experiences I keep reading about =D
How do you see yourself in 5 years?
Ha ha, tough question. I very rarely plan that far ahead. Two years is usually as far ahead as I can see. But in 5 years I’m probably either still at ustwo or have transitioned into a product manager role. I would really love to work more long term on a product and with something that is manifested physically in the real world. Maybe I have finally produced some of my own stuff as well.
Bonus track: Can you recommend any TV show/ movie/ song/ artist/ gadget?
I don’t really watch that much movies/series. It’s mostly cooking shows on youtube 😳. I can share my Spotify playlist? https://sptfy.com/1YJ5 😁 I would however recommend the books Sapiens/Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari. Super relevant stuff for us in the design world that have the power to shape tomorrow.
