Finding common ground between developers and product managers

Engineers and product managers often have different perspectives on what's most important.

While the business side pushes for product features and meeting deadlines, the engineering side cares deeply about code quality, scalability, and reducing technical debt. The challenge comes in figuring out how bridge this gap  without making either side feel unheard.

Same team, different priorities

Non-technical stakeholders, like product managers, marketers, or executives, typically focus on customer needs, they want to ship new features quickly, capture market opportunities, and keep customers happy.

On the other side, engineers prioritize scalability, reliability, maintainability, and reducing technical debt. They want to make sure that what we're building today will be sustainable and easy to work with tomorrow.

When these two worlds collide, the result is often frustration. Engineers feel pressured to sacrifice quality, and product teams feel like their priorities are being ignored.

Why misalignment happens

Misalignment typically happens because both sides are working towards different objectives without understanding each other's needs. Here are what I've noticed are some common reasons for this breakdown:

1. A lack of communication means product managers may not always understand the technical complexity or long-term consequences of certain decisions. They don't see the trade-offs involved in taking on technical debt or of skipping over quality checks.

2. Sometimes, the engineering team is left out of key business decisions. Without understanding the why behind deadlines or feature requests, engineers can't prioritize their work effectively.

3. Product minded folks often measure success by customer engagement, revenue growth, or speed of delivery, whereas engineers measure success by system stability, code quality, and scalability. Without aligning on shared goals, both sides end up speaking different languages.

The hidden costs of misalignment

Misalignment can seem like an inevitable part of working in cross-functional teams, but it comes with significant costs:

• Constant back-and-forth over priorities leads to delays in shipping features and creates frustration for both sides.

• When engineering teams are forced to cut corners to meet deadlines, they end up accumulating technical debt, which slows down future development and increases the risk of bugs in the code.

• Misalignment often leads to burnout and disengagement, especially for engineers who feel like their concerns are being ignored.

How to get alignment

Alignment doesn't mean sacrificing one side's priorities for the other, it's about finding a balance. Here's how to foster better collaboration between engineers and non-technical teams:

Start with shared goals

The most effective way to align priorities is to start with shared goals. Both sides need to understand the big picture: What are we trying to achieve as a company? What are the business objectives, and how does technical work contribute to them?

For example, if the goal is to launch a new feature, the engineering team should be involved early on to discuss potential technical challenges and trade-offs. If the team understands the business impact, they're more likely to make decisions that align with those goals.

Communicate the "why" behind business requests

Sometimes in the rush to delivery, features are requested without having the time to explain the reason behind them.   When engineers don't understand the "why," they might deprioritize these requests or push back because they see them as low-value.

Engineers should get comfortable asking these questions. Why is this feature important? How does it impact customers or revenue? What problem does it solve? The more context engineers have, the more they can make better decisions about how to implement it without sacrificing technical quality.

Encourage a shared understanding of technical debt

One of the reasons for friction between engineering and non-technical teams is a lack of understanding of technical debt.  For many business stakeholders, technical debt seems abstract or unimportant. But for engineers, it's a critical factor in long-term success.

Take the time to educate non-technical team members about the impact of technical debt. Explain how shortcuts in code today can slow down future development, increase maintenance costs, and introduce bugs or outages.  

By demystifying technical debt and framing it in terms of business outcomes, you can help non-technical teams understand why investing in technical quality is just as important as shipping new features.

Establish a prioritization framework

One way to avoid endless debates over what should come first is to establish a clear prioritization framework that both teams can agree on. This might include categories like:

• Urgent business needs. Critical features or updates that have a direct impact on customers or revenue.

• Technical debt reduction. Regularly scheduled sprints focused on paying down debt and improving system health.

• Long-term strategic goals. Projects that will have a lasting impact on both technical scalability and business growth.

Once both sides agree on this framework, it becomes easier to prioritize tasks based on impact and urgency.

Create open lines of communication

Finally, make sure there are always open lines of communication between teams. This can take many forms, whether thats async slack threads or regular catch-ups. The key is to create a space where both sides feel heard and can contribute to decision-making.

When communication is open and ongoing, it's easier to catch misalignments early, before they become bigger problems. It also fosters a culture of collaboration rather than competition between technical and non-technical teams.

If you'd like to improve communication in your team you may be interested in capture.dev - a bug reporting tool that makes it quick and easy for all team members to create engineer-ready bug reports.