One of the core skills of a product manager is requirements disassembly, which directly affects the success rate of the project and the final effect of the product. This article will delve into the importance of demand disassembly, analyze the differences between monthly salary 3W and 8K product managers in demand disassembly, and provide practical learning methods and practical skills. Through case comparison and detailed process analysis, it helps product managers improve their ability to dismantle requirements, so as to better understand the essence of the business, balance the interests of multiple parties, and promote the implementation of projects.
A very important skill for product managers to grow is “demand dismantling”. Whether facing new business scenarios or optimizing functional modules of existing products, requirements disassembly plays a key role. It can not only transform complex requirements into specific executable tasks, but also gain insight into the essence of business, balance the interests of multiple parties, and promote project implementation.
The essence of demand dismantling is “being good at details and seeing the overall situation”.
Product managers deal with vague business goals, fragmented user needs, and uncertainty about technology implementation. Through requirements disassembly, abstract requirements (such as “improving user retention”) can be concretized into user behavior paths, functional designs, and data indicators. Identify potential risks and resolve technical difficulties or resource conflicts in advance; Build consensus on team collaboration through structured requirements documents (e.g., PRDs); and promote deep thinking to verify the rationality of business logic.
Case comparison: before vs after disassembly
01 How do novice product managers learn requirements disassembly?
For product managers just starting out, requirements disassembly can often be both exciting and challenging. Here are two key paths to help you master this skill quickly:
Learn from the masters
For novice product managers, observing the process of dismantling the needs of excellent colleagues is the core growth path. In real business scenarios, seniors can build a systematic demand analysis framework with long-term experience.
Key learning scenarios and methods, meeting observation method, in-depth participation in the requirements review meeting, focusing on how the seniors completed the three-step method of requirements deconstruction:
- Traceability: Quickly locate the business background and core objectives of the requirements;
- Verification: Cross-verify the rationality of requirements through user portraits and usage scenarios;
- Solution: Predict potential risks such as technical bottlenecks and user acceptance, and output solutions.
Case review method, actively apply to participate in classic project review, learn the logic of requirements prioritization (such as KANO model application), the processing strategy of demand dependencies, and understand the transformation link from the original requirement to the product solution.
Feedback iteration mechanism, after each independent disassembly of requirements, it is necessary to immediately conduct structured feedback communication with the team. Focus on two key dimensions: element integrity, check whether there are omissions in key demand points; Logical rigor, evaluate whether the feasibility analysis covers multiple dimensions such as technology, operation, and user.
To achieve these three challenges, product managers will only continue to appreciate
Good product managers are very scarce, and product managers who understand users, business, and data are still in demand when they go out of the Internet. On the contrary, if you only do simple communication, inefficient execution, and shallow thinking, I am afraid that you will not be able to go through the torrent of the next 3-5 years.
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Through a continuous “practice-feedback-optimization” closed loop, rapid iteration of professional capabilities.
Practical exercises
Actual combat is the forging furnace of product managers’ demand dismantling ability. Only by going deep into real projects can we transform the methodology into practical capabilities and iterate the demand dismantling system.
Take the initiative to undertake dismantling tasks and accumulate experience from basic needs. Execute according to the process of “Clarifying Business Objectives – Identify Key Elements – Dismantling Functions and Technical Requirements” to hone your analytical and adaptability capabilities in solving problems such as ambiguous requirements and technical bottlenecks.
Pay attention to customer feedback as a demand checkpoint. As a product user, customer reviews directly expose dismantling biases. By collecting functional feedback, we optimize the dismantling logic, and at the same time deepen our understanding of the market and users, and establish a cognitive foundation for subsequent work.
Establish a closed-loop working method of “dismantling-review-precipitation”. After each dismantling, systematically sort out the success factors and improvement points, gradually form a personal methodology, and improve the efficiency and accuracy of demand dismantling.
02 The process of dismantling requirements
Define business objectives
Clarifying business goals is the starting point and core of demand dismantling. Product managers need to penetrate the surface of demand, lock in business goals and expected results, and ensure that the direction of dismantling is at the same frequency as the company’s strategy.
When communicating with the business side, focus on the essence of the demand: dig out the drivers of demand, core problems to be solved, and quantitative business indicators. For example, in the face of the demand for new marketing functions, it is necessary to clarify its core value – to improve user conversion, drive revenue growth, or strengthen brand recognition.
Dismantling needs to be closely related to the company’s strategic focus: if the main focus is on new market development, focus on localization adaptation, multilingual functions and other needs; If the focus is on product optimization, it revolves around user pain points and experience shortcomings.
Apply SMART principles to transform abstract goals into “specific, measurable, achievable, related, time-bound” execution indicators, and anchor the direction for demand disassembly.
Identify key elements
After clarifying the business goals, product managers need to accurately break down the key elements:
1. Required features
Anchor business goals and dismantle the core task chain of users. For example, on online education platforms, course retrieval, video playback, assignment submission, etc. are the core functional modules to achieve “high-quality course services”. It is necessary to clarify the functional value hierarchy, cut the core and auxiliary functions, avoid feature stacking, and plan development priorities based on dependencies.
2. User experience
User experience is the life and death line of a product. It is necessary to disassemble the usage scenarios and user portraits: the mobile terminal adapts to fragmented scenarios and designs lightweight interactions; The silver-haired group strengthens visual and operational fault-tolerant design. At the same time, the problem solution is embedded to improve the user’s decision-making efficiency through intelligent guidance and instant feedback system.
3. Technical boundaries
Technical feasibility determines the quality of demand landing. It is necessary to evaluate the team’s technical reserves and system architecture carrying capacity to predict technical risks. The demand for super-existing capabilities, or adjustment of plans, or pre-resource planning. At the same time, a compatibility review mechanism is established to avoid the impact of new functions on the existing system.
Implementation plan dismantling
After the requirements are dismantled and identified the key elements, the implementation plan is the core action of the implementation.
First of all, how is the demand priority arranged, and why is it arranged this way? Anchor core requirements based on business goals, user value, and technical complexity, divide must-do items and iterable items, and form product demand priorities.
Then how is human resources allocated, and why is this allocation more reasonable? Accurately allocate manpower, time and materials according to priorities to prevent resource misallocation. Then break down the requirements into executable tasks, and clarify the responsible person, delivery node and acceptance criteria.
Finally, in view of the dynamic changes in the market, demand and technology, it is necessary to regularly review the execution deviation and adjust the strategy agilely to ensure that the project is steadily advancing towards the business goal.
Review and summary
Review and summary is a key step in the growth of product managers. Systematically collect full-link feedback from development, operation, and users, use data to quantify demand achievement, and compare actual results with preset goals. Find out the gaps, find out the shortcomings, and then iterate and improve in the subsequent products and continue to grow.
At the same time, summarize the good aspects, precipitate reusable methodologies, and iterate the demand management system in continuous reflection, so that every project practice becomes a ladder for product capability leaps.
brief summary
The essence of needs dismantling is to establish a deterministic cognitive framework in uncertainty. It requires product managers to be both “microscopes” and can see the detailed logic of each demand point. It is also a “telescope” that can clearly see the position and value of demand in the business map.
As Steve Jobs said: A great product manager needs to have both the logic of an engineer and the intuition of a poet. Requirements dismantling is the training ground for this compound ability – through continuous deliberate practice, the methodology is internalized into thinking instinct, and finally the qualitative change from “functional designer” to “business architect” is achieved.
The core competitiveness of product managers is no longer the simple ability to realize requirements, but the wisdom of “penetrating the business appearance and building system value”. It is recommended to dismantle the needs regularly: select past needs and re-disassemble them with the latest cognition.
