Congrats on the Product Transformation! Did You Tell the Rest of the Company?
Why product transformations fail at product-enabled companies
Many product transformations start the same way: new organizational structure, new roles, new frameworks, a prominent consulting firm, and a plan to become “product-led.” Product, engineering, and design teams are trained in new methods and vocabulary: stuff like continuous discovery, lean development, OKR, and (unfortunately) SAFe, and the shift begins...at least on paper.
But in product-enabled companies — where product teams exist to empower the business, not lead it — these transformations often miss the point. They center the change on product management itself, assuming that if those teams evolve, everything else will fall into place. This assumption is wrong.
In a product-enabled organization, Product isn’t the center of the universe. It’s a partner. An enabler. A collaborator. This means that real transformation has to reach across the organization — not just into product.
Transformation in a silo only changes how product teams talk about the work, not how the company actually works together.
While the product teams get new tools, rituals, and language, everyone else is left to fend for themselves. Stakeholders — the very people product teams are meant to partner with — are kept in the dark about what’s changing and why. No one tells them what’s expected of them now, or how they’re supposed to work differently. They're not trained. They're not informed. They're not included.
And then leadership wonders why the transformation’s impact is negligible.
The Teams That Get Left Behind
This problem isn’t subtle — it’s systemic. The list of people excluded from product transformations is long: marketing, customer service, legal, finance, operations, business development, communications, field teams, and even senior leaders. If you're not on a product, engineering, or design team, you're probably not getting the memo — literally or figuratively.
When these transformations roll out, they tend to skip five essential things:
Discovery on the business. Not enough time is spent understanding how Product operates within the larger system, and what those outside Product might need.
Stakeholder education. No one explains what’s changing, why it matters, how it benefits the busiess, and what to expect. A one-time roadshow doesn’t count.
Cross-functional ways of working. Product teams get new rituals within Product and with UX and IT, but other partner teams are not provided with new ways to engage.
Redefinition of roles and decision-making. Ownership shifts, but no one says who decides what — so everyone does, or no one does.
Two-way feedback loops. No one asks what the stakeholder groups think about the transformation.
Everyone else is expected to figure it out on their own. It’s no surprise things start to break down.
What Happens When You Leave Stakeholders Out
When stakeholders aren’t included in a product transformation, it doesn’t just create a few awkward meetings. It causes real damage.
Trust begins to erode, and teams that used to feel involved now feel excluded. Requests go in, but answers don’t come out; or when they do, they’re vague, slow, or confusing. Product starts to feel like a black box. Conversations get tense. Alignment turns into conflict. Everyone’s frustrated, and no one really knows why.
One of the most common and damaging outcomes is a collapse in clarity around ownership. Product transformation often introduces new language without shared understanding. For example, product teams are told they are now “empowered,” which internally means autonomy.
But to stakeholders who haven’t been included in the transformation, it can sound like, they don’t have to listen to you anymore. Without context or collaboration, words meant to signal healthy change can come across as power grabs, and a transformation intended to unlock speed and clarity just creates new sources of conflict.
Meanwhile, product teams end up in constant defense mode, explaining and justifying their new ways of working instead of focusing on outcomes. The transformation starts to lose momentum, and leaders start asking whether this whole “product thing” was a mistake.
If You're a Stakeholder, You're Not Crazy
If you’re someone outside the product org and you're feeling disoriented, sidelined, or frustrated, you're not crazy. You're just in the middle of a change no one explained to you.
Here’s what might be happening:
You used to make a request and someone would handle it. Now your request goes into a backlog and vanishes.
You’ve heard there’s a roadmap, but you didn’t help shape it and you’re not allowed to see it. When you do see it, it doesn’t give you the information you were looking for.
You’re told the team is in “discovery” and they’ll get back to you later — but “later” never comes.
You’re left out of the mysterious process of prioritization.
This isn’t a failure on your part. It’s a failure of the transformation to include you.
What You Can Do
You shouldn’t have to bridge the gap alone, but if you’re a stakeholder trying to make things work post-transformation, your conversations with product teams matter. Here are a few ways to keep those relationships productive and clear:
Ask about goals, not tasks. Instead of saying, “Can you build this?”, try “What problem are we focused on solving right now?” It helps shift the conversation into Product’s language — and gives you more context for where your priorities fit.
Share impact, not just urgency. Product managers hear “This is high priority,” from every direction. Help them understand why something matters — customer impact, regulatory risk, revenue loss, etc. Give them something they can weigh, not just something they have to triage.
Be clear about your role. Are you offering input? Making a request? Providing data? Making a decision? Product managers often interact with dozens of people across the business. Helping them understand how you want to be involved can prevent a lot of misfires.
Don’t assume they know your world. PMs may not understand your team’s timelines, constraints, or success metrics. Give them the context they need to connect the dots — they’ll usually appreciate it.
Learn a bit of the product language. You don’t need to use it all the time, but understanding the terminology and the product mindset can help you interpret what’s happening and ask better questions.
Assume good intent, but ask for clarity. If something doesn’t make sense — or feels like a brush-off — don’t assume malice. Just ask. “Can you walk me through how this decision was made?” is a lot more productive than “Why weren’t we consulted?”
What Companies Should Be Doing
If you're a product-enabled company — where product is a key partner, but not the driver of the entire business — stop trying to become product-led. That's not your goal.
Your goal is to evolve how teams work together so that the product organization can do its job well and the business gets stronger. That kind of transformation doesn’t radiate out from Product. It has to happen across the organization — deliberately, simultaneously, and with shared ownership of what’s changing.
That means:
Bringing stakeholders into the process early and meaningfully. Not just in a kickoff meeting or at a roadmap review. Bring them into problem definition. Into tradeoff conversations. Into what’s being learned, not just what’s being built.
Running transformation workshops that include secondary and tertiary teams. Don’t just train product, design, and engineering. Train marketing, sales, ops, legal, finance, and support — anyone who works with Product should understand what’s changing and how to engage with it.
Teaching shared ways of working, not just new rituals for product teams. Discovery, prioritization, decision-making frameworks, measurement — these aren't “product things.” They're business practices that work better when everyone uses a shared approach.
Redefining roles and responsibilities collaboratively. Don’t just hand out a new RACI chart. Get in a room and figure out what ownership really looks like in this model. Who decides? Who informs? Who defines value? Bring the doers of things to the meeting, not just leadership and consultants.
Creating two-way communication channels. Not updates. Not demos. Actual dialogue. Roadmaps should be visible. Context should be shared. Feedback should be constant — and welcomed.
Investing in partnership, not just velocity. The point isn’t to go faster — it’s to get better at solving the right problems together. That takes trust, clarity, and the right kind of friction.
This kind of transformation is harder, and it takes longer. But it actually works.
When companies say they’re transforming but only include the product team, they’re not doing a transformation. They’re doing a rebrand.
A real transformation changes how the entire business works — how teams plan together, make decisions together, and solve problems together. Anything less is just theater.
And here’s the twist: this is what “product-led” actually looks like inside a product-enabled company. This is the cross-over between being product-led and product-enabled.
Product doesn’t become the main driver of revenue, acquisition, or strategy, but the mindset — customer-centered thinking, problem-first framing, a focus on value and outcomes — takes root across all teams.
It’s not about giving more power to Product. It’s about giving the whole company better ways to work.