A few month ago, the product manager proposed to change the feature demo after the sprint (development cycle) from by himself to the development team. I thought it’s a great idea. It let developer showcase his/ her work and engage with stakeholders. Even better, the product manager said he’d coach and support the team in presentation.
I took notes during the demo, as Toastmaster habit to give each speaker feedback – what he/ she has done well and what to think about, then shared them with the product manager. He was excited to see the feedback and asked if he could share them with the team. I said yes and trust he’d communicate in a positive and constructive way.
I’m glad to see the engineers embrace the change. For some, presenting to people is much harder than coding; for others, how to explain that is easy-to-understand and interesting-to-follow for non-technical audience is challenging. Yet we are all learning and getting better as we go. People don’t expect engineer to be like a sales person or marketer yet an engineer can be and shall be a good communicator. It makes him/ her more effective and stands out. Doing good works and telling great stories go hand-in-hand.