Series: Rethinking IT – The Path to AI-Enabled Business, Part 3
Agile alone isn’t enough.
Many organizations learned this the hard way: after implementing ceremonies and renaming roles, delivery still stalls, ownership is unclear, and customer outcomes remain elusive.
In Part 2, I unpacked the Agile Illusion—how well-intentioned transformations fail when culture, accountability, and structure aren’t aligned.
In Part 3, we move to the heart of the matter:
The fundamental shift isn’t just in how we work—it’s in how we structure what we work on.
It’s the difference between projects and products.
And it’s the difference between organizations that deliver value and those that only deliver.
📌 Executive Summary
While many organizations are eager to adopt Agile, few realize that true agility doesn’t come from ceremonies — it comes from structural change.
The shift from project to product thinking is more than a process update — it’s a new operating model that drives ownership, customer value, and long-term success.
This article examines the pitfalls of project funding, the misuse of the term’ product,” and what needs to change to make Agile truly effective.
🧱 1. The Legacy Project Mentality
For decades, enterprise IT has operated in a familiar, comfortable rhythm: gathering requirements, defining scope, securing funding, and delivering through a temporary project structure.
It worked — until it didn’t.
Project funding models, especially those that pool budgets and allocate funds quarterly or annually, reinforce a false sense of certainty.
They force teams into rigid plans that must be scoped, approved, and forecasted before discovery begins.
And the prioritization process? It often favors political influence over customer value.
This blurs the line between what is truly important and merely urgent, leaving delivery teams to chase shifting priorities instead of executing a clear mission.
Teams are temporary.
Context is lost.
Accountability dissolves when the project ends.
I’ve seen cross-functional teams execute flawlessly against project plans, only to find that the business need had changed by the time the solution launched.
The result? Perfectly delivered work that no longer mattered.
That’s the trap of the project mindset: you may do the work right, but it may no longer be the right work.
🧠 2. What Product Thinking Means
Shifting to a product isn’t about changing job titles.
It’s about changing the operating model.
In an actual product model:
- Teams are long-lived, not assembled for delivery, and disbanded
- Funding is continuous and tied to customer outcomes
- Success is measured in value delivered, not just velocity
- Scope is flexible, driven by learning, experimentation, and iteration
Organizations inspired by the Silicon Valley Product Group understand this.
Their mantra: “Product teams exist to solve problems, not deliver features.”
True product thinking:
- Assigns problems, not roadmaps
- Empowers teams to make decisions
- Connects the entire team to the customer and the business outcome
It’s not just “Agile done right” — it’s an entirely different way of thinking about how technology and business intersect.
🧩 3. Where Most Companies Get It Wrong
Here’s where it goes sideways:
Many companies declare they’ve adopted a “product model” —
But continue to structure work the same way they always have.
🔻 “Product” lives in the business, isolated from technology
🔻 Product managers are responsible for output, not empowered for outcomes
🔻 Funding still flows to projects and initiatives, not to missions or capabilities
🔻 Marketing, Tech, Risk, and Data all operate in silos, reporting through different lines
The result?
Confusion.
Misalignment.
No shared definition of success.
And numerous meetings are held to reconcile plans that were never aligned correctly in the first place.
The product becomes a label. Not a model.
And when structure reinforces silos, no amount of Agile coaching or Jira configuration will drive innovation.
🛠️ 4. What Has to Change
For fundamental transformation, structure must catch up to ambition.
That means:
- Funding capabilities, not timelines or deliverables
- Empowering product teams to discover and solve, not just deliver
- Embedding risk, data, and architecture inside delivery teams
- Using shared KPIs and OKRs that cut across functional boundaries
The most effective product models operate on trust and clarity, not control and hierarchy.
And leaders need to rethink their roles:
- CIOs must act as enablers of product delivery
- CPOs must translate customer problems into team missions
- CTOs must ensure platforms support autonomy, speed, and resilience
- COOs must embrace flexibility over rigid control
Collaboration—not ownership wars—is the only way forward.
⚡ 5. Why This Matters Now
In the AI era, speed, learning, and iteration aren’t buzzwords — they’re survival tools.
You can’t build real-time, intelligent customer experiences with project-based thinking.
You can’t unlock AI’s full potential if you fund temporary teams and measure success solely by the scope delivered.
Structure either accelerates innovation or suffocates it.
And while Agile frameworks may offer a new process, product thinking enables actual transformation.
🔁 Conclusion
Projects deliver features.
Products deliver value.
The difference?
Structure.
You can’t fix structural problems with process changes.
If you want innovation, customer outcomes, and sustainable agility, it’s time to go deeper.
Rethink the structure. Rethink IT.
Harvard Business Review – Agile Isn’t Enough
