In the Zilker Trail Product Development Life Cycle, Experimentation is not just a box to be checked or a tool that is periodically used. Instead, in Phase Five, it is a critical step that will determine the measurement by which we we will evaluate success of the feature.
Once the work is done in the Engineering Phase, we release the feature as an experiment. This could be done either as an A/B test (with one or multiple variants) or as a Feature Flag. The goal is to launch in a way that live data can be gathered to validate the findings from the Design Phase.
The Experimentation or Analytics team takes the lead in this phase, creating test plans with clear success criteria, working with the Engineering team on a plan to back out the feature if the data does not validate the original hypothesis. This work should be done with rigor but also with speed, to ensure that the process is not being delayed.
When this work is complete, the feature is launched, and the Analytics phase begins.
Next Phase: Product Development Life Cycle - Analytics
Related Post: Product Development Life Cycle - Research and Insights
Comments