Predicting and preparing for future operational needs

This article is based on Ally’s appearance at the Product Operations Summit in Amsterdam 2024.

Predicting future operational needs is crucial for any business striving for long-term success.

I'm Ally Wardrop, Director of Product Operations at GoCardless, and I’ve seen firsthand how a proactive approach can transform not only the efficiency of product development but also the culture within a company.

In this article, I’ll share the strategies I use to predict and prepare for future operational needs, including how to prioritize long-term solutions, filter information effectively, and build the right team to support sustainable growth.

My product operations ethos

There are three core areas I focus on: delivery, efficiency, and speed.

These are the pillars that guide my thinking when it comes to product operations. In any project or process, it’s crucial to not only deliver but to do so with a high level of efficiency and speed.

However, what I truly want to focus on today is the concept of setting up product operations in a way that anticipates future needs. This is where the metaphorical "crystal ball" comes into play. It’s about looking ahead and realizing that strong foresight is invaluable in shaping and refining how product operations function.

The role of product operations at GoCardless

Product operations comes in many different forms depending on the needs of the organization. It sits at the intersection of product management, engineering, and the customer—acting as the glue that holds these functions together. It ensures smooth collaboration and effective communication across teams.

One common flavor of product operations focuses heavily on supporting product managers—making them more effective and efficient by providing the tools, data, and insights they need.

However, when I was asked to take on this role at GoCardless by our Chief Product Officer, it quickly became clear that this wasn’t exactly what we needed.

We already had a strong product management function that excelled in communicating with customers, gathering data, and building detailed roadmaps. Our engineering team was highly capable, consistently delivering on the projects we set out. And our customer insights team was doing a fantastic job collecting feedback and data to inform our decisions. So, why did we need product operations?

Identifying the real gaps

After assessing the situation, I identified four key pillars that needed attention:

1. Process efficiency and enablement

Our processes were overly complicated and frustrating.

At GoCardless, moving a project forward meant navigating a maze of templates and approvals. You had to fill out endless forms and get input from countless people, and just when you thought you were making progress, another hurdle would appear, often in the form of more paperwork.

The inefficiency was demoralizing for teams, and I knew we had to streamline this to remove the unnecessary friction and pain.

2. Delivery: Speed and structure

We knew what we wanted to build, and we had the team to do it, but starting projects and keeping them on track was a challenge. There was a lack of clear structure around delivery, which led to delays and bottlenecks. Speed was suffering because we didn’t have the right frameworks in place to move forward smoothly.

3. Internal customers

At GoCardless, our "customers" weren't just external users; they were internal teams like Customer Services, Customer Success Managers, Legal, and Regulatory teams. These internal customers needed to interact with product operations in a positive and efficient way, but that wasn’t happening. There was a disconnect in how these teams engaged with us, and fixing that was crucial for smoother operations.

4. Culture: Productivity and team growth

The final pillar I identified was culture—specifically, how we could foster a positive, productive environment for our teams. We needed to ensure that engineers were excited to come to work every day, and that product managers could focus on the strategic elements that truly motivated them.

Building and growing teams with a focus on productivity and job satisfaction was essential to our success.

These four pillars—process, delivery, internal customers, and culture—became the foundation of how we approached product operations at GoCardless, ensuring that we not only predicted future needs but were also prepared to meet them head-on.

Moving from reactive to proactive product operations

It's easy for product operations to fall into a reactive mode. Teams often come to us with urgent needs—requests for data, questions about how we're operating, or even panicked inquiries from leadership or the board.

We often scramble to provide answers, but this can lead to unreliable data or stories we’re not fully confident in. We end up "fudging" the narrative just to respond to the pressure.

While product operations is great for answering those immediate questions, being constantly reactive isn’t sustainable. We can’t keep relying on uncertain data or half-formed insights to respond to critical business needs.

So I made a shift to a more proactive model. This required me to predict what people around GoCardless would need—not just in the moment, but looking ahead to what they’d require to do their jobs effectively.

Building the right team

When I first took on this role, it was just me. As much as I’d love to say I could handle it alone, I quickly realized that wasn’t feasible. So, I started building a team with the right skill sets to support this proactive approach.

The first key move was bringing in Product Operations Analytics. I was lucky to bring two fantastic people on board, Pina and Po Young. Their focus is on understanding our internal processes and the data we collect from our engineering and product teams. They answer essential questions like:

Where are we spending our time?
Are we estimating our work accurately?
What’s the return on investment for our product teams?

Beyond just data, they also focus on culture—ensuring that we have a high-performing environment at GoCardless. Their work allows us to tell a compelling story about how we’re improving both our operational efficiency and our team dynamics.

The power of technical program managers

On the other side, we have my incredible Technical Program Managers. Their role is straightforward but critical: they deliver complex, cross-company programs that no one else wants to touch.

These programs are often daunting and involve multiple teams, but my "SWAT team" steps in and handles them brilliantly, taking on the most challenging projects and delivering results. They ensure we’re executing initiatives that impact the entire company efficiently.

The "magic" of the crystal ball

There’s an ongoing joke at GoCardless that I’m some sort of Oracle who knows everything happening in the company. People come to me with vague inquiries like, “I heard a team is thinking about doing something—what is it?” They seem to think I have all the answers at my fingertips.

The truth is, there’s no magic involved. It’s all about having the right conversations at the right time. I talk to people about what matters to them, gathering the key insights that will be valuable later. It’s a bit of a game—listening, pulling in intel, and connecting the dots.

By consistently engaging with the right teams and asking the right questions, I’m able to predict what’s coming down the pipeline and prepare accordingly.

Ultimately, the "crystal ball" is just proactive communication, focusing on the information that truly makes a difference. And with the right team in place, we’re able to turn those insights into real operational improvements.

The power of preparation

The real "magic" behind effective product operations is preparation. I know that doesn’t sound glamorous, but it's essential. Every day, I dedicate a significant amount of time to thinking and anticipating what might go wrong for GoCardless—specifically within our product development teams.

I try to foresee potential roadblocks, whether it's entering new markets or regulatory challenges that we may not have fully considered yet.

For instance, I know that our regulatory team will need engagement from us early on, so I start thinking about these issues well in advance to help our product teams avoid any last-minute surprises.

Connecting with people

Another key part of my role is talking to people—and I know that may sound obvious or even patronizing, but it’s critical, especially in a leadership position. It's about making sure you're connecting with the right people.

It’s easy to get bogged down with the day-to-day, but doing some of that discovery work yourself is essential to stay ahead of potential issues.

By having meaningful conversations with key people around the business, I gather the information I need and, in return, provide insights that are valuable to them.

For example, I regularly meet with my boss, the Chief Technology Officer, and these conversations are often transactional. I bring insights about his engineering teams—like how they’re feeling or any risks they’re facing—and in return, I get to ask him direct, sometimes cheeky, questions that help me gather intel for the team.

No one is going to walk into the CTO’s office and tell him they think the priorities are wrong or that technical debt is building up. But I can. I can tell him that people are uneasy about his decisions or that he needs to go back to them with more context. This gives him the confidence to address concerns and lead more effectively.

Conversations with leadership

I also work closely with other leaders in the organization. For example, I regularly speak with our CFO, who wants to know about the return on investment from product development and whether we’re getting the most out of our engineering teams.

To provide her with the right insights, my team organizes detailed reporting, gathering data from our engineering teams. In these conversations, I also ask her about the questions she gets from the board regarding product development so I can stay ahead of their concerns.

Likewise, I keep in touch with other leaders like our VP of Customer Success. I might ask him about any feedback he's received on our delivery forums, or what complaints he’s hearing about product development. These interactions allow me to proactively address issues before they escalate and refine how we operate across teams.

Supporting engineering teams

While I engage with leadership, it’s my team that works most closely with our engineering function. Their role is critical in ensuring that engineers aren’t overburdened with unnecessary processes.

We’ve all been in situations where we’re asked to fill out reports or forms that feel like they go nowhere. I want to avoid that frustration. Any process we introduce has to have a clear purpose, and we make sure the teams understand the "why" behind it—even if they don’t necessarily like it.

More importantly, we work to enable our engineering teams to move faster. We have a clear roadmap of what we’re delivering to them, and they can give feedback, adding or removing items as necessary. In return, we ask them simple but revealing questions like:

Where do you spend your time?
Where do you want to spend your time?
What tasks irritate you that you wish you didn’t have to deal with?

By gathering this information, we can focus on solving the right problems for them, although sometimes that’s easier said than done. There will always be aspects of the job, like performance reviews, that aren’t exciting but are non-negotiable.

Our goal is to minimize these pain points wherever possible and ensure our teams feel supported in the work that truly matters to them.

In the end, preparation, communication, and thoughtful processes are what keep product operations running smoothly. And while there’s no real "crystal ball," asking the right questions at the right time gets us pretty close to predicting—and addressing—future needs.

Filtering: Managing information overload

The last topic I want to touch on is filtering, which I almost overlooked until someone pointed out, "That's so much information. Do you just do it all?" The answer is no. You can't, and you shouldn't.

In product operations, I categorize tasks and information into three buckets: unimportant, quick wins, and complex needs. Here's how they break down:

1. The unimportant bucket

This might sound harsh, but this category is all about information that feels urgent at the moment but isn’t actually useful for product operations.

For instance, sometimes people come to me for what I call "corporate therapy." They need to vent about something—a person, a situation, or a frustration that’s weighing on them. While I’m fully engaged during the conversation, the moment it’s over, I mentally throw that information in the bin.

It’s not because I don’t care, but because carrying that emotional baggage forward doesn’t help me make better decisions. You can’t let one-off complaints or emotional venting sessions cloud your judgment when it comes to roadmapping or planning; it will bias your thinking. So, while these conversations are great for building relationships, they belong in the unimportant bucket.

2. The quick wins bucket

The next category is quick wins. These are small, manageable tasks that you can resolve quickly and easily, yet they still have a meaningful impact. For example, if people are constantly struggling to find information, it's a quick win to make that information more accessible. This doesn’t just mean pointing them to the right place—it means identifying why the information was hard to find in the first place and making it more visible or easier to share.

Another example is project management training. One of my technical program managers (TPMs) developed a one-hour training session for teams that are struggling to manage their projects.

It’s something we can roll out quickly, and it helps teams feel more empowered, while also showing them the impact product operations can have. Quick wins like these build rapport and create value without requiring massive time investments.

3. The complex needs bucket

Finally, we have the complex needs bucket. These are the tough, long-term issues that can’t be solved overnight. They need to be added to the roadmap and require a great deal of discovery, cross-team collaboration, and in-depth analysis.

Tackling these challenges takes time and can feel overwhelming, but they are the ones that yield the most significant impact on the business.

For these complex issues, you're relying on your team to gather insights from various parts of the company. You need to sift through a lot of data and information to find the root causes of the problems.

It can feel like you're making slow progress, but sticking with these big, juicy challenges is crucial because they will have a profound impact once resolved. They require patience and persistence, but the long-term gains make the effort worthwhile.

Filtering isn’t just about managing tasks; it’s about managing your focus and attention. By filtering information into these three buckets—unimportant, quick wins, and complex needs—you can prioritize effectively, avoid getting bogged down by distractions, and stay focused on what really drives value for the business.

Key takeaways

The most important lesson I want to leave you with is this: design your teams to solve long-term problems.

While it’s tempting to get caught up in the day-to-day, reactive tasks, your real focus should be on tackling those bigger, more complex challenges that will have a lasting impact on your business.

Here’s how you can achieve that:

Avoid being overly reactive. While it's inevitable that some reactive tasks will come your way, don’t let them dominate your time. Prioritize the long-term, strategic problems that will move the needle.
Build strong relationships. You can’t push your agenda on people you don’t know. Start early by building rapport with the right stakeholders, so when you need to collaborate or ask tough questions, you’re doing it from a place of trust and mutual understanding.
Ask the right questions and filter the answers. Not every piece of information is valuable. Develop the habit of asking the right questions and then filter through the responses to focus on what truly matters.
Be nosy! Be proactive in gathering insights from other leaders across the business. The more you know about what's happening in different areas, the better you’ll be able to anticipate needs and solve problems before they escalate.