Romulo Braga

TIMEBOXING FOR PRODUCT LAUNCHES In March 2003, we presented the launch plan for Google AdSense to Sergey Brin. I was proud of our well fleshed out plan, with a well designed product featuring self-serve sign-up, ad management, and reporting, supported by metrics and testimonials from beta partners who were already seeing success from it. We proposed a launch date of mid September. Sergey’s succinct feedback: “No”. “Sergey, what do you mean? We’re pretty confident we can launch an awesome, differentiated product.” “The product looks great but it’s taking far too long. Launch it in June.” “June?! That’s less than three months away!” Sergey reiterated: “Team, I need this launched by June. I will support you and help you cut through any bottlenecks. I know you can do this.” Fast forward to 3am on June 18, 2003. Our tech lead pushed code to production and formally launched Google AdSense. The launch was incredibly successful, resulting in one of the fastest growing Internet products to date. To get the product launched within three months, Sergey employed a technique called timeboxing, imposing a hard deadline (3 months) as a constraint on product launch. At Amazon, Jeff Bezos employed the same technique, telling a SWAT team in late 2004 that he wanted them to launch Amazon Prime before Amazon’s earnings in February. Why did two of the most consequential advertising / commerce products - ever - both launch through timeboxing? Because it works. Timeboxing works for three primary reasons. First, it leads to improved prioritization. By limiting the time for a project, it forced us to decide what was most important to work on. I remember cutting large swathes of features and flows in one fell swoop to make the deadline. Ironically, many of those flows later proved redundant and were never built out. And this brings up the second reason - product editing. Cutting features leads to launching a simpler, leaner, better product. This process made me a staunch believer in the power of editing to build great products. Finally, timeboxing creates a sense of urgency, increasing efficiency. Since the launch date was fixed in stone, we couldn’t procrastinate; all timelines were clearly laid out working backwards from the launch date. In order for timeboxing to work, you need four conditions to hold true. 1. Committed Leader: Sergey backed his talk and adopted our project (as did Bezos at Amazon, I’m sure). He (and Susan Wojcicki, my boss) attended our team meetings, unblocked decisions and helped funnel resources to our team. They came to our war room the night of the launch and stayed with us till the launch at 3am. Timeboxing needs these kind of leaders, who are willing to be in the trenches with the team, invaluable in high pressure situations. 2. Empowered team: Our team had the right skill sets to launch the product. We had the full spectrum of necessary skills, were able to unblock ourselves and were not gated by other teams. If a timeboxed team has to spend a chunk of time waiting for other teams, it’s not going to work. 3. Seemingly unrealistic but not irrational timeline: The timeline that Sergey pulled out of thin air - 3 months to launch - seemed unrealistic, but on closer examination, it wasn’t crazy. A lot of the complex back-end ad targeting and serving work was close to complete, and most of the remaining work was productizing the flows. It did force us to focus on the essential features, the ones that REALLY mattered, which ultimately proved to be a good thing. 4. Sparingly used: The 3-month sprint to launch was exhilarating but also exhausting. The technique needs to be used judiciously and carefully, in high stakes situations. tl;dr CEOs and leaders: Timeboxing can be an incredibly powerful tool in your arsenal to drive motivation, energy, clarity and to get things done. However, you need a committed leader, an empowered team, a rational (if unrealistic) timeline for it to be effective, and you need to use it thoughtfully. Go out there and timebox!