The problem
After several acquisitions, each solution line managed its backlog differently. That made it hard to prioritise consistently, share knowledge or integrate the acquired products.
What I did
I led a task-force of eight product and technology leaders from the five acquired solution lines. We assessed how each line worked today and ran workshops to find the best practices. The key realisation was that the tooling had to be shared, but the ways of working could not be imposed. The products served customers very differently (SaaS, API and UI), so no line could be told to change its whole approach.
We settled on a unified tooling structure, with common workflows for epics, stories and tasks. Delivery teams kept control of how they managed their own work, such as sub-tasks. I also built a shared knowledge base, standard templates and prioritisation frameworks, and an implementation roadmap, with about six months planned for the rollout.
The result
Five previously siloed product lines moved onto one backlog approach, with better resource allocation, closer collaboration across teams and faster feature delivery. The Product VP endorsed it for rollout across the organisation. It taught me that standardising works when it leaves room for what makes each team different.