We have this long-running joke. It’s not a bug; it’s a feature.
But what if it actually is? What if the defect is actually holding opportunities to be a feature?
What is a defect?
A defect is known as a bug or an issue, an unintended flaw, or a deviation from the expected behavior of the product.
Value of the defect…
We prioritize defects and evaluate the risk to understand whether they will be prioritized to get fixed or not. Some of these defects will be set to fix in an urgent manner, and some will go to the backlog to be fixed at a later stage. Some defects will be closed due to various reasons that suggest they are no longer a defect.
During this time, as we evaluate and prioritize defects, what if we look at the opportunities they hold to improve the product?
Yes, we convert defects to a story when it’s a requirement that was initially missed. I am not referring to those. Sometimes, we raise defects when we think the user has to press too many buttons to get to checkout, or a customer may find the information confusing and talk to customer service about it as a pattern , or you found a way to disturb the flow by deviating from the common user journey. I am suggesting that we can seek out the opportunity in these defects as they may have the potential to improve the product by scaling it up to a feature.
Simply put, can we transform this inconvenience we found into a business opportunity?
What are the benefits?
Foster innovation as part of sprint activities: The development team can look for opportunities of how the existing code can be used to improve the product. Encourage seeking opportunities in the code, user journeys, design, etc., to make improvements to the product.
Embrace change (Be Agile about it): Embracing defects as opportunities as feature development highlights the agile practices such as flexibility, continuous improvement, and adaptability which allow development teams to respond to fast-changing requirements and user needs.
Satisfaction: Instead of focusing on defect fixing, shifting the mindset of the development team to maximize the value of their work turns potential liabilities of the product into valuable assets. Make the process more rewarding.
Enhance user experience: Defects can highlight the areas that are overlooked or painful in the user journey. By incorporating user journey data analysis, customer feedback, customer care feedback, and leveraging these unexpected functionalities, teams can improve the overall product improvement and satisfaction.
Competitive advantage: Features derived from defects can set the product apart from competitors as these changes can offer unique functionalities and capabilities. Also, involving users in the process of identifying defects and converting them to features can build up a sense of community and product loyalty that can also give a competitive advantage.
Is this a successful way of thinking? Well, here are some real-life examples.
Slack’s Emoji Reactions: Initially, Slack did not have a feature for users to react to messages with emojis. However, users found a workaround by typing out emoji codes within messages. Recognizing the popularity of this behavior, Slack implemented an official Emoji Reactions.
Instagram’s Swipe Navigation: In 2018, Instagram accidentally rolled out a feature that allowed users to navigate between posts by swiping horizontally, instead of vertically as usual. While initially met with backlash, some users found the new navigation intuitive and requested it as a feature. Instagram eventually reintroduced the swipe navigation feature as an option for users.
Retweet button: Initially, Twitter users used the @reply feature to manually retweet messages. However, this process was not user-friendly and limited the spread of tweets. Users found a bug that allowed them to use the “RT” abbreviation to retweet more efficiently. Twitter recognized the popularity of this user-initiated feature and officially incorporated the Retweet button into its platform.
Its not a silver bullet…
There are things to remember when we try to apply this concept, such as:
Risk management: Some defects that are found may not be suitable to convert to a feature, and there is a possibility that converting a defect into a feature may affect product stability and security. There should be a balance when choosing which defects to be converted to features and a risk assessment.
Overall quality: While defects are considered for a bigger impact on the product, the team should still consider the overall quality of the product. The new features still should adhere to the quality standards, and the defects should be fixed that may compromise the product quality while they may qualify for a bigger purpose.
Time and money allocation: Converting defects to a feature still requires time and budget allocation. It is still required to consider these converted features to be assessed as a new project idea, design, and evaluate the impact from both development and consumer point of view. The process you follow from idea to implementation to production still should be followed.
Useful user feedback?: Not all user feedback is helpful and supports the product improvement. There should be a process of filtering out the feedback that is helpful and goes with the business vision, mission, and its ethos.
We can yield multiple benefits for both the development team and the users by looking at defects as opportunities. However, it should be done in a balanced way where the product’s overall quality is not compromised.
What are your thoughts?
My world of testing and thoughts 