Cadences and Visibility
Purpose
Few ceremonies, each with a clear purpose. This document defines the team's recurring meetings and the communication channels that give the company visibility into what Product ships and why.
Team Cadences
| Frequency | Ceremony | Duration | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily | Squad Standup | 15 min | Squad members |
| Monday | Weekly Product Sync | 45 min | CPO + PMs |
| Ad-hoc | Spec Review | Per Project | PM + CPO + QA |
| Ad-hoc | Project Kickoff | Per Project | PM + Dev Lead + QA |
| At close | Project Demo | 20 min | Project team + stakeholders |
| At close | Retro | 30 min (optional) | Project team |
| Monthly | Monthly Product Review | 45 min | Whole company |
| Quarterly | QBR / Roadmap Planning | Half day | Product + leadership |
Squad Standup (Daily)
Walk the board from right to left. Each person states: what moved, what is blocked, what is next. No updates on work not on the board.
Weekly Product Sync (Monday)
CPO and PMs review:
- Active Initiatives and their Project portfolio.
- Top of the Prioritized queue for the week.
- Expedite usage from the previous week.
- Projects approaching Spec Review or QA pass.
Spec Review (Ad-hoc)
Triggered when a Project is ready to exit Refining. The CPO validates spec completeness against the Product Principles and the Quality Bar. Outcome: approved or returned to Shaping.
Project Kickoff (Ad-hoc)
Triggered when a Project enters Prioritized. The PM hands the spec to the Dev Lead. The Dev Lead confirms Issue breakdown and identifies technical risks. QA confirms environments and data are ready.
Project Demo and Retro (At close)
After the Project reaches Resolved and the 72-hour monitoring window closes, the PM runs a short demo for stakeholders. A retro is optional unless the appetite was exceeded or the QA pass criterion rejected the Project more than once.
Monthly Product Review
45-minute session, open to the company. The CPO presents:
- What shipped (Projects moved to Resolved in the month).
- What is in flight (Projects in Prioritized, In Progress, In Review).
- What is next (Projects in Shaping and Refining for the coming month).
- Metrics against active Initiatives.
- Expedite log audit.
QBR / Roadmap Planning (Quarterly)
Half-day session. Initiatives are refreshed. Verticals are re-confirmed. Projects that no longer fit an active Initiative are parked. RICE scores are recomputed against the new Initiative set.
Company Visibility Channels
Project Updates (Weekly, Fridays)
Every active Project publishes a weekly update in Linear. Format:
- State: current Kanban column.
- This week: what moved.
- Next week: what is planned.
- Risks or blockers: if any.
Linear broadcasts updates to #product-updates. The update is the PM's responsibility.
Release Shout-outs (Per deploy)
When a Project moves to Resolved and the deploy lands, the PM publishes a Shout-out in #releases:
- What shipped (one sentence).
- Who it impacts (user segment, tenant scope).
- Links to the Project and to the relevant metrics dashboard.
The Shout-out is customer-facing in tone even though the audience is internal, so it doubles as raw material for changelog entries and external communication.
Monthly Product Review Recap
After each Monthly Product Review, a written recap is posted in #product-updates with the slide deck or document attached. This serves the audience that could not attend live.
Ceremonies We Removed
To keep the cadence list short, these ceremonies were explicitly removed:
- Standalone grooming meetings (Shaping and Refining replace them).
- Mid-sprint check-ins (the Standup and Weekly Sync cover the need).
- Per-Project kickoff meetings larger than Dev Lead + PM + QA.