How to deprecate a feature the right way - William Bishop - NDC London 2023

A good deprecation plan involves a lot of forward thinking and an awareness of how developers or end users are currently leveraging your capabilities, and how a given feature deprecation will affect them. The hard-earned trust that you’ve built and maintained with these individuals is at risk with any type of deprecation. A successful feature deprecation is a multi-faceted initiative with input from customer success, product, engineering, and others. Knowing which voices to have in the room, understanding the appropriate communication timelines, and ensuring that you’ve secured ongoing support from your product and engineering teams is key to a smooth deprecation—and ultimately— retirement of a feature. Join us as we dive into the nuances of this process and how to avoid the common pitfalls that come from lacking a strategic, thoughtful approach to deprecation and retirement of a feature. Outline: - What does a bad deprecation look like?: Unclear or misleading expectations, Ambiguous timelines - Deprecation vs retirement: “This feature is no longer recommended” vs “This feature no longer functions” - Planning and strategy: Working backwards, Understanding feature gaps - Working cross functionally to get input and buy-in - What success looks like: Concrete examples and discussion Key Takeaways: - Deprecation of features or products doesn’t have to be painful - Deprecation is the first step towards retirement - A good plan requires a multi-faceted strategy across departments - A successful deprecation leads to an on-time retirement Check out our new channel: NDC Clips: @ndcclips Check out more of our featured speakers and talks at https://ndcconferences.com/ https://ndclondon.com/