At a Glance: Cox Communications’ Hybrid-Agile Transformation
For telecommunications giants, innovation is often slowed by legacy infrastructure and complex hardware dependencies. Cox Communications partnered with Product School for a comprehensive training initiative to bridge this gap.
The Challenge: Unifying a diverse workforce of 120+ professionals who lacked a shared product vocabulary and struggled to balance agile software goals with rigid hardware constraints.
The Solution: A custom 10-cohort training roadmap that standardized PRDs and introduced a "Hybrid-Agile" model, ensuring accessibility was a core requirement, not an afterthought.
The Result: The training achieved a 4.6/5 satisfaction score and established a unified product culture. Graduates demonstrated their new strategic skills by presenting their Cox Case solutions directly to senior leadership, proving clear ROI.
“Product School has been a tremendous partner with us. The continued workshops that they facilitate for us help to fortify our PMs by sharpening their skill sets and exposing them to new ideas and tools.”
Trae Webb — Sr. Learning Advisor, Cox
The Challenge: Overcoming the "Tower of Babel" Effect
Cox Communications needed to upskill over 120 professionals ranging from absolute beginners to seasoned veterans. Despite their tenure, the lack of formal product training created three critical operational hurdles:
The "Tower of Babel" Effect: Without a shared vocabulary, "Product" meant different things to different departments, creating silos that stalled cross-functional collaboration.
The Hardware-Software Divide: Unlike pure software startups, Cox required a nuanced approach. They needed to increase agility without disrupting the necessary waterfall requirements for physical infrastructure.
The Accessibility Mandate: Building inclusive products was a non-negotiable core value, yet it lacked a standardized implementation process within the product lifecycle.
The Solution: A "Hybrid-Agile" Roadmap for Telecom
Product School designed a high-impact, virtual training roadmap led by industry veteran Mariano Capezzani. The curriculum was specifically engineered to bridge the gap between legacy realities and digital aspirations:
Standardizing the Language: The first step was linguistic alignment. We defined product terminology clearly, ensuring junior PMs and senior engineers used the same language to accelerate decision-making.
Bridging Waterfall & Agile: The training standardized Product Requirements Documents (PRDs), teaching teams to apply agile rituals to software while maintaining the rigorous planning required for hardware deployment.
Real-World Application (The Cox Case): Theory without practice fails. The program culminated in a custom "Cox Case" Capstone, where participants solved actual internal business problems to ensure immediate relevance.
The Impact: A New Standard for Product Leadership
The engagement delivered immediate cultural shifts across all 10 cohorts, achieving an average satisfaction score of 4.6/5.
Key Outcomes:
Unified Product Culture: 120+ graduates now operate on a level playing field with a shared understanding of the Product Lifecycle.
Leadership Visibility: Graduates presented their Capstone solutions directly to senior leadership, demonstrating clear ROI and strategic thinking.
Operational Agility: By weaving accessibility standards directly into new PRD templates, inclusivity became a default step in the development process rather than an afterthought.
“I was impressed by the constant relevance and appropriateness of content that was shared ... 10/10 would recommend and I am taking away valuable lessons I will begin applying on my journey as a PM."
Product Manager, Cox
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