For every clever saying, there's an opposite, equally profound sounding quote. Wisdom is knowing which piece of sage advice to take in which circumstance/context.
You can read all the blogs and books, but unless you've deeply internalized the advice through hands-on experience it can be difficult to know what to apply to what situation.
Should you "do the unscalable thing first" or "scale at all costs"? Should you "focus on growth" or does "revenue cure all ills"? Should you "undercut the competition thanks to software efficiencies" or "charge a premium"?
These decisions depend on many variables and need to form part of a cohesive strategy.
This is one of the reasons why good advisors are priceless.
Be careful, though, Many "advisors" are career advisors. All they do is talk and teach. Find people who've been in the trenches building real things at real scale. They should help you know which piece of sage advice to apply at any given time and as part of a holistic business and product strategy.
Product & Startup Builder
Half the battle is classifying and naming things well
A Product Manager’s secret weapon
As a product manager, your PRD is your source of power. You need to train the other stakeholders that if it’s not in the PRD it’s not happening.
Emotional design
The most important emotions to create with your app are friendship, excitement/competitiveness (dopamine) and nostalgia. They fulfill deep human needs and drive habit forming behavior.
Responsibilities of a Group Product Manager/VP/CPO
Articulate the vision for the overall product strategy
Determine the high-level KPIs/Goals for the org/business
Collaborate with all fellow VPs/Execs (eng, design, ceo, impact etc) to determine the business priorities
Review the roadmaps from their PMs and push for additional clarity or ambition
Review PM KPIs/Goals and push for additional clarity and ambition
Hold PMs accountable for their results against the KPIs/Goals
Act as a point of escalation and conflict resolution when their PMs are not getting what they need from other functions
Rinse and repeat
Responsibilities of a Product Manager
Articulate the problem
Understand the customer (through research etc)
Determine the KPIs/Goals for the product/problem area
Collaborate with all stakeholders (execs, eng, design, customers, partners, product marketing etc) to determine the priorities
Articulate a compelling vision and drive alignment across all stakeholders towards that vision
Develop and evangelize a roadmap to all key stakeholders
Drive the design and feature specs for each iteration
Work with the craftspeople (designers, engineers, data scientists etc) to turn concept into reality through a regular cadence of checkins, reviews, and other project management techniques
Work with Product Marketing/Sales/BizDev to announce and drive adoption
Measure the results against the KPIs/Goals
Rinse and repeat
See responsibilities of a Group Product Manager/VP of Product/CPO Here
What does it take to have a successful first meeting with an Investor?
Here are some thoughts...
Earning investment from an Investor is a lot like dating and/or forming any kind of relationship. Therefore...
Ideally, you're meeting an investor for the first time BEFORE you are raising capital.
Do some research into what they care about - both personally and professionally. But don't be a stalker.
Get a warm intro through their network.
Get them excited about your company through a combination of voice and vision. Show your passion and explain why this is a big idea with big potential to make the world a better place.
It's likely that you don't have much built yet - so they will essentially be investing in YOU, not your idea or company. You need to convey a sense of personal credibility and conviction while still demonstrating that you are coachable and collaborative. This means you should be able to...
a) Be clear and straightforward about what you know, your hypothesis and what you're still yet to figure out. It's ok that you haven’t figured certain things out yet - but its important to know and admit it.b) Avoid absolutist language and scarcity thinking
c) Both eagerly hear and digest ideas/criticism while also defending key decisions or beliefs you have - all without being defensive.
d) Earnestly ask for and capture feedback and advice. In particular, ask what the investor would need to get conviction about your company when you come back while raising a round
e) Compensate for any weakness in your background or skillset by having pulled together a great advisory and operations team, a strong pitch deck with a clear narrative, and a beautiful product. Or better: Lots of traction!
Set good expectations about what you're going to do next with the company - including responding to or acting on their advice and requirements to invest - and be prepared to come back having delivered on those things (or have good information about why those things were no longer relevant).
Focus on finding a fit instead of convincing them of something. After all - you have to live with them as a partner in your business. You need to like each other!
Relax
If you’re in a big company, it might be better to just start over
Building an innovation culture inside a medium to large, legacy business is hard work across multiple dimensions. Sometimes the challenge can actually be insurmountable with too many intractable forces working against change.
In some cases, it can be better to spin out a separate company with a new culture, mission and team composition. In these cases the legacy business provides the “seed” capital and takes a meaningful ownership stake.
The new company(s) should be free to aggressively pursue an innovation agenda - even if that means cannibalizing or even disrupting the legacy business.
This has many, many advantages (and, of course, some disadvantages). Amongst the advantages is that it allows outside investors to come in (reducing risk) and the development of an ESOP (employee share option pool). Both of these factors increase the chances of attracting top talent from Silicon Valley style companies who tend to be looking for high growth equity opportunities.
A related area to explore is setting up a strategic venture fund to invest in existing companies innovating in the areas you believe in. But that’s for another post.
So if you’re inside a large company fighting to drive disruption and new thinking, consider getting buy-in for a clean new entity with a different kind of structure, mission and people.
Platforms present unique challenges for Product Managers
For Product Managers, Platform Products are extra complicated to lead because there are more internal and external stakeholders to align and collaborate with.
Internally, the critical functions of your product development team expands from just designers, engineers, data scientists, and product marketing to also include Business Development and Partner Engineering.
Externally, you're no longer just creating interaction surfaces for your end-users - you must also create a user experience for your implementing partner; one that guides them, engages them and helps them be successful. Further, your end-user experience is heavily influenced (if not outright controlled) by the implementing partner.
As a result driving alignment, getting predictable timelines, measuring outcomes and iterating are all exponentially more complicated.
You have to be very, very good at communication, narratives, sync meetings, templates, guides, reviews and other alignment tricks to try to manage through the complexity.
In short; you have to be the very best Product Manager you can be.
It's often deeply underestimated just how complicated building a great platform is and how much unique pressure a Product Manager in that position is.
How do you EARN a Technical Co-founder?
You may have heard the saying "You don't find a Technical Co-founder, you earn them"
But what does that mean exactly?
It means you think of them like you would an investor. So you should...
Build your startup as far as you can without them. Pitch decks, designs, partners, investors, advisors, prototypes using freelancers, in-market product using yet more freelancers etc. Make your business worth investing in.
Have a process. Execute it well. That includes...
a) Find the senior engineers at the companies you admire who seem to have a background in the kind of work you're doing
b) Reach out to them (LinkedIn is great for this) with a message that is highly tailored and extremely leaned in (remember that they are being bombarded by recruiters all day long - make sure to point out you're the CEO). Don't be coy, don't be dry. Explain why you think they might change the trajectory of your company and why its a MASSIVE opportunity for them. Ask for just 15 minutes of their time to explain the rest on a call
c) Offer them a meaningful piece of the business with a 4-year vesting schedule and a 1-year cliff.
Tips for prioritizing your backlog
Tips for prioritizing a backlog
Annotate each item with what problem it solves (e.g. usability problem, new user acquisition, performance issues, content/Inventory issue etc)
Group them by theme
Ask yourself "What is the number 1 reason more people are not being more successful with my product this week"
Do the items that address that reason first, second, third
In writing: Being clear is more important than being “smart”
Being clear and well understood is more important than appearing clever by using flowery, sophisticated language.
Don’t over-communicate in your presentation
When presenting your product/business to customers or investors for the first time, It’s not necessary to explain every technical detail. Listing three strong bullets is better than 10 technically accurate but extremely dense bits of information.
The rest can go in the appendix in case somebody asks.
The all-important details can be part of a second, “deep dive” meeting.
Sovereignty by interest and intent
For all of history, we have been grouped and defined our sovereignty by where we are physically located in the world. In the last decade, in the online world, we are increasingly grouped and define our sovereignty by interest and intent.
Be careful about your team’s definition of “Done”
It’s a common mistake to get 80% done and never fully deliver value to the market.
“Done” means tested, stable, shipped into production, listed on the website, documented, promoted on the blog, shared via mailing lists etc
[Side note: The only thing better than “Done” is “Successful”. The only definition of success that matters is: adopted by a large and growing number of active customers. Media, pilots, academic studies, government grants etc don’t count]
This doesn’t just apply to software. This also applies to partnerships, operations etc etc.
To achieve this you need to align expectations across teams and partners about the definition of “done” and make sure you finish the things you start before chasing the next shiny object. Said another way - FOCUS.
To do otherwise is one of the biggest possible mistakes in business - spending resources and not achieving any return on that investment.
My definition of luck
My standard answer to "How did you achieve that?" is "Luck".
Luck = Preparation + Opportunity + Execution.
Startups help us adapt to a changing world
Startups are simply the best vehicles we’ve come up with to deal with a rapidly changing world by applying first principles thinking, creativity and the scientific method to adapt to, and fix what’s broken.
Data needs UX
Data without value added UX is simply stored potential energy. It’s not enough. L
Pay attention to the details
The details matter. Getting them right can be the difference between conveying a subconscious sense of credibility - or not. Pay attention to pixels, colors, margins, voice and all the things that "don't matter"
Vision requires kindred spirits
Vision is having a prescient, almost fully formed sense of something you want to see in the world and then pulling the future into the present. Manifesting thoughts and hopes about a better way of doing things into reality.
Success requires almost every kind of skill imaginable. People skills, creativity, engineering, project management, invention, business acumen and so much more. Most of all it requires optimism and abundance thinking.
This kind of force of will can scare those who don't understand how or why this is possible.
In pursuing this journey, finding kindred spirits who's skills and insights can compliment your own is not only delightful, it's essential.