All Facebook developers are able to push to production. And if it blows up, so what? It’s still in keeping with the company’s original ethos to move fast and break things. They even broke their Android app on purpose just to test their users’ loyalty.

Unfortunately, the rest of us don’t have the luxury of Facebook’s world-devouring scale. Even with the most well-oiled continuous deployment loop, we’ve got to test stuff. No one wants to take a call from their Managing Director when the system’s tanked during a major client demo thanks to an untried update that just went out.

From being in the trenches when a £500m corporate software implementation imploded on release day (despite five years worth of planning) to watching a quick-and-dirty MVP become a NVP because a button didn’t work, I’ve learned a lot about testing in my career. And sometimes I still get it wrong.

Even Sage, a FTSE 100 company and one of the most recognized software brands in the UK, hold “Prayer Meetings” before they push out a major update.

As a product manager, you need to be acutely aware of Murphy’s Law. Whatever can go wrong will go wrong; it’s how you deal with it that matters.

Here are my Ten Commandments for Software Testing:

1. EVERYONE owns quality
2. Test your own code
3. Evidence your test results
4. QA isn’t there to mop up sloppy development
5. Nothing goes out untested
6. Always verify new features and fixes in production
7. Try and break stuff
8. If it’s broken, FIX IT
9. User feedback matters; they’re your ultimate testers
10. Bugs happen; it’s how you handle them that counts

#essays #prodmgmt

But how do you make your tech guys sit up and take notice of bugs they see as minor annoyances? When the workaround is “just press F5” or “log out and log back in”, how do you convince them you need an urgent fix?

One surefire way to get your developers to fix and release bugs at lightspeed is to make them work on your helpdesk. Nothing gets a query resolved like an irate customer berating your Lead Developer.

In many companies, development exists in its own bubble where “works on my machine” is the ultimate stamp of approval. In that sort of world, though, there are always going to be issues.

Your customers don’t think like developers. Why should they? The secret is to try and get your developers to think like your customers; by talking to them and understanding their issues and annoyances.

Here’s how to do it, without causing a mutiny:

Set up focus groups where your developers and customers can meet

Your customers are your biggest source of ideas for new products, features and improvements. If you don’t talk to them, then you’re just making assumptions about what they want. But why leave your developers out the loop?

If you’re relying on your Product Manager and UX team to do all the requirements gathering, then how can your development team put what they’re building into context?

The best way for developers to find out what can make their product better is to spend time with its users and learn about their issues firsthand. Involve your development team at the very start of the product development process; they’ll come up with ways to meet your customers’ challenges that you’ll never think of otherwise.

Create a culture of “all company support” (which includes your development team)

If the responsibility for managing customer satisfaction only sits with your support team, then you’re absolving the rest of your company from taking accountability for the quality of your products. Fostering a company-wide culture of excellent service means everyone takes an interest in keeping your customers happy. And that includes your developers.

Get everyone in your company to spend some time handling support queries; it’s the quickest way to get an understanding of how your customers actually use (and feel about) your product. It’ll open your team’s eyes to issues that seem trivial when you’re looking at them in the office, but have a huge impact on your users’ experience.

And nothing encourages a developer to fix a bug quicker than a load of irate customers hassling them about it.

Make resolving customer queries part of your developers’ KPIs

Without targets for resolution, your bug backlog will grow and grow. Who wants to fix a mundane issue with a simple workaround when they can dive into a in-depth science project?

By nature, most developers are inquisitive types who like nothing more than solving a (brand new, complex) problem. Customer queries are just a distraction from the real work.

To stop bug tickets sitting in the backlog indefinitely, make them part of your development team’s KPIs. Incentivise your developers to get them resolved and find the time for the projects they really want to work on.

Implement a support process which mean your developers don’t need to speak to anyone

Many developers, by their nature, are introverts; try and get them to pick up the phone to customers and you’ll have a potential mutiny on your hands. That doesn’t mean you should keep them at arms length, though. There are plenty of tools out there to bring your development team into the support process and engage with customers.

With services like Intercom and Zendesk, developers can talk to customers from the comfort of their own keyboard. We’ve even implemented a dedicated Slack channel for one of our larger clients to easily facilitate the conversation with frontline staff using our software and the back-end developers who built it. It’s removed the “Chinese whispers” approach where the support team would need to relay a problem to development.

Foster a culture of collaboration between your frontline support team and your developers

Your support team wants to help your customers, your developers want to develop. In many companies, the two hardly ever cross paths. If you want your products to really address your customers’ issues, though, you’ve got to bring your customer-facing staff and your back-end team together.

The easiest way to do that is to create a product team accountable for delivering a world class end-to-end customer journey. This includes product management, UX, design, development, marketing, sales and technical support.

Delivering awesome products that leave a long-lasting impression is the responsibility of everyone in your business, from the CEO down. By insisting your developers become part of that journey and interact with the people who use their code, you’ve got a much better chance of building a loyal customer base who’ll stick with you.

#essays #prodmgmt

The problem with traditional product roadmaps is they’re obsolete as soon as they’re written. Agile technology projects are, by their nature, extremely fluid; old-fashioned project management techniques just won’t work.

Why waste hours building complicated Gantt charts if you’re just going to have to rip them up every time your requirements change?

The trick is to bring that Agile mindset to bear during your planning process as well.

Dates Are A Waste of Time

No new product is delivered on time. Ever. If anyone tells you otherwise they’re a liar.

How can you possibly forecast every roadblock, hiccup and product scope change ahead of time and predict, with accuracy, when your product will be ready to go in front of customers?

Deadline dates are always missed, so do yourself a favour; don’t set them.

That doesn’t mean giving your development team free rein to finish whenever they’re ready, though. You’re not painting The Sistine Chapel or building St Paul’s Cathedral. No product means no income for your business, after all.

Instead of setting arbitrary deadline dates that keep on moving, agree a time frame for delivery instead. Flex scope, not time, and make sure you’re getting new product features and improvements in front of people as quickly as possible.

Noah Weiss, Head of Search, Learning & Intelligence at Slack, advocates a Now, Next, Later approach for prioritising deliverables. I’ve tweaked it a bit to meet the needs of my business and now work to the following:

• Current: to be delivered within the next four to six weeks
• Near term: to be delivered in the next three to six months
• Future: to be delivered more than six months over the horizon

This approach makes it really easy for your team to focus on their immediate priorities (Current), what’s coming up in the pipeline (Near term) and their longer term goals (Future).

Link Your Deliverables to Business Strategy

The items on your roadmap need to have purpose; they’ve got to carry you closer to your vision, mission and goals. There’s no room for boring, platform-specific tags here.

I use ProdPad for my roadmaps (I used to use Trello, but ProdPad is awesome) and label my items with one of the following objectives:

• Growth: New products and features aimed at growing our business and/or pivoting into new markets
• Retention: New products and features aimed at increasing the retention of our existing customer base
• Engagement: Improvements to existing features/functionality to increase engagement
• Usability: UX/UI improvements to existing products and features to make them more usable for our customers
• Integrations: Integrations with some of the 3rd party systems our customers use
• Support: Improvements to the way we’re able to deliver support and make that part of our offering more efficient
• Resilience: Architecture and infrastructure improvements aimed at improving the reliability of our existing products and systems
• Other: Anything we’re working on that doesn’t fit into one of the other buckets but still needs to be tracked on our roadmap

It means I can see, at a glance, what the areas of focus are for Product and how my team is contributing to the business. If my roadmap is full of green “Growth” cards for example, then it’s all about building the customer base.

Stick to Themes, Not Tasks or Stories

Stories are for Product Requirement Documents, not roadmaps. Leave the “as a user, I can” stuff for the next layer down.

Your roadmap should be about articulating value.

You already know the strategic impact of what you’re working on; the next step is to think about the value that each item on your roadmap brings to your business and, most importantly, your customer.

Here’s a recent example from our roadmap:

Implement Automated Campaigns (Usability)

• Automate the Email Campaign process and make it really easy for schools to share their projects and ask for donations, volunteers and general support.

Make sense? It’s clear where the value is straight away; implementing automated campaigns will make sharing really easy. Easier than it is at the moment, anyway.

Don’t go overboard with detail here. All you need to cover is the idea and the value it’s adding. You can flesh out the rest with your team.

Keep It Simple, Stupid

Technical jargon has no place in your Roadmap. It should be so straightforward that a brand new user of your software can understand what you’re trying to achieve.

ProdPad and Slack (to name two) have clear, concise public-facing roadmaps so their customers know what they’re up to:

• ProdPad Product Roadmap
• Slack Platform Roadmap for Developers

You don’t need to go that far, but it’s worth writing your Roadmap as if you are.

Keep It Up-to-Date

Your product roadmap should be a living, breathing document that you use to steer your team in the right direction. It should be the focus of your weekly meetings and you should review it, in depth, at least once a month.

As a product manager, I’d advocate updating your Roadmap every day with notes / updates on anything that’s moved.

A well thought-out product roadmap will help guide you and your team to their destination, but you’ve got to use it. Don’t just create it and think that’s the job done.

#prodmgmt #essays

Quoting military strategists in business has become cliched, but it’s still relevant; from carrying round copies of Sun Tsu’s The Art Of War in their briefcases, to team-building in the woods with paintball guns, plenty of business leaders have taken the actions of history’s greatest commanders to heart.

But what are the most powerful pieces of advice you can take on board?

Here are seven lessons that stretch back more than two thousand years and are as relevant in the office today as they were on the battlefields of Europe, Asia and beyond.

Lead from the Front

Follow Alexander the Great’s example and become a figurehead for success

He wasn’t called Great for nothing. By the time he died at 32, legendary Macedonian commander Alexander had conquered most of the known world; creating an empire that stretched for 10,000 miles and encompassed the Mediterranean, most of Europe and even reached the borders of India.

An intelligent and inspirational leader, Alexander forged unwavering loyalty in his troops. He rode and walked among them, drank the same amount of water his soldiers had, and deeply understood their physical and emotional state before a battle. It’s that understanding, coupled with his ruthlessness, that led him to amass one of the largest empires the world has ever seen.

If you want your team to follow your vision, then you’ve got to get on the frontline with them. When was the last time you handled a complaint from an irate customer, spent time in your call centre or sat alongside your team for a day? Being a leader doesn’t mean being aloof and unapproachable; it means being a genuine figurehead who inspires loyalty in those you lead.

Pursue your Aims with Audacity and Strength of Will

Adopt Clausewitz’ still-relevant 19th century strategy to overcome your obstacles

Inspired by his experiences in the Napoleonic Wars, Prussian scholar-general Carl von Clausewitz brought the study of warfare to an intellectual level that has dominated the discipline for more than 150 years. From the American Civil War to Vietnam, his theories and analysis have continued to remain relevant despite the ever-changing technology of combat.

Published after his death from cholera in 1831, Von Clausewitz’ book, On War, is arguably the single most influential military text in human history. Laying out the principles that have defined Western doctrine ever since, it’s an earth-shattering tome that fuses hardcore military tactics with in-depth political strategy to set out the rules for winning in battle.

But how can von Clausewitz help you succeed in the office? One of his most powerful quotes, “If the leader is filled with high ambition and if he pursues his aims with audacity and strength of will, he will reach them in spite of all obstacles”, sounds like it could have been written with today’s entrepreneurs in mind. The road to success in business is strewn with obstacles. If you want to be successful, you’ve got to have the mental strength to overcome them.

Empower your Employees

Take a leaf out of the Wehrmacht’s blitzkrieg book and let your team make their own decisions

Before Adolf Hitler blunted its attacking prowess through his own megalomania, Nazi Germany’s Wehrmacht was one of the most impressive military organisations in history. Embracing the power of the tank, Germany’s army stormed through France in 1940, bringing the nation to its knees in a matter of weeks; something it had been unable to achieve through the four bitter years of fighting of the First World War.

The reasons behind the Wehrmacht’s early successes were the innovative tactics of its leaders, particularly the visionary theorist Colonel Heinz Guderian. Understanding that an inefficient chain-of-command would undermine his lightning-fast “reconnaissance in force”, Guderian empowered his officers to make their own battlefield decisions without the need to refer to their superiors, slicing the Allies in pieces before they had a chance to react.

It’s an approach that can work just as well in the office. Don’t create bottlenecks where your team can’t move forward without your say-so. Set clear goals and objectives and let them find their own way there.

Teach Your Team How to React Quickly

The OODA loop isn’t just a recipe for victory in air-to-air combat

Rarely discussed outside military circles until recently, Colonel John Boyd was arguably the most influential strategist to emerge since Sun Tzu. Obsessed with finding the truth about conflict, his philosophical approach to the analysis of military strategy has influenced everyone from the US Marines to police SWAT teams, the fire service and a host of other organisations.

A combat fighter pilot during the Korean War, Boyd was desperate to understand why the American F-86 Sabre had a kill ratio of 10 to one over the superior Russian MiG. The result of his study was the OODA loop, a near-perfect recipe for victory in air-to-air combat; it’s a tactic that can be applied to any situation where an upper hand is needed.

In the workplace, the four tenets of Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act are pivotal. Teach your team to follow Boyd’s approach and their chances of succeeding are vastly amplified. From combating threats from competitors, to managing tricky customer support calls, the OODA loop is an extraordinarily powerful approach that nearly always pays off.

Consider all Possible Options

Napoleon wouldn’t go into battle until he’d considered all the risks; why should you?

Napoleon Bonaparte was, undeniably, the finest operational strategist of his generation. On the battlefield, though, it was a different story. For every major success, there was a disaster. From his triumph of Jena-Auestadt to his abject failure to subjugate Russia, his military career was one of bloodletting of near-mythic proportions.

But for all his failings in battle, Napoleon was an extraordinary military campaigner. A deep thinker, he would ponder all the possible outcomes of his endeavours, good and bad, before choosing to engage the enemy. He exaggerated the calamities in his own mind first, so he was absolutely prepared for whatever came to pass.

It’s an approach that any business leader can apply. Before kickstarting anything new, spend time with your team thinking about everything that could go wrong; it’ll stand you in good stead for whatever does.

Remember, Planning is Everything

What you can learn about planning from Dwight D. Eisenhower, the mastermind behind D-Day

Anyone with a passing interest in time management will be familiar with Stephen Covey’s Time Management Matrix. What many don’t know, though, is it wasn’t Covey’s matrix at all. Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during World War 2, General Dwight D. Eisenhower created the model to help him focus on his most important tasks.

A masterful military planner, Eisenhower never shied away from making important decisions. By understanding and evaluating where he needed to spend his time, Eisenhower was able to make real progress on his goals, instilling confidence in his subordinates even when it looked like events were conspiring against him.

Eisenhower’s oft-quoted statement that “what is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important” powered him from the Allied advance through Europe to the presidency of the United States; it can certainly help drive you to the top in business.

Develop Your Character

Sun Tzu was right; understanding, empathy and self-awareness are critical to your success as a leader

Sun Tzu’s seminal The Art of War has been transforming the way military leaders think ever since it was translated into French in the 18th Century. It’s more than just a book about warfare, though; it became essential reading for everyone as soon as the words “business” and “strategy” were flung together in the 1960s.

At the heart of Sun Tzu’s philosophy is one of his greatest pieces of advice; a leader leads by example, not by force. Self-awareness, empathy and understanding are essential elements of every business leader’s strategy. As Sun Tzu elaborated,”treat your men as you would your beloved sons and they will follow you into the deepest valley.”

There’s a reason that The Art of War has become such an important work. It’s advice is timeless and is just as powerful in the modern office cubicle as it was on the battlefields of ancient China. Lead by action, not words, understand what motivates your troops and do your best to deliver it.

#leadership #essays

But if you lead a team of developers, how can you make sure you’re leveraging their output without having to micromanage story points, bug fixes and lines of code?

As a product manager, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to motivate my team and help increase the value of the people I’m responsible for.

One word I keep coming back to is belief.

For a team to feel motivated, it needs to believe in what it’s doing. That goes for every team in your organisation, not just engineering or product development.

Without belief, you run the risk of building a feature factory where developers clock in and crank through code for seven hours without really thinking about it.

If you’re lucky, you’ll get the velocity you need. But you’ll never build a product that can change the world.

So how do you get your developers to believe in what they’re doing? By involving them right from the start when you’re figuring out the vision and strategy for your product.

If your developers understand why you’re building a product and they understand how it’s being delivered, they’ll be more likely to take ownership of what they need to do to make it happen.

Simon Sinek’s TED Talk on How Great Leaders Inspire Action has received more than 31 million views. And for good reason. The Golden Circle is the perfect model for getting buy-in for your vision, not just from your external customers but also from the people inside your organisation.

“People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”

And that includes your developers. They won’t always buy into the user stories you’ve just assigned to them in Jira, but they will buy into the differences the features they’re building are going to make for your product’s users.

Make sure everyone on your team understands the vision of your product. And don’t wait until you’ve got a fully-formed strategy and roadmap before you ask your developers to join the discussion.

Identify your product’s jobs to be done as early as you can and get your team to come up with the answers.

If your developers are using their own creativity to solve your users’ problems, then it’s almost guaranteed they’ll be motivated when it comes to delivering their solution.

Use frameworks like Objectives & Key Results to drive organisational growth and performance and try to maintain the right balance between shipping product and measuring results.

To refer back to Andy Grove, training and motivation are the only real ways to leverage the performance of a team.

If you want to motivate effectively, don’t tell your team members what to do; show them where you need to go and give them room to work out how to get there. You’ll be amazed by the results.

#prodmgmt #essays

But that doesn’t mean you should avoid metrics altogether. If you want to ensure your team is executing with maximum effectiveness, then you’ve got to keep track of how it’s performing week-on-week.

What you track on your Product Team’s KPI Dashboard (you’ve got a KPI Dashboard, right?) depends on what your product (and your business) is trying to achieve. There are a few key numbers, though, which can help you measure the success of any product you’re managing.

A great place to start is Dave McClure’s Pirate Metrics, which presents a framework of categories which can help you determine where you need to focus or tweak your efforts.

The categories McClure suggests tracking are Awareness, Acquisition, Activation, Revenue, Retention and Referral (or AAARRR for short, get it?).

Not all of these items are relevant for every Product Team, though. To keep it lean, start with the following three categories and figure out if there’s anything else you need to add afterwards.

Acquisition

Measuring acquisition isn’t just for your Sales Team. It’s the first KPI that helps prove if your product is successful. If your acquisition numbers are low compared to a) what you’ve forecast and/or b) what you need for your product (and business) to turn a profit, ask yourself; “are we building the right thing?”

If your product isn’t addressing the right customer need, then it’s unlikely that you’re going to be able to attract new users. Dig deep into your target market’s jobs to be done and make sure you’re creating a product that really delivers.

KPIs to track:

• Number of New Users (Daily, Weekly, Monthly)
• New Users as a % of your Total User Base
• % User Base Growth (Daily, Weekly, Monthly)

Engagement

You might be acquiring plenty of new users for your product, but how do you know you’re meeting their expectations? The clearest indicator that your product is helping its users get their jobs done is engagement.

How well are you engaging your customers once you’ve acquired them? If you’ve got loads of sign-ups, but no one logging into your system afterwards, then it’s very likely that your product isn’t meeting expectations. It’s time to start speaking to your customers and make sure your product is helping them get those jobs done in the most effective way possible.

KPIs to track:

• Number of Active Users (this could be daily, weekly or monthly Active Users depending on the regularity of use you’re expecting)
• Active Users as a % of your Total User Base
• Net Promoter Score (the “one metric to rule them all” which will give you a real insight into how your customers feel about your product)

Retention

If you’re acquiring and engaging customers, but not retaining them, then you’re product isn’t going to last. The question to answer here is “do people come back to use this product again and again?” If so, then it means you’re delivering value. And if you’re delivering value for your customers, then it’s a safe bet that they’ll be likely to renew their subscription.

If, on the other hand, you’re acquiring and engaging new users but they’re all leaving your product at the point of renewal, then you risk burning through your entire potential customer base.

Speak to your ex-customers and really try to understand why they stopped using your product. Acquiring new customers can cost your business more than five times as much as retaining your existing customers.

If your retention metrics are poor, you need to move the dial in the right direction urgently.

KPIs to track:

• % Customers Who Use Your Product/Feature Again & Again (typically a Cohort Analysis that helps you analyse if usage drops off after an initial honeymoon period)
• Customer Churn Rate (number of customers lost in a time period divided by the number of customers you had at the start of the period)
• Customer Retention Rate (number of retained customers divided by the total number of retained and lost customers in a time period)

The above is just a starting point but, by tracking what’s happening in these three categories, you’ll soon have a real insight into the overall health of your product and where you need to focus your team’s efforts.

#prodmgmt #essays

I’ve also got a Reddit button on my denim jacket…

If you’re not careful, though, Reddit can become a massive time sink. Like most, I’ve wasted hours of my life I’ll never get back scrolling through hilarious (but utterly pointless) subreddits like r/Turtlegifs (and plenty of others I won’t list here).

But, used intentionally, Reddit is one of the most powerful resources available for personal and professional development online. Whatever your job or interests (however leftfield) there’s a subreddit for you.

As a Product Manager, I’m constantly trying to learn new ways to build better products and leverage the output of my team. Through Reddit, I’ve upskilled myself significantly. And all for free. Who needs an expensive university degree or MBA these days?

Here, then, is a list of the 28 subreddits that have helped me become a more effective Product Manager:

1. r/agile

Useful articles and discussion on all things Agile including Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Lean Startup and Kanban. Essential reading for anyone building software products in the 21st Century.

2. r/coding

A pure discussion forum for anyone who wants to talk about programming without being bombarded with technology and political news. It operates a strict programming-only policy, but if you’re interested in understanding what your engineers are getting excited about this is the place to find out.

3. r/Creativity

A place for people to discuss ideas, techniques and design in the creation of art. If you’re struggling to visualise where you’re going with your product a bit of time browsing round here will get the creative juices flowing again. It’s a bit spammy these days, but there’s still the occasional gem to inspire you. Like this.

4. r/dataisbeautiful

As a Product Manager, you’ll regularly find yourself called on to present product statistics and other information in an engaging way to people at all levels of your business. This is the place to find your inspiration.

5. r/dataisugly

The flipside of r/dataisbeautiful. This is where you’ll learn how not to present data about your product to the rest of your company (or risk getting laughed off your podium).

6. r/Design

Great design is an integral part of every great product. If you’re in need of design inspiration (or just want to find some cool stuff to look at or read about) then this sub will keep you busy for hours.

7. r/designthought

This sub is like r/Design, only deeper. Much deeper. If you want to dig your own Marianas Trench of design process and craft, then this is the place to do it. There’s some extraordinarily cool stuff posted here.

8. r/Entrepreneur

If you’re really going to be the CEO of your product then you’ll need to have the entrepreneurial talent of a world-beating startup founder. This sub is a great place to learn from the successes, failures and insights of business owners across the globe.

9. r/Futurology

To be a truly great Product Manager you’ve got to be able to see the future. What’s your market going to look like in five years time and what opportunities will that create for you? This sub is an amazing resource for helping identify the future trends which could have the biggest impact on your product.

10. r/hci

HCI is the heartbeat of the world’s most innovative organisations. From Apple to Amazon, the way we interact with computers (in the broadest sense) dominates the way we engage with products. Learn about why that matters in this sub.

11. r/Innovation

“The trick to having good ideas is not to sit around in glorious isolation and try to think big thoughts. The trick is to get more parts on the table.” ~ Steven Johnson

Get the parts you need from the r/Innovation sub.

12. r/learnprogramming

You don’t have to be a rockstar programmer to be a successful Product Manager (hell, my background is music journalism and project management), but you do need to have a basic understanding of the way software products are put together. Instead of wasting thousands on a Computer Science degree, get the education you need for free here.

13. r/marketing

If you build it they won’t come. You could have just released the most awesome product ever made, but if you’re not marketing it effectively no one is going to care. And don’t think you can just rely on your Sales & Marketing Department. It’s your product; you should at least have an idea about how it should be marketed.

14. r/product_design

Does exactly what it says on the tin. Packed full of cutting edge physical product design news, design processes and design-related resources, this sub is a brilliant resource that can help inspire your physical products.

15. r/productivity

“Being a product manager is like riding a bike except the bike is on fire and you’re on fire and everything is on fire and you’re in hell.” ~ Anon Keep your head out the fire by making sure you’re as productive as possible with this sub.

16. r/ProductManagement

Weirdly for such a tech-savvy profession, this sub is pretty quiet. Probably because everyone’s hanging out on the Product Manager HQ Slack chat. There are still quite a lot of useful posts here, though, that will help you build your Product Management toolkit.

17. r/projectmanagement

Product Management isn’t Project Management; but that doesn’t mean you can ignore it. To be effective as a product leader, your project management skills need to be razor-sharp. The r/projectmanagement sub is dedicated to Project Management in the software development area, so it’s the ideal place to hone them.

18. r/Slack

You are using Slack to run your Product Team, right?

19. r/softwaredevelopment

An awesome resource for software development methodologies, techniques and tools. This sub covers Agile, RUP, Waterfall, Crystal, Extreme Programming, Scrum, Lean, Kanban and more, and complements r/agile nicely.

20. r/startups

A community of all backgrounds, levels of expertise and business experience sharing stories about the failures, the successes and embarrassments along their startup journeys. A place to learn from other people’s mistakes before you make them yourself.

21. r/talesfromtechsupport

Your customer isn’t always right, but they’re always your customer. When you’re having a hard time trying to explain your latest product update to a difficult user, head over to r/talesfromtechsupport and remind yourself that it’s not just you.

22. r/TimeManagement

The sister sub of r/productivity. Packed with advice on how to manage your time more effectively and get everything on your list done.

23. r/usability

Interesting links and discussion on user experience and interface design. A bit more “general” than some of the other UX subs and a great starting point for any Product Manager looking to brush up their usability knowledge.

24. r/userexperience

A fairly active sub covering all aspects of user experience design, from traditional human-computer interaction design to all aspects of a product or service experience. A great place for all your UX questions.

25. r/UserExperienceDesign

Similar in content to r/userexperience, this sub is also worth keeping an eye on for thoughts and resources about User Experience, Information Architecture and Interaction Design.

26. r/UxResearch

An awesome community for sharing and discussing UX research in its broadest sense. Encourages links, articles and discussion relating to both academic and applied research and gives you a deep insight into methods and analysis techniques.

27. r/visualisation

Anything relating to the visualisation of data, from graphs and charts to maps and infographics. Compliments r/dataisbeautiful nicely as a source of inspiration for ways to present your product health metrics and other data to your stakeholders.

28. r/webdev

Want to know what’s new for Web Developers? This sub will keep you up-to-date.

#prodmgmt #essays

Here are some of the most valuable things I learned from my time spent talking about music in tiny dressing rooms:

Conducting open-ended interviews

Whether it’s talking with Adele about the inspiration behind her debut album or chatting with users about their pain points and motivations, interviews are the foundation stones of great journalism and great products.

Writing with clarity

When you’ve got to distill a 2-hour interview into a 300-word article, you’ve got to make the most of every sentence.

The same is true for writing job stories and product specs — you need to be able to turn your customer interviews into concise, usable docs.

Finding the right angle

As a journalist, you’re always asking “what’s the story?”

When you’re developing new products, you’ve got to be able to get to the root of the problem you’re solving and the people you’re solving it for.

Remembering it’s not about you

The best music journalists fade into the shadows while their subjects do the talking.

As a product manager, your job is to lead from the back and let your product (and its customers) take centre stage.

Knowing your market

The quickest way to fail as a freelance journalist is to forget you’re writing for an audience.

As a product manager, if you’re not building for a market that wants your product then you’re going to lose — understanding your market is everything.

Don’t just follow trends, create them

The dream of every music journalist is to be the first to write about an era-defining band, artist or movement.

You can build great products on the back of others, but to be truly innovative you’ve got to lead the Zeitgeist, not ride it.

You can’t pay your mortgage with free CDs and guestlist passes

If you’re creating products — from magazine articles to iOS applications — your ultimate goal is to generate income.

In the end, what you’re doing has to be interesting enough for someone to give you money for it.

#prodmgmt #essays

Here are five skills that distinguish the top product managers from the rest:

Analysis

The top product managers are natural analysts. They can look at a problem and see the solution straight away. They make decisions based on market data, but aren’t afraid to listen to their instincts. They use numbers to help them understand how their products are performing and keep a close eye their KPIs. They know their one metric that matters inside out and do everything they can to maximise it.

Vision

The top product managers have vision. They can take customer feedback, industry trends and other data and transform them into a clear strategy for their product. They can distinguish its market fit, what sets it apart from competitors and which satisfiers and delighters will keep their users coming back for more. They understand their customer personas and can effectively map their product strategy onto their wants and needs.

Communication

The top product managers are effective communicators. They can effortlessly translate their analysis and vision into requirements and feature ideas everyone in the business can understand. They’re just as comfortable talking about product benefits with their head of marketing as they are working through user stories with their lead developer. They keep everyone on the same page with clear communication at all stages of the product delivery lifecycle.

Prioritisation

The top product managers prioritise with skill. They combine their analysis, vision and communication skills to ensure their team is building the right features at the right time and understand what it takes to stay on track. They use roadmaps, product specs, daily standups, and regular planning meetings to ensure everyone in their business knows what must, should and could be built (and when) to satisfy their customers’ needs.

Execution

The top product managers don’t just plan, they do. They’re happy to get their hands dirty and will do everything in their power to make sure their products stay on target. They lead from the front and understand the challenges faced by their developers. They are realistic with their timescales, but they aren’t afraid to push their team to its limits. They understand that the biggest responsibility of any product manager is shipping product and they make sure it happens.

#prodmgmt #essays

Here are three ways my ADHD has helped make me a better product manager:

I’m always thinking about “what’s next”

I’ve spent a lifetime chasing after “the next big thing” because I’m often bored with where I’m at.

In some roles, that’s been a major issue.

In product management, though, it works perfectly.

I spend a lot of my time trying to figure out what I should be doing next and it keeps me totally engaged.

I can’t stand staying still

BAU roles bore me to tears.

I can’t stand the monotony of doing the same thing day in, day out.

As a product manager, though, every day is different.

I can’t wait to get to work each morning to see how I can push things forward for my business and my customers.

I’m unflappable in a crisis

A recent study found the brains of people with ADHD produce more Theta waves than average.

I don’t know what a Theta wave is, but it apparently indicates a deep state of relaxation.

I’ve always had a reputation for being cool, calm and under control — hugely beneficial traits when your latest release is unexpectedly blowing up in your face.

#prodmgmt #essays