Note: This is the narrative article version of a talk I’ve started giving recently at conferences, product meetups and corporate leadership teams. It is a long read, but I believe it’s a critically important topic, and it lays out for...
Sharing what we learn in a startup typically happens naturally because the product team and the company are pretty much the same thing. However, as companies scale, this becomes substantially more difficult, yet it also becomes increasingly important to do....
Have you ever received a text notification from your airline about a flight delay before the ground crew in the waiting area has the information? Have you been unclear on whether to call your bank’s web support or banking support...
You got the go ahead to hire some in-house designers. That’s great news! Up until now you’ve been relying on an external agency for the majority of your design work and this is going to enable you to create a...
Exactly a year ago I was invited to give a keynote at the Craft Conference in Budapest and I discussed the 10 biggest reasons why product teams fail. You can read the narrative article here. As I mainly shined a light on why so...
In my last article on Discovery Sprints I mentioned the concept of Discovery Coaches and several people asked me about that, so I thought I’d describe more about what this role is and when it’s helpful. For many years, as...
I find that many teams, especially those new to modern product techniques, are looking for a structured introduction to modern product discovery. In this article, I’d like to describe the concept of a discovery sprint, and also introduce you to...
Product Optimization is a hot topic. It can provide real value to teams. However, many people confuse optimization with product discovery. I’ve written about this earlier. Eric Ries of the Lean Startup movement also recently tried to clear up this...
Most of us are working on solving some pretty hard problems, and it usually ends up taking some fairly complex systems in order to power these solutions. As such, for most teams there are two very significant challenges to tackle:...
NOTE: This article is a narrative version of a talk I’ve given for developers at the Craft Conference and for product managers and designers at Mind The Product. In this article I’d like to discuss the root causes of so many...
The role of the product organization is to consistently deliver significant new value to the business through continuous product innovation. At a startup, the product team either innovates and provides real value or the startup dies. However, in larger, more...
NOTE: My friend and colleague Jeff Patton is the author of a book on the general topic of User Stories and especially the technique of Story Mapping. I was asked to write a foreword for this new book, and this...
Note: This article is a collaboration between myself and my long-time friend and colleague Jeff Patton. We often work together to help product teams. We have both long argued that the best way to evaluate product teams is by their...
Every week I continue to find product teams laboring away on old-style product roadmaps that have been painstakingly negotiated with management and stakeholders, sometimes for several quarters in advance. I have written several times about the problems with this approach...
The term “pivot” is probably one of the most overused and abused terms in today’s product teams. If you’re not familiar with the concept, see Your Business Plan Is Wrong. As I work with different teams I find the term used...
