Required reading for product managers
Why Software Is Eating The World, Marc Andreessen (2011).
The only thing that matters, Marc Andreessen (2007). Introducing the original concept of product market fit.
Manifesto for Agile Software Development (2001). The original document for developing software in agile ways.
The New New Product Development Game, Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka (1986). The article that moved product development from waterfall to overlapping development phases with self-organizing project teams.
Brand Man, Neil McIlroy (1931). The memo that first started to define the role a product manager might play.
More businesses should hire philosophers
Everyone hired into organisations is there to do, to produce, deliver, create outputs. No one is hired just to think. Thinking that happens has to lead to action.
What if more businesses hired people to think?
Misunderstanding the mechanics
It’s easy to misunderstand the mechanics of the internet. Easy to apply an out-of-date understanding of how things work. Easy to think that the internet works in the same way as
Sometimes, when we talk about ‘vanity metrics’, we aren’t really being vane in what we measure, measuring things that make us look like we’re successful but don’t achieve an outcome, we’re just applying old thinking to new mechanics. We’re just misunderstanding what mechanics drive what behaviour and so what is the right thing to measure.
The long tail, for example, describes a power law distribution which explains how a few things are really popular and lots of things less popular. It’s an important model for understanding how some things behave on the internet.
Network effects is another model for understanding behaviour on the internet. It tells us how the more people using a product the more useful that product becomes.
In the pre-internet world, these models didn’t apply. But now they do. Which means we need to update our understanding.
Start fast, slow down as you uncover complexity
Things always seem easier at the start, before you’ve realised how difficult they can be. This is the time to move quickly. Make progress, even if it’s in the wrong direction. Learn quickly by doing quickly. Momentum matters.
As you realise the complexities in what you are trying to do, slow down. As you discover problems, give yourself time to understand them. Learn slowly to understand deeply.
Adjust the pace of the work to the complexities.