Rachel Hughes

> you always have a strategy, even if it is implicit and not written down. Writing helps you sharpen it, have a shared understanding. > one of the simplest yet most powerful things you can do, is to write your strategy down.

38

4 Comments

The Hands-On Product Leader: Why Deep Product Knowledge Matters In the fast-paced world of product management, it's easy for product leaders to get swept away by the big picture. Strategy, organizational alignment, budget control, and market-facing activities all demand attention. However, true product leadership thrives on a deep understanding of the very products it manages. This may seem counterintuitive - after all, product leaders set the context and guide teams to execute, right? But staying intimately familiar with the product's core functionalities is a critical component of effective leadership. Here's why a hands-on approach is essential: 1. Meaningful Guidance and Direction: A product leader who can demonstrate the product at any moment is demonstrably engaged in its intricacies. This level of exposure allows for informed guidance to the product team. They can provide insightful feedback on feature development, anticipate user pain points, and drive solutions that truly address market needs. 2. Enhanced Representation: Deep product knowledge allows you to be a stronger advocate for your product in both internal and external forums. You can confidently answer questions, address concerns, and demonstrate subject matter expertise that inspires confidence. This contrasts with relying on product managers or owners for all conversations, potentially undermining your credibility and authority. 3. Synergy and Efficiency: By being well-versed in the functionalities of your product and others within the organization's ecosystem, you can identify potential synergies. This knowledge empowers you to define strategies that leverage product convergence, minimizing wasteful investments and maximizing operational and financial efficiencies. 4. Breaking Down Silos: Product leaders operating in isolation can create a fragmented product landscape. Hands-on knowledge fosters collaboration with other product leaders. By understanding the nuances of each product, you can identify opportunities for collaboration, avoiding duplicated efforts and driving a more cohesive product strategy across the organization. The takeaway? Staying close to the product isn't a sign of micromanagement; it's a crucial element of effective product leadership. It fosters deeper team engagement, propels strategic direction, and ultimately fuels long-term product success. Call to Action: Share your thoughts! Have you witnessed the benefits of hands-on product leadership? Let's keep the conversation going and elevate the product management discussion.

28

1 Comment

Dealing with ***very*** surprising changes will be your most important skill in the next 5 years. As product managers, we often encounter unexpected changes that can disrupt our well-laid plans. Whether it's a feature redesign, shifting priorities, or unforeseen challenges, how we respond can make or break our projects. Here are a few key questions to ask yourself when faced with such situations: How flexible is my current plan? What are the top priorities right now? How can I communicate changes effectively to my team? What steps can I take to adapt quickly and efficiently? How do you handle unexpected changes in your projects? Share your experiences. #productmanager #Agile #projectplanning #adaptability #productdevelopment #leadershiplessons #productor

12

5 Comments

My biggest fear as a product manager are Friday afternoon code deployments. 😄 Kidding (but really, please don’t). My actual biggest fear is that I’m not driving the value my teams and customers need from me. 🔗 As product managers, our job is to drive value for our product’s teams and customers. We aren’t necessarily the people who deliver the tangible results that our peers and customers see – a lot of what we do is traditionally “behind the scenes” work. It makes sense, product management is often seen as the bridge between business and technology, customers and solutions, etc. 💡 That’s where a lot of my fear comes from. I’ve felt it the first day I served as a product manager, I still feel it over a decade later even with a list of achievements saying otherwise. But fortunately, I’ve had the opportunity to work with coaches and mentors in the product space, each of which assure me that the feeling is normal. I recently had a conversation with a product manager from the MAANG space; several more years of experience than I and an even longer list of achievements. He, too, still holds a fear that he may not be driving value. But, he counters that fear with a few affirmations like these: “I am the reason my developers know what to build and why it matters.” “I am the reason my marketing and sales teams know who the product is for and how to engage them.” “I am the reason my product is solving a problem that people in my space want to solve in the first place.” 💭 Today, I still use affirmations to overcome my fears. They remind me that fear is “False Evidence Appearing Real.” What are you most afraid of as a product manager? How do you face your fear and overcome it? #productmanagement #productmanagers #impostersyndrome #fear #affirmations

3

🔥Hot Take for PMs: Please don't hand me a solution to a problem. Instead, focus on detailing the problem and help me understand the why. We will ideate and find a solution together. Next week, in our first episode of ⚫️Bounce, Claire and I continue to unpack the PD + PM working relationship. Buckle up. Subscribe today - links in comments 👇

60

23 Comments

How much does industry experience matter in Product Management? I'm hearing from a lot of folks who I mentor that they are getting great feedback through the interview process only to learn in the end that they didn't have enough industry experience to be hired. I take issue with two things here: 1. You can tell if someone has industry experience by their resume. If it's that important, then don't interview them. 2. I don't think industry experience is that important for most product manager jobs. If you are a talented product manager who has skills for discovery, developing strategy, and engaging stakeholders, then you are miles ahead of most product managers. This individual should be able to ramp within 3 months. By the way, if this is you, keep a look out for when I have roles available. But if you hire an industry expert who is lacking in product thinking, they will take much longer to learn the skills of the field. In the meantime, they are going to do a lot of damage as they do things like: - Trust their own opinion over seeking learnings in the market. - Build to please senior stakeholders. - Alienate the engineering team and lose their trust. I'd love to hear the thoughts of others on this topic.

82

16 Comments

When launching a new product I see alot of product managers wait until they're asked "how it's going", before thinking about what their metrics of success are. This is something that I learned as a new product manager when trying to get funding for my first product. Think about the metrics that are important both your company, as well as what is going delight the customer to the point that they're publicly championing your products and organization. #productmanagement #GTM #productlaunch #launchstrategy

4

I'm often asked, "How can you help our organization work more like Crema?" The answer isn't a single silver bullet. It's a combination of factors that consistently leads us to produce quality results. To help clients get started, we've identified three key areas where we can provide immediate value. We've developed a suite of assessments to address some of the most common challenges our clients face. These services, which we previously offered as custom projects, are now standardized to deliver consistent and exceptional outcomes as quickly as possible. 1. User Experience Audit: Focused on the enterprise space, this audit targets issues like internal or external adoption struggles, dips in satisfaction or engagement, and inconsistencies across your products. We'll pinpoint key improvement areas and recommend where to invest for the biggest impact. 2. Product Team Assessment: Leveraging our experience with hundreds of teams over the past 15 years, this assessment identifies what’s holding your organization back. Our goal is to unlock your team's full potential, helping you meet your business goals more effectively. 3. Engineering Quality Assessment: Our engineering team is particularly known for their level of technical quality. This deep dive into your development practices and processes evaluates the technical quality of your products. You'll receive prioritized recommendations based on impact and effort, ensuring you can make meaningful improvements. At Crema, quality extends beyond these three areas, but focusing on user experience, product team health, and engineering quality provides the essential insights leaders need to steer their organizations towards success. While we're working on getting the other services officially launched, consider me dropping the link as me letting you in the backdoor. Shhh. Don't get me in trouble. I'm just excited for these to get out into the world and would like us to help as many organizations as possible thrive. ;) https://lnkd.in/gMkzjsgA If any of the above sounds like something your organization may benefit from, let's talk!

20

I found this article to be a great summary of what a product manager does- understanding all stakeholders and acting as the glue across the organization. Check it out here: https://lnkd.in/g39gC_4G

12

1 Comment

Simple, but really useful idea from Will Larson: Every company has engineers who complain, "There's no product strategy. Why don't we even have a product strategy?" Then, you talk to product managers, and they say, "There's no business strategy. How do we function without a business strategy?" When you go back to the engineers, they lament, "There's not even a technology strategy. What kind of company are we?" This pervasive belief that there's no strategy anywhere is common, but I've come to believe that strategy is everywhere—it's just rarely written down. The challenge is that unwritten strategy can be effective but difficult to use and refine. When strategies are updated, people have different understandings of the changes. It's tough to onboard new hires when there's no written strategy. You often have senior leaders who come in and just assume their last company strategy is your strategy because you don't have your strategy written down anywhere. Explaining confusing points becomes a series of one-on-one conversations or trying to interpret past decisions like case law. It's confusing and inefficient compared to just writing it down. One of the biggest improvements we can make in the quality of strategy across all areas—engineering, product, business—is to commit to documenting it. Once written, people can disagree, iterate, and revise the strategy. Unwritten strategies are hard to engage with, and writing things down, even imperfectly, can lead to significant improvements almost overnight. Without documentation, improving your strategy is incredibly challenging. Read the entire Review article featuring Will by following the link in the comments.

500

26 Comments

I wrote Hiring Product Managers to show that hiring can be an agent of change. We need to stop thinking of hiring as simply 'ticking a box' - approaching hiring in a meaningful way can have a great impact on our personal growth, team dynamics & the shaping of our organisational culture. Get your copy!

10

Highly recommend this insightful Lenny’s Podcast with Vikrama Dhiman to anyone in Product! Here are my key takeaways: 1) Even if you’re at a mid-senior or higher level, continue to produce quality outputs/artifacts in addition to a focus on strategy & outcomes. 2) When needing to push back on something, be artful about how you do it: Intentional about keeping the tempo logical and adding value over being emotional. 3) Keep your focus on what you can control and not what you can’t. The latter tends to start happening as you grow in your career. There’s *always* a lot to do in the axis areas of your product & yourself: Data, technology, design/research, strategy, communication, organizational skills, community, & collaboration. 4) Constantly aim at what will increase your rate of change. If you’re skilled in a certain area, move your benchmark so you continue to scale and improve. If it's data or technology, look to the best in the industry; if it's communication or collaboration, expand to mapping to other company stakeholders. 5) To keep yourself grounded and to foster continued learning, be aware of your self-assessment and make sure you aren’t over inflating or telling a skewed narrative. Mindfulness helps with this. “Don’t be high-agency; be mindful agency.” 6) The product axes are -> HARD: data, design/research, technology, strategy; SOFT: communication, organizational, community, & collaboration. Target growth in the axis that will have the maximum leverage for you first, then move to the next. Don’t try to grow in all areas at once, or you’ll get overwhelmed. Tip: If you come from a background in design & research, focus on data or tech (or vice versa) to improve where you may have most opportunity for improvement. 

42

1 Comment

Could not agree with this sentiment more. The best UXR are invaluable, especially in making sense of the implications (and optimal applications) of emerging technologies like LLMs. I experienced this firsthand collaborating with Loi Sessions Goulet to assess patient perceptions of (earlier generation) AI to guide their medical decisions. In short — they craved the personalization that AI could unlock, but they disliked the idea that AI was behind it. This insight fundamentally shifted our positioning and overall approach to guiding patient decisions. Judd Antin also sheds excellent light on similar topics on Lenny Rachitsky’s podcast a few months back. Tl;dr — you might be underestimating UXR’s potential impact when positioned to play a strategic role. https://lnkd.in/eTtNzZSS

12

1 Comment

It's wild to see how many product teams still "performing activities" rather than realizing business outcomes. And even if you're a PM who feels the need to "perform work" (so that you won't lose your job), helping move forward your business can protect, well, you and your team! Go attend Matt LeMay's webinar tomorrow! On impact-first product work.

1

"What is the best way to network to help advance my career in product management?" Networking is a foundational skill every PM needs for long-term success. Today, I share some of my thoughts around the subject. If you have a question about product management, shoot me a DM. ✉️ I'm here to help! #productmanagement #productmanagers #careeradvice #askaquestion #askmeanything

1

🎙️Tonight is the night! Join Bosky and me for a deep dive into the importance of soft skills in product management. We’ll discuss how EQ can help you grow your career, enhance your products, and build better relationships. See you at 8:30 PM CET at this link 👉🏻 https://lnkd.in/e3RiyHjE

12

1 Comment

📣 Product Folks: 😡 Have you and your team hit the wall with trying to focus on value? That *could* look like: ▶ No steady stream of data to inform strategy, prioritization + roadmaps ▶ Stakeholder misalignment ▶ Competing priorities ▶ Duplicative or overlapping work streams 🤓 Are you ready to put Product Operations into practice at your company? Join me for Produx Labs' Product Operations June 5 Masterclass! Snag your seat today. https://lnkd.in/ephFvTwf #productmanagement #productops

4

I share this perspective.

2

I have always been a proponent of good design systems. They can enable teams to work faster, keep the user experience consistent, and reduce the bottleneck when teams don’t have enough designers. My first experience with a proper design system is when we built one at athenahealth. We had something like 10K different types of buttons across the website, and the UX was getting a lot of negative feedback from customers. We also had a shortage of UX designers, no matter how fast we were hiring. Scott Mackie and Jen Cardello orchestrated the design system launch, and it was game changing. Teams were able to prototype faster. The code base was simplified. Eventually, the UX scores got drastically better. I love hearing storied about how other people have implemented design systems, and what it can do to help propel our products forward. I had a fantastic chat with John Athayde, former VP of Design at Powerfleet and owner of Meticulous, LLC in this Product Thinking Episode about just this. John talked about the importance of viewing internal tools as products in themselves, and that means prioritizing them appropriately. Designing them with a user-centric mindset is important for ensuring scalability and efficiency within an organization. Here's a glimpse of what we covered: 🚀 John's journey to PowerFleet and his lightbulb moment for enhancing internal controls. 🏗️ Why designers need to understand code—it's like building a house; you gotta know the basics! 💡 Crafting internal tools as complex, scalable systems with a product mindset. 👩‍💻 The key role of UX engineers in blending functionality and design seamlessly. 📱 Why UX and UI matter more than ever as users compare their interface experiences. As customers get pickier about their user experience, focusing on internal tools and design matters more than ever. John's journey and wisdom remind us just how vital UX designers are for driving success in fast-growing companies. What are your thoughts on the role of internal tools as products within organizations? Have you experienced any challenges or successes in this area? Let's keep the discussion going! Share your insights below. Listen now: https://lnkd.in/evWJyHA4 #ProductThinking #DesignSystems #InternalTools #UXUI #ProductManagement

50

5 Comments