What do product managers get wrong when trying to influence the C-Suite?

3 most common pitfalls I see are:  Not simple enough Not investing into understanding broader context (outside of one's product area) Wrong words-to-numbers ratio Lack of simplicity is the most common out of these, and it usually manifests itself in long sentences, using jargon and vague words to describe specific (e.g. "solid" results). A good rule of thumb when presenting to C-suite is imagining an exec from a completely different field reading/listening to you. Would a sales leader understand ...Read More

A few common anti-patterns I've seen: Always agreeing with the feedback you get live in a meeting quickly. If feedback is worth changing your plans for, ask clarifying and probing questions first. Make sure you really understand the goal of the feedback, and the why behind it. You'll need those things to act on the feedback. Doing so builds credibility with your stakeholders and gets you comfortable with having an open dialog with them. Treating C-suite meetings as pure sales pitches. You need t ...Read More

A common mistake most product managers and sometimes even senior product leaders make while convincing c-suite in favor of a particular decision is bringing in tunnel vision related to just their own product area or business vertical. Spoken differently, they fail to treat company over their own team. Analysis that takes into account the holistic view of the company (even if it hurts your own area in short term) brings confidence and conviction with senior leadership.  The hierarchy of needs whe ...Read More

We can be more tactful and realize we don’t need to rely on logical reasoning alone! To this date, I am still amazed at how one of my colleagues got an executive to change their opinion. We were working on a new product launch at the time and had proposed a pricing bundle that included a feature from another product. Our executive was adamant that we should keep them separate and not bundle. Several meetings went nowhere and we were stuck. At our company the product teams provide weekly updates ...Read More