Product Strategy

The more differentiated & sticky your core value proposition is, the less you'll need to worry about market trends, as you'll have more and more of a market all to yourself. Make this your goal. Few companies find themselves in that position. For the rest, market trends give us a better sense of consumer demand – what's driving it, how it's evolving, what it's most responsive to. Understanding those deeply will help you develop the customer & market intuition you need to create a differentiated product strategy.  That being said, keep in mind that what's happening in the market is general...more

For us, product strategy stems from company strategy, so it's first important to have a firm grasp on where the company strategy is headed holistacally, and why. Additionally, we serve as a partner function for the entire ProdDev org, so rather than owning a specific segment of the product, we're responsible for helping the company zoom out a bit to identify key areas that could make sense to invest in.  As a result, when working with our exec team it's critical to understand both the company strategy & priorities, functional strategy & priorities, as well as the audience we're communicati...more

I encourage my teams to start by understanding their objectives, plans, assumptions & approach to risk management. We listen carefully and figure out where the gaps and opportunities lie and how impact & success is defined & measured.  Then, as we develop our strategies, we share early & often – at minimum at the key stages of defining what our product strategy might become: * Defining the customer problem & the opportunity size * Proposing the right solution & the necessary investment * Defining the go-to-market plan * Adjusting & iterating post-launch at our Mike Tyson Moment ("ever...more

Love this question as well, and I'll approach it from a couple different perspectives. First, I'd acknowledge that some markets are so big or fast growing that multiple amazingly successful winners can emerge. As of today, Apple is worth $2.8T and Microsoft is worth $2.25T. While I'm sure both companies wouldn't mind adding their other's market share to their portfolio, I also think any reasonable person would consider both outcomes desireable. This example is not to say there's not need to play defense if a market is large or fast growing enough. Quite the opposite, both companies needed ...more

Our mission as a team is to clarify & accelerate the product roadmap. For us, clarification means a couple things: 1. Do we know what we aspire to invest in over the next quarter, half year, or FY? 2. Have we clarified our decision / prioritization framework of what causes an initiative to be above or below the line for what we will commit to? 3. Do we have a shared understanding of the tradeoffs that will occur as a result of our decisions, and are we ok with the outcomes of the tradeoffs? On the acceleration front, one helpful lens we've found has been: 1. What are orga...more