AMA: Asana Head of AI & Platform, Product Marketing, Neel Patel on Influencing the Product Roadmap

I typically like to think about it in a few phases: * Phase 1: top customer asks from existing base * Phase 2: top reasons for customer churn or closed/lost * Phase 3: top leading indicators for the industry * Phase 4: experimental where we believe we want to go in 3-5 years I'll then work with my respective stakeholders to opportunity size each phase by potential ARR and then work with R&D to make calculated investments in prioritizing our existing customers, customers we want to target/win, and directions that will help us break away from the pack as a category-leader. It's a blend of all (4) phases but a fun exercise nonetheless to see what levers are available to you and your teams to best serve your customers.

We often hear that Product Marketing is a blend of art + science. Well early on in my career, I'd come mostly from a place of art and then dragging very slowly behind...the science. I'd frequently find myself wondering why my voice didn't feel heard and then it dawned on me: for a business to run at hypergrowth speed, it needs that blend of art + science but one without the other is a recipe for disaster. If you're trying to influence the roadmap, come prepared with customer insights, field input, analyst themes/trends, marketing-sizing of the opportunity, competitor audits, etc. That shows you're coming from a place of calculated decision-making and have done your homework gathering the data. Alternatively, trying to influence based on feeling alone will not go very far. I've found most PMM + PM relationships are open and well receptive; however, to make your voice heard you want to bring the data to back it up. Start with a feeling, trust your gut, and bring the data to back it up. It's an art and science.

This is a great question and one I still try to balance based on what research/insights we gather. For analysts, I like to think about bigger market trends, competitive insights, and where an overall industry/category may be going. Once we have that, it's about marrying those broad-stroke themes with product investments that ultimately support your target buyer/existing customer base. Making sure you're serving your customers is critical and getting these insights will help evaluate where to weigh finite time & team resources. While one is not viewed higher or lower, it's an on-going blend of the two worlds to 1) influence the business and where you're trying to go as a company and 2) support your customers and what they're looking to your product to help accelerate their missions.

What an undertaking as the sole PMM—how exciting! Putting myself in your shoes, I'd first start by zooming out and thinking more broadly about what does your ideal PMM + PM working relationship look like overall. Identify your top 3-5 wishes/goals and then meet with your respective counterparts to align on theirs. Then once you have a shared language and understanding, you can review initiatives like a product roadmap and decide together what success looks like. Is it to align on overarching themes/focus areas by target buyers? Is it to go deeper with PMM support on one area in particular, like a new investment in AI? Is it to help bring customer insights and size up different market opportunities? These are great questions to align with your R&D leaders and once you have that shared mental model, it should help you know where to best step in vs. letting them run their roadmap process as planned. And for me, I've learned that things shift and change frequently so while it's great to align upfront, be open to flexing as needed to make sure you all are able to best support your business and customers.

I've found that the best working relationship between PMM and PM is one grounded in transparency and clear, open communication. Sharing customer insights/pain points, emerging market trends, etc. frequently helps your R&D partners understand where things are going and why you're coming with a perspective that might defer from their roadmap plans. Especially in the changing tech landscape that we're experiencing right now, we have to operate a bit more like a start-up when it comes to new technologies, like AI. What's foundational building blocks for where you want to go? What can be more experimental and change as needed? These are areas where workshopping with your R&D teams will help influence what can shift on a roadmap. And when in doubt, get close to the customer. Understand what a 1, 3, 5-year vision with your company looks like. I do this via Product Councils where we bring customers in to help us understand and influence where we want to go. I've also found briefings and inquiries with analysts to be helpful in getting my bearings but also creating that feedback loop with R&D. These are just a few examples but co-creating that partnership early is key for where you might pivot later on.

I rely on this a good amount so that I can bring a data-driven POV vs. having an inkling about something. Some ways to go about this include: * Customer insights & input via market research, product councils, surveys, alpha/beta programs, etc. * Analyst briefings & inquiries to understand the landscape of your industry + competitors and overall TAM * Field intel & recommendations based on sellers who are on the frontlines with customers every day * Work with revenue analytics partners to help opportunity size different investments & revenue impact Some of these can be rolled up into a VoB/VoC process (voice of the business/voice of the customer) within your company but if you don't have a formal program here, you can still approach it via the steps above.

A few themes come to mind when thinking about influencing a product roadmap: 1. Understand business impact: how does your idea or recommendation impact the company at large? Is there a shared business goal that other teams can get behind in hearing your proposal? Laddering up to shared objectives creates a path of less resistance. 2. Understand customer/industry impact: what impact will this have on your customers? Have you talked to any customers to provide proof points? Or at least, work with key sellers in your Revenue Org to further validate? This is critical to ensuring you have support and a way to back up your thinking. 3. Acknowledge trade-offs: nothing comes for free. Acknowledging that there might be trade-offs and being willing to partner with your R&D teams to weigh those pros/cons will make them more receptive to your proposal. Ultimately, when a leader is having to make the decision on this idea it'll be important that they understand the risks involved as well. Now to answer the question more directly, I've seen this work well for prioritizing new integrations on our product roadmap and even more recently with where to invest our efforts in AI opportunities for this year. I've also been on the losing end but through both the wins and losses, the (3) steps above helped me put my best foot forward and have a collective team effort to back it up.