⚙️Don't be a bottleneck or a cog in the machine, your interface is your brand & more / PM Snacks #31

A sheet to build a product strategy, advice not to be the bottleneck of your team, the role of the interface in your brand and quitting productivity

1️⃣  Product Strategy Template: Focus Your Efforts With These 3 Steps
Mar 2021 • 6 min read • #strategy
Last week I shared the best intro video I know on product strategy... but how to actually form a strategy in the first place? On top of Gibson Biddle's exercices, this sheet contains many useful prompts: 
1/ Delight & unity: what promises is your product making to customers (= job to be done)?
2/ Growth & scale: what should you do to sustainably keep these promises and scale (= model)?
3/ Differentiation & competition: how can you differentiate & create hard to copy factors (= moats & picking a few battles)? 

2️⃣  The Product Manager BottleNeck
Feb 2020 • 7 min read • #execution #manageyourself
I often refer to the "super(wo)man effect" when I encounter PMs who try to fight too many battles & do everything for the team... Let me be clear: it's bulls***, don't do it. The effects are disastrous: you put at risk your mental health, the team's productivity and autonomy too. Instead: 
1/ Give context & externalise as much as possible your artefacts: insights, ideas, roadmaps, documentation
2/ Keep the communication transparent & make clear when you should be involved
3/ See yourself as a router: learn to delegate, bridge knowledge across the org & facilitate  

3️⃣  Diagnose with Data and treat with Design
Mar 2021 • 4 min read • #design #data
A catchy tagline & thoughtful thread on why you should gather data (qualitative & quantitative users' data as well as market ones) to go past your intuition (that is still useful most of the time) and assess the real situation, before solving the problems at hand (in a creative way). Reminder: all builders are designers, design is *how it works*, not how it looks. 

4️⃣  The Interface of a Cheeseburger
Oct 2006 • 6 min read • #design #brand
When we talk about branding, most people think: name, logo or color. That's about it. But actually the most prominent feature of your brand is the interface. Think of a McDonalds cheeseburger, a Dyson hand dryer or an Apple iPod. You don't need to look at the logo to recognise them, the interface in itself is the brand... but lately aren't all interfaces the same? Think of minimalism, flat design, material design or your brand new design system. Could your customers tell immediately that it's you?

A better way must exist but I'm not sure it will come from no-code though* 
*Yes, you can probably tell that I'm very bored with current apps & interfaces. Hit reply if you disagree

5️⃣  5 reasons why I refuse to be productive
Mar 2021 • 9 min read • #ethics #manageyourself
A great essay that goes through time to explain why the "productivity" concept actually stopped working for us (the workers) a long time ago: from its roots in slavery to the complete useless optimisations it creates. This excerpt says it best: "In companies where presenteeism prevails, there’s more to gain from giving the appearance of productivity than from actually being productive". A few takeaways: 
1/ If you decide to optimise your productivity, start with why. 
2/ Our line of work is not easily measurable... I for example dropped velocity measurement at comet. I was not interested in measuring outputs, only outcomes
3/ Creativity requires unplanned chunks of time and struggle. Whenever you try something new, there is no way to be productive.
   
A warm welcome to the 16 new subscribers, we are now 1510 readers strong!

Thank you for reading me.
Have a great week!

Olivier Courtois 
10y+ in product, currently coach, advisor & podcast host

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