Everyone is passionate about product excellence - but in reality, is it possible to achieve? This interactive discussion will lay the foundation for how to define product excellence in your organization, product team according to your own standards; recognize the 7 phases of the product management lifecycle; understand perspectives of customers, users and others consuming your code, and isolate soft skills to help you communicate, collaborate and align with non-technical team members http://www.siliconvalley-codecamp.com/Session/2013/deconstructing-the-code-for-product-excellence

1. Deconstructing The Code For
Product Excellence
by Cindy F. Solomon
1:45 PM Saturday Oct 5 Room: 4305

2. Forwarding Product Leaders
• Creating brilliant products is a group effort.
• It takes designers, developers, marketers – really, everyone in
the product ecosystem.
• Startup Product Summit is the premiere place to gain valuable
insights from product stars that have been in the trenches and
have the battle scars to prove it.

3. http://sfproducttalks.com

4. http://startupproduct.com

5. Agenda.startupproduct.com

6. Voting for @ProductCampSF Sessions Oct 12
OPEN!!!! Inside @ProdThink http://bit.ly/1gbDhZU

7. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
@STARTUPPRODUCT
# STARTUPPRODUCT
• Founder, Host, Producer Global Product Management Talk
• Organizer, Startup Product Talks.Producer, Startup Product Summit.
• Startup Product movement for product excellence through cross-discipline
collaboration and holistic product perspective.
• Contributing writer for the SVPMA, 42 Rules Product Marketing, and
ProdBOK, Product Management Body of Knowledge
• >15 years of web development, services, and software product marketing
and management at Apple, Vadem, NetObjects and start-ups in Silicon
Valley. www.linkedin.com/in/cfsolomon/
Cindy F. Solomon, CPM, CPMM

8. The Global Product Management Talk
• started with a tweet that traveled 7400 miles
• Pioneered Socratic Twitter Chat Format
• Discovered difficult to tweet & discuss complex issues
• Started recording thought leaders via Skype
• Became top 10 business podcast on BlogTalkRadio
• 2 years, >100 chats, 30,000 listeners/week, new
programming
• Spawned in-person community >1700 members
• Conference: Startup Product Summit
• Startup Product Academy at Broadway Studios, SF
Listening to the market, to practitioners, to what’s needed to forward
future product leaders

9. Startup Product
A movement for Product Excellence
• Holistic view of product
• Cross-functional, cross-discipline
collaboration
http://startupproduct.com/about/

10. 1.RECOGNIZE WHO IS IN THE
ROOM (who)
2. ESTABLISH CONTEXT (why)
3. DEFINE TERMS (what)
4. SOLVE PAIN / PROVIDE VALUE
(how)
4 Steps to Collaboration

11. Blank Slide
(I’ve got 50 slides prepared – however, none
of them are more important than your
answers to the following questions)

12. Questions
• Who’s here?
• What do YOU want to get?
• What does product excellence mean
to you?
• What metrics do you use to measure
excellence?
• What’s your success rate?
• What’s not being voiced?

13. How Do You
Define Product
Excellence?

14. "Above all else, align with customers.
Win when they win. Win only when
they win.“
—Jeff Bezos, 2012

15. Product Excellence Depends
on where you’re touching

16. What Makes A Product Great
Depends…

17. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
• On who you’re asking
• On where you’re looking
• On what you’re touching
• On where it is in the Product
Lifecycle
• On who’s using it, etc.

18. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
The Invisible Computer
Donald Norman mapped
lifecycle of products
why good products can fail…

19. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
lifecycle of products
“In its early days, a technology cannot meet all the needs
of its customers.
Early adopters need the technology and they are willing to
suffer inconvenience to get it.
With time, the technology matures, offering better
performance and higher reliability.
When the technology exceeds the basic needs of most of its
customers, there is a major change in customer behavior.
Emotional reaction, pride of ownership, and pleasurability all
can become major selling points.”
The Invisible Computer Donald Norman

21. http://www.lukew.com/ff/entry.asp?618

22. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Product Excellence is
measured differently in
Each Stage

23. Stage 1
Pure function is all that
matters: If the one thing it
does is the only option
available, people will be
happy with it.

24. Stage 2 Feature Wars
The number of features matters
because frequently the buyer doesn't
understand what each feature actually
means.
Later in this phase, specific features
do make a difference as people are
looking for certain features to make
their purchase decisions.

25. Stage 3 Experience Wars
The experience and total cost of
ownership matters most. Products
with fewer -but better- features
will trump the more feature-laden
winners of Stage 2.

26. The actual item becomes
absorbed into a larger product
mix.
Individual features of the
technology no longer matter,
but become a price/performance
issue for the integrator.
Stage 4 Commodities

27. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
There is a lifecycle that every
product, startup, idea and
project passes through to be
realized that parallels the
“creative process”

28. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Focusing on where the product
is in its lifecycle enables a
conversation that brings us all
together on what will serve the
product most to arrive at
product/market fit, sustain
growth and generate revenue
streams.

29. Identify Where The Product
Is in the lifecycle
AIPMM Product Management Lifecycle Framework

30. Become Expert At Speaking “Product”
DELIVER RESULTS ACROSS ALL PHASES
AIPMM Product Management Lifecycle Framework

31. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
1.Business, organization view
2.Product Management functional view
3.Personal (team member) view
How You Define Product Excellence
Depends on Where You’re Looking

32. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Solomon says
“Product Managers create context for
the product within the company, within
the development process, with all the
stakeholders and within the industry,
market, channel and end-user
community.”

33. PRODUCT
MANAGEMENT
Building a successful product management
organization requires not only developing the
skills of your product managers, but making
sure they know how to work effectively with
the rest of the product team, as a key part of
your company’s overall product development
organization and product development
process, and knowing how to create the type
of products your company requires, and
knowing how to compete successfully in the
markets you play in.
Marty Cagan, SVPG
PRODUCT
MANAGEMENT -
NOUN
BUSINESS
FOUNDATION

34. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Product
Management
Product
Management
- Verb
Product-specific (inbound) responsibilities:
•Product strategy development (high level vision for how the product
drives the business model and competes against competition)
•Requirements and use case gathering and development (both
internal and external customers)
•Requirement prioritization
•Create specification (detailed to address requirements)
•Product life cycle management (including release definitions,
roadmap development, etc.)
•Project management - manage the day-to-day execution of the
product team (QA, development, design, copy, etc.)
Market-specific (outbound) responsibilities:
•Product positioning and marketing messaging
•Competitive monitoring and analysis
•Collateral development explaining product and features
•Training and education of internal and external customers on new
product and features
•Launch campaign development and support - e.g. PR campaigns,
tradeshows, webinars, social media marketing, etc.
General business responsibilities:
P/L management
Organization Function

35. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
The PRODUCT
MANAGEMENT - thing
Department,
Group
Product Manager,
Product Marketing Manager,
Product Owner,
Scrum Master
Agile Project Manager
Program Manager ?
Strategic?
Execution?
Customer driven?
Sales driven?
Technology driven?

36. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
PRODUCT MANAGEMENT
You
job, position, career, profession,
identity Your Personal Value –
what you’re providing and
what you’re getting from
being or doing product
management
PRODUCT MANAGEMENT
Professional People

37. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
@STARTUPPRODUCT
# STARTUPPRODUCT
How Do You Drive
Alignment of Product
perspective across all
functions?

38. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Listen
• What are their concerns, issues, focus?
• What motivates them?
• How do they define and measure product success?
• What do they need to guarantee success of the product?
• What can you provide them that forwards their success?

39. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com

40. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Ask Questions, Listen &
Learn Their Language
Translate the Road Map
For Various Audiences

41. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Practice The Art Of Product
ManagementLISTEN: http://bit.ly/14a95K4

42. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
@STARTUPPRODUCT
# STARTUPPRODUCT
Gain Respect of
Developers
LISTEN: http://bit.ly/T2hEOy

43. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Understand What Sales
Needs
LISTEN: http://bit.ly/RDnbtF

44. Put Humans First
LISTEN: http://bit.ly/17a6dNl

45. Embrace UX
LISTEN: http://bit.ly/NNHc2V

46. Become A Better Leader
Dave Kerpen is the New York
Times bestselling author of two
books, Likeable Social
Media and Likeable Business.
http://bit.ly/ZqO6va

47. http://excellencenow.com/part-4/

48. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Archives
http://www.blogtalkradio.com
/prodmgmttalk
Listen on iTunes
http://bit.ly/silH98
Android App
http://bit.ly/tEeWFx
RSS http://bit.ly/IyCnJD
Twitter @ProdMgmtTalk
Sponsor: http://bit.ly/gF0Tt3
Speak: http://bit.ly/f4xAIW
Contact:
info@prodmgmttalk.com

49. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
ProdBOK
ProdBOK is the Product
Management and
Marketing Body of
Knowledge , an industry-
wide effort to standardize
the practice of product
management sponsored
by the Association of
International Product
Management and
Marketing (AIPMM)
http://bit.ly/ZPbdH6

50. © Cindy F. Solomon
cfsolomon@gmail.com
Listen: http://bit.ly/JX15Oq
Attributes of High Performing
Product Teams

51. Thank you!
Join me weekly on Global Product Management Talk
And on Twitter:
@cindyfsolomon
@prodmgmttalk
@startupproduct
@productcampsf October 12, 2013
Please connect with me on linkedin!
www.linkedin.com/in/cfsolomon/

52. Cindy F. Solomon
510-499-6955
cfsolomon@gmail.com
LinkedIn! www.linkedin.com/in/cfsolomon
Twitter and skype @cindyfsolomon
Join the Startup Product movement for product excellence!
@startupproduct #startupproduct
http://startupproduct.com
http://www.meetup.com/StartupProductTalks/
http://www.meetup.com/StartupProduct/
Founder, Global Product Management Talk
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/prodmgmttalk
Broadcast discussion of vital issues affecting professionals passionate about
products, business process, product management, startups, marketing,
innovation and excellence.
@prodmgmttalk #prodmgmttalk
Be showcased on the show! http://bit.ly/f4xAIW