3. Your Session Leaders
• Alex McCarthy
• 25 years in product management, marketing, sales, and engineering
• Trilogy, National Instruments, American Innovations, Polycom
• Navigate Next – helping senior leaders navigate their careers
• John Milburn
• 20 year Austin tech veteran (Tivoli, Lane15, Dell, Vtel, IBM)
• 10 year Instructor at Pragmatic Marketing, CSPO
• Now, helping technology firms better align their people, products and
plans to drive greater revenue and market success
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4. First, What’s a Product Manager?
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SiriusDecisionsPragmatic Marketing Proficientz 280 Group
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5. Outline
• “To thine own self be true”
• Develop business sense
• Hone your influencing skills
• Models, process, models, process (repeat after me)
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6. But, what is your “true” self ?
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7. What do you Enjoy?
What are you Good at?
Are you in the Right Role?
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8. Introvert (I) Extrovert (E)
“Study the data for hours”
Thorough and detailed, listeners
Trouble linking impact to others
“Schmoozing in the Hall”
Good at convincing, selling
Struggle with how to improve
Sensing (S) Intuition (N)
Think in the Abstract
Big Picture over Details
Recognize Patterns
Basic Information
Respond to what is observed
Logic and Consistency
Thinking (T) Feeling (F)
People and Circumstances
Judging (J) Perceiving (P)
Get things decided
Critical for Execution
Remain open and flexible
Critical for Adaptability
MBTI for Product Management
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11. Business Sense
• Inherent ability to know if “it” will be successful AND
profitable
• Part art (gut), part science (learnable)
• Ultimately, a sense of the PROBABILITY of success
• Key aspects
• Is it a win for the right people, companies and markets?
• Headwinds and tailwinds in market, technology, politics,…
• Are there enough resources – money, people, systems, time
• Impact on PMs
• Strong predictor on PM career success
• Usually improves with experience (not necessarily just time)
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12. The Opportunity - Outside and Inside Data
• Is it worth it?
• “Why we win?”
• “Can we win?”
• Does everyone make money (but the competition)?
• Is value chain aligned?
• How will the competition respond?
• What happens if we do nothing? Wait 12 months?
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14. It’s a great idea!
Why won’t they just say “Yes”?
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15. Why are decision makers so stupid and slow?
• You can’t make the decision. It sucks. We know.
Move on.
• No, they’re not stupid. And if they really are stupid,
educate them.
• No, it doesn’t take forever. They either aren’t
convinced, committed or concerned.
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Guess what? IT MAY BE YOU!!
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16. I’d like to invest 20% of our staff and 10% of our
earnings in “Next Gen”, here’s why:
• Most of our sales people say they can sell it
• Our competitor already has it
• Two large customers want to know if we have it
• Development is “on board” and thinks they can do it faster than buying
it
• The current solution is expensive to maintain
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17. I’d like to invest 20% of our staff and 10% of our
earnings in “Next Gen”, here’s why:
• It is a deciding factor in 4 out of the last 5 Win/Loss reports
• Two of our top 5 customers are willing to be beta sites and fund
development
• ACME announced it at their User Conference last year
• 7 new testimonials on their web site
• Hosting 4 regional events dedicated to it
• Sales and marketing will dedicate two people to launch it ($200k)
Forecast $750k in first year and ~$2M in second year
• Development estimates it needs 4 new people ($500k), new equip
($120k) and 11-14 months
• Three year ROI is 7.4 which is above our target threshold
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18. The Art of Influencing
• Simple and immediate actions
• Think it through
• Reframe – WIIFM? SCORE?
• Longer term
• Formal training (UT Exec Ed Advocacy, Influence and Power)
• Books (The Art of Persuasion)
• Blogs
• Coaching
• …
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Source
19. Be a Data Hound
• Decide what’s most important data first! Not sure? Ask.
• Factual AND anecdotal
• Customers
• Internal: finance!, sales, marketing, development, operations
• Competitors – especially at industry events
• Industry analysts, blogs, magazines
• Vendors, suppliers, new technology
• Don’t forget intangibles: emotional, risk level, “politics”, consensus…
• Get a little more than “just enough” data
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The Human Element of Data Driven Decision Making
20. Think the Situation Through
• Start with “How much is it worth?”. Invest
accordingly.
• Next focus on “Who” (roles)
• Define “it” clearly! What’s the “ask” and “return”?
• What data do you need to make your point?
• It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it!
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Source
Source
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23. Regardless of Development Method or Role……..
• Problem
• User & Buyer
• Business Case / Plan
• Revenue vs. Costs vs. Time
• Vision / Roadmap
• Capabilities mapped to time/releases
• Competition
• Why you will win
• Fit / Alignment
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30. Who Owns What? How is it documented?
How much is “Enough” (or Too Much) ?
Product
Roadmap
Business
Case
User Stories &
Epics Overall
Project
Plan
Value
Proposition
Build /
Test
Go / No Go Done
Sprint
Plans
Marketing /
Launch
Plans
Expectations
Release
Architecture
Design
UX
Internal
Alignment
“Agile Planning Process”
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31. SO, what did we miss????
• “To thine own self be true”
• Develop business sense
• Hone your influencing skills
• Models & process
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