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Mind the Product

Product Management

The executive product leader persona

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Eira is an editor for Mind the Product. She's been a business journalist, editor, and copywriter for longer than she cares to think about.

Eira Hayward

<p>April saw Mind the Product run a focus week on “learning to lead”, a podcast from Pluralsight’s <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/hpuxixd/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ha Phan</a> on machine learning in discovery, and publish plenty more insightful content besides.</p>
<p>Here’s a recap of our top posts from the past month.</p>
<h2>Measuring the right North Star metric</h2>
<p>Accenture Business Agility and Product Coach Sebastian Straube gave us an article on<a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/measuring-the-right-north-star-metric/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Measuring the right North Star metric</a>. The article focuses on measuring the right things in order to build successful products. Sebastian examines different types of metrics and provides an actionable framework &#8211; the North Star framework &#8211; that product managers can use to measure the path from customer problem to reaching the product vision. He also takes us through some examples of how this framework might work in specific businesses.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/measuring-the-right-north-star-metric/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Measuring the right North Star metric</a></em></p>
<h2>You’re not the CEO of anything</h2>
<p>A revisit to Martin Eriksson’s influential post <a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/product-managers-not-ceo-anything/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Product managers — you are not the CEO of anything</a> proved very popular with the product community this month, showing us again how the debate over the scope of the product manager’s role will run and run. In it, Martin explains why he disagrees with Ben Horowitz’s view that product managers are the CEOs of their products. He emphasises that product management is a team sport, and that even product leaders are not CEOs of their products. He says: “You are not Steve Jobs, you are not a <a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/netflix-abstracts-team-out-of-product-design/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">lone genius</a> designing a product from your ivory tower. Never forget that as a product leader you are only as good as your team. Setting them up for success and giving them the space and air cover to do their best is ultimately how you and your product will be successful.”</p>
<p><a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/sunday-rewind-product-managers-you-are-not-the-ceo-of-anything/"><em>SUNDAY REWIND: Product managers – you are not the CEO of anything</em></a></p>
<h2>Easy ways to engage stakeholders</h2>
<p>An article looking at ways to engage stakeholders was up among our top reads in April. It includes plenty of nuggets of advice from product managers who have experience in getting and keeping their stakeholders engaged. For example, product managers should borrow from tried and tested sales techniques to engage stakeholders, and they should make sure they’re consistent in their communication, even when there’s nothing to say.</p>
<p><em> <a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/easy-ways-to-engage-your-stakeholders/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Easy ways to engage your stakeholders</a></em></p>
<h2>Product management dysfunctions</h2>
<p>A ProductTank London talk from <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/benfoster/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ben Foster</a>, CPO at <a href="https://www.whoop.com/en-gb/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Whoop</a>, explaining some of the most common product management dysfunctions and how to solve them was one of the most viewed videos this month. Ben’s talk underlines the importance of a product strategy, and shows how having a product strategy can prevent product management dysfunctions from occurring.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/product-management-dysfunctions-by-ben-foster/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Product management dysfunctions by Ben Foster</a></em></p>
<h2>Unifying agile processes for product teams</h2>
<p>Case studies are always instructive so it’s heartening to see that a case study from Oliver Borders at AZA Finance on unifying agile processes for product teams was one of our top reads this month. Oliver outlines how product teams are organised, how meetings are structured at AZA Finance and how different types of meetings can benefit your overall product strategy.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/unifying-agile-processes-for-product-teams-a-case-study/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Unifying agile processes for product teams: a case study</a></em></p>
<p>There’s lots more great content to look forward to in May. To ensure you don’t miss out on a thing, keep your eyes on our <a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">homepage</a> as well as visiting the <a href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/membership/leader/dashboard/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">membership dashboard</a>.</p>
<div class="g g-21"><div class="g-single a-95"><a class="gofollow" data-track="OTUsMjEsMSw2MA==" href="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/product-management-training/public-workshops/product-metrics-workshop/"><img decoding="async" src="https://mtpdevwpe.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Training-Metrics-what-should-a-PM-know_-FOOTER-scaled.jpg" /></a></div></div>

core/freeform

Anatomy of a real product strategy by Nacho Bassino

Applied product management: Why you may be struggling as a product leader by Gijo Mathew

Our bot workforce by David O’Brien

Organizational behavior and dysfunction in product management by Ken Chin

It’s all about the outcome by Georgie Smallwood

Self-care and stress management for product leaders by Dominique Jost

Empowered Teams and Decision Agility

Hacking Confidence by Janice Fraser

Scaling Product Teams: In Defense of Process by Spectra (Adaora) Asala

Great User Research (for Non-Researchers) by Steve Portigal

April’s top product management content

ProductTank Tallinn

ProductTank Norwich

ProductTank Portland

ProductTank Abu Dhabi

ProductTank Manchester

ProductTank Newcastle Upon Tyne

ProductTank Milton Keynes

ProductTank London

ProductTank Jacksonville

ProductTank Phoenix

ProductTank Ljubljana

ProductTank Belgrade

ProductTank Bologna

ProductTank Edinburgh

ProductTank München

ProductTank Birmingham

ProductTank Porto

ProductTank Pune

ProductTank Chennai

ProductTank Genève

ProductTank Heidelberg

ProductTank Málaga

ProductTank Paris

ProductTank Hamburg

ProductTank Kraków

ProductTank Riga

ProductTank Reading

ProductTank San Francisco

ProductTank Goiania

ProductTank Des Moines

ProductTank Bangkok

ProductTank Canberra

ProductTank Dubai

ProductTank Valencia

ProductTank Madrid

ProductTank Düsseldorf

ProductTank Raleigh

ProductTank Warsaw

ProductTank Bielefeld

ProductTank Bern

ProductTank Tokyo

ProductTank Pittsburgh

ProductTank Cardiff

ProductTank Krakow

ProductTank NYC

Product Leadership Course

ProductTank Recife

ProductTank Dublin

Member AMA: Unpacking User Research with Laura Klein

ProductTank Copenhagen

Trainer-Led Workshops

ProductTank Tauranga

World Product Day

Member AMA with Ken Norton

#mtpcon London+EMEA 2022 Workshops

#mtpcon London+EMEA 2022 Conference

April’s top product management content

Eira Hayward

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