Alyssa Dver on Great Product Managers

Alyssa Dver tells us what distinguishes a great product manager from a good one. Great product managers:

1. Know their product but also know their own limits.
2. Listen first.
3. Ask why, not what.
4. Are decisive.
5. Are responsive.
6. Communicate frequently, concretely, and concisely.
7. Manage passion.

For details, read the rest of Dver's piece.

Comments

Alyssa @ CPLC said…

Roger - thanks for the post on my article. I thought I would mention that I have delivered that content in presentation form a lot - recently at the Software Marketing Conference and prior to that via webinar with the FeaturePlan group. Anyone intersted can listen to the archive of that webinar at: http://www.featureplan.com/elqNow/elqRedir.htm?ref=http://www.featureplan.com/forms/Requirement_management_07_03_14_dver/Requirement_management_07_03_14_dver.mp3

There is the same presentation also archived on the Boston Product Manager's Association website. I delivered it to that group in April.

I am also presenting (a similar but more performance measurement view) at the AIPMM confernece in Tahoe next week - anyone interested in coming - contact me for info on how to save $300! Obviously hurry though - the conference starts next Wed.

I hope its OK, too, that if anyone is intersted in more of this type of content, they might be interested in my book, "Software Product Management Essentials". I just did a major update in honor of the 4th anniversary printing and with teh 10,000th book sold back in Nov 06. The book can be bought on Amazon or B&N.com but if you order from my website, you get free access to the online templates ($17.95 value). The website is: www.swproductmanagement.com.

Thanks again for your post! All the best, Alyssa Dver; info@swproductmanagement.com

Mon Jun 04, 10:08:00 AM 2007

Why Spreadsheets Suck for Prioritizing

The Goal As a company executive, you want confidence that your product team (which includes all the people, from all departments, responsible for product success) has a sound basis for deciding which items are on the product roadmap. You also want confidence the team is prioritizing the items in a smart way. What Should We Prioritize? The items the team prioritizes could be features, user stories, epics, market problems, themes, or experiments. Melissa Perri makes an excellent case for a " problem roadmap ", and, in general, I recommend focusing on the latter types of items. However, the topic of what types of items you should prioritize - and in what situations - is interesting and important but beyond the scope of this blog entry. A Sad but Familiar Story If there is significant controversy about priorities, then almost inevitably, a product manager or other member of the team decides to put together The Spreadsheet. I've done it. Some of the mos...

5 Ways Companies Make Product Decisions

In the last blog entry, we reviewed the four problems that companies face, or are trying to overcome, as they make product decisions . Now we'll look at the ways that most companies make their product decisions. Companies that develop, market, and sell products and solutions make strategic and ongoing tactical decisions. They decide what features to include in their products, what messages they will use to communicate the value of their products, what marketing tactics they will use, what prospective customers they will target, and many day-to-day choices. Whether or not these decisions are deliberate or ad hoc, most companies use some combination of the following ways of making product decisions. (A downloadable "map" that summarizes the product decision landscape is included at the end of this article.) Customer Wants Product decisions based on feature requests, focus groups, and what prospects and customers say they want. Companies are selling products to ...

Is Customer Development Pseudoscience?

The “Science” of Lean Startup Lean startup practitioners embrace the scientific method, seeking the "truth" about what business model and strategy will lead to product success. We do so by: Formulating hypotheses Crafting and running experiments to test them Learning from the experiments Iteratively feeding our learnings back into revised hypotheses Sounds pretty scientific, at least in spirit, doesn't it? Yet this process actually neglects a key ingredient in the scientists' mode of operation. To identify what’s missing, let’s examine “customer development”. Customer Development Steve Blank is one of the pioneers of the lean startup movement. He introduced into the lean startup lexicon the term “customer development”. Customer development consists of sessions and interactions with customers to test hypotheses. For example, a product manager might interview a prospect, asking if she agrees with the product manager’s hypotheses about the problems she faces or the ...

Cauvin

Search This Blog