By Stewart Rogers June 06, 2009

10 Secrets to Great Product Management

Who Am I?

• Stewart Rogers – Product Management Consultant with Ryma (over 100 product management process deployments)

• Previous experience in Corporate Strategy with leading Canadian financial services company and in Product Management with i2 Technologies.

• Recognized industry thought leader on product management best practices

Voted one of Five Most Important Product Management Personalities on Twitter

• Check out my blog…. http://www.strategicproductmanager.com

http://grandview.rymatech.com/

Where I work…

Company

Products

Community

• Blogs: http://product-management.alltop.com

• Product Management Webinars: http://grandview.rymatech.com/pmv/webinars

• Product Management Events: http://www.strategicproductmanager.com/events

• Product Management Book Club: http://www.booksprouts.com/club/show/426

• Twitter:

• http://twitter.com/StewartRogers (me)

• http://www.cindyalvarez.com/learning/product-managers-on-twitter

• Upcoming ProductCamps: New York (July), Austin (August), Seattle (October), Boston (November), Toronto (fall)

Product Management Resources

“participants in the conference leading all discussion sessions.”

• Agree / Disagree

• Additional commentary (share your experiences)

• Additional questions

Help Me Help You

Call Reports

• Validate assumptions (or special projects)

• Discover new opportunities

• Only 30% of product management

visit customer sites(Pragmatic Marketing’s

2009 survey)

Call Reports…

http://www.strategicproductmanager.com/2009/05/22/the-strategic-family-expands-to-customer-visitsRead: The Strategic Family Expands to Customer Visits

Watch and learn

• Observe your customers in action

• Determine why they do certain things

• Be honest in your desires to learn

(People fear change)

Observe…

Be mindful customer interviews vs. user observations- Constrained answers

Roadmap

• Feature vs. Release-based

• Strategize your Roadmap

Two take home points

• Most important deliverable

• Review weekly

Manage Roadmaps…

Ask yourself WHY before you…

• Respond to that email

• Attend that meeting

• Plan that feature

– Input processed to Output

Think…

Be mindful of being the demo’er and enhancement manager

Product Management defines the price of your products

• Only element to produce revenue

• Implies value

• The price today will determine the price tomorrow

• Stop discounting

Own your pricing…

http://www.pragmaticmarketing.com/publications/magazine/3/5/0507ds1_1Read: Pricing for Software Product Manager by Daniel Shefer

Win / Loss

• Key and missing features

• Sales process problems (#1)

Do Win/Loss Analysis…

Win/Loss Analysis *WILL* be a career differentiator.

http://www.strategicproductmanager.com/2009/04/30/win-loss-analysis-resources/Read: Win Loss Analysis Resources

To understand the problem, one must document problem

• “… innovation occurs at the boundaries of organizations and industries where the problems and needs of users can be linked together in a creative process that challenges both.”

• Peer reviews

• Find time!

Write Problem Statements…

Product Management is 90% influence

• People and relationships

• Enable team members to be creative

• Share your thoughts & reasoning

• Be a coach and catalyst

• Offer feedback

Be a leader…

http://leadonpurposeblog.comRead Lead on Purpose (blog)

Metrics help you make decisions

Vanity vs. Actionable Metrics

It is all about metrics!

• Revenue!• Customer Satisfaction • Defects / Bugs• Velocity• Usage statistics

Measure Measure Measure…

Read: Vanity Metrics vs. Actionable Metrics by Eric Rieshttp://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/05/19/vanity-metrics-vs-actionable-metrics/

Who the buyers are

• Key for Product Marketers

• Know background, daily activities, and current solutions

for their problems

Who the users are

• Goals and behavior of a real group of users

Define your Personas…

http://www.buyerpersona.comRead: Buyer Persona Blog

*Author of personacreation.com

Stewart Rogers

Product Management Consultant

http://twitter.com/StewartRogers

http://www.strategicproductmanager.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/rstewartrogers

Thank you

Where to find me...