In 2017, I attended the five-day executive education course Product Management at the Haas School of Business at Berkeley, California. I met and learned from exceptional people and recently reviewed my notes. Here is a summary.
1. Attitude in PM
Sales: Always be closing (ABC)
PM: Always be investigating (ABI)
Always ask why:
“I need to build a bridge.” Why?
“I need to cross the river.” Why?
“I need to deliver a message.”
2. PM capabilities every company needs
Sensing: what value am I providing for whom, understanding strategic environment, evaluate business model.
Seizing: how am I creating, delivering and capturing value? Segmenting, targeting, positioning, pricing, product lifecycle management, portfolio planning.
Transforming: how am I communicating value? Iterating, testing business model, creating and communicating vision, strategic negotiations and influence.
3. Understand your target group
In the past, Lego was mainly played by boys. So Lego decided to do some research, they concluded the following:
Boys seek goal achievement, thus finishing the task within a couple of hours. Therefore, Lego for boys comes with simple characters (policemen vs criminal), and that’s all they need to know.
However, girls tend to role-play with friends, then pause and play again later. They empathize with the role. That’s why Lego for girls comes with stories about characters.
4. Personas
Most important parts of personas: what are their goals, what frustrates them, what job needs to get done? See McDonald's example below.
5. Positioning
Three ways: unique, better, cheaper
Perception is driving behaviour
The category you are choosing matters
For {target segments}
the {brand / products}
Is the {product category}
that {key points of difference}
6. What’s the job to be done?
Clayton Christensen describes (HBR article here) that there are some people out there who hire a McDonald's milkshake to get a particular job done. It turns out about half the milkshakes are sold before 8:30 am to people who have a long and boring drive to work. A milkshake lets them stay engaged with life and even though they weren't hungry yet, they knew they would be by 10 am. So bananas and bagels wouldn't get the job done: either they are gone too quickly or challenging to eat while driving. And they'd be also hungry much sooner.
Another example would be headphones these days. Which ones you buy depends heavily on what job you need them to get done, e.g. running, calling, commuting.
7. Getting into PM
As long you aren't viewed as the expert on the customer, you are not yet the PM.
If not, share monthly updates about the customer, then you earn the seat at the table.
8. Managing PMs
There is no perfect PM; when you hire, see it as a portfolio exercise: what is the skillset I am missing? Specialist, generalist, junior with fresh eyes, senior with experience etc.
It’s your job to make sure your teams understand all three layers: purpose, autonomy and mastery.
About cross-functional teams:
"I don’t care about what Sales want. I want their expertise before opinions are expressed."
Start with low emotions (facts), not high (opinions).
You need a facilitator.
9. Miscellaneous
Customer: someone who doesn’t have an alternative.
Pricing challenge: can you double the prices of some of your products?
Design for extremes. They usually articulate their needs better.
If your value is not clear for the customer, your price will always be too high.
A business model describes the rationale of how companies capture creates and delivers value.
Understand the importance of churn. 3% churn 5bn annual revenue business means losing 150 million a year.
Don't assume that competition understands the customer.
And lastly, think differently: When people complain that the elevator is too slow, put mirrors into it.