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3rd time’s a charm: ProductCamp Atlanta is Back! Saturday 8/21/10.
Even though summer is almost over, it’s time for summer camp. With the second PCampATL behind us this winter, the 3rd installment is rapidly approaching for technology Marketers, Product Marketers and Product Managers. I’ve had the opportunity over the last couple of weeks to work with the team to put...
Develop content your buyer might actually scan…
Image by TheAlieness GiselaGiardino²³ via Flickr There is no shortage of stuff to write as marketers and nearly everyday someone is looking for a new piece, email blast or other “tweak” to content from us as product marketers. So we either edit, proof or create content daily so it is...
Do the work, do the math & the whole start-up thing just might work…
…according to David Cancel’s presentation from the lean start-up event in Boston. Data-Driven Startups View more presentations from David Cancel....
Sharing the the things I found for the day: The Difference Between Motion and Action Change The Way You See Profit How To Increase Sales With Laughter What Did You Really Do Today? Be Productive Over the Summer Slowdown The Problem With Influence What Matters More? What You Know or...
The funnel is dead, long live the loyalty loop….
Francois’ presentation below on the Hyper-social Organization provides some interesting insights into social and the benefits of changing your processes to be shared/social. The hyper social organization View more webinars from Francois Gossieaux....
Hypersocialbility: We need new stories for our products and brands
“Old, linear forms of storytelling are like going on a date and not letting the other person talk.” -Nicke Bergström As marketers, we have have always been storytellers whether it was looking to get alignment on your strategic roadmap , engaging your the people which buyer your product or looking...
Web Ink Now
Rob Barraco on the Dead, taping concerts, and building a fan base
Rob Barraco plays keyboards and vocals for Dark Star Orchestra. From 1999, Rob has been part of Phil Lesh and Friends and in 2002 he joined with the original members of the Grateful Dead for the Alpine Valley reunion shows......
Give back to your community: A marketing lesson from the Grateful Dead
The Grateful Dead frequently threw their support behind causes and ideas they believed in, especially anything related to improving life in their home base of San Francisco. This is an idea we discuss in chapter 18 of our book Marketing......
Grateful Dead book tour begins Monday. Join us!
Our book tour for Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead begins Monday July 26. Join me and Brian Halligan in our Follow the Band Book Tour (hashtag #GDbook) as we present the ideas in the book, do some Q&A, sign......
Efficiency and cranking stuff out
Joe Chernov emailed me: "My question to you is this: how are you SO prolific? Where do all of your ideas come from?" In the past few days about a dozen people have asked me how I can crank out......
New book! Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead
Our secret is out. For the past four months, I have been quietly working on a book with my friend Brian Halligan, CEO of HubSpot on a book project. Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn......
Join us on our Grateful Dead book Follow the Band Book Tour
Brian Halligan and I just announced our new book Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History Join us in our Follow the Band Book Tour (hashtag #GDbook) as we......
ack/nak
transitions: from here to there
Please point your browser-thingie to my new home on the intrawebs at http://www.thebobcorrigan.com"That's a mighty odd name."I think it's a perfectly reasonable one."Please explain."It has to do with the ambiguity of names. There are on the order of 200 other Bob Corrigans running around out there, and I needed a way...
best: product management manual
What is the best instruction manual for product managers?Yee, Wong Herbert. Hamburger Heaven. New York: Scholastic, 2001.(Amazon link)In a review of this fine book, C. Posey wrote:My son was delighted while we read this book. Tickled by fantastic illustrations and disgusting delicacies, he enjoyed the book from front...
boo: spammers make commenting on ack/nak harder
I'm flattered that so many of you continue to read ack/nak. Really, I am.I am very flattered by the notes I get from product managers, sheep wranglers, lint sorters, long-distance rope haulers, bulb jugglers and the French. I enjoy your notes. I encourage you to continue to...
A week or so ago it became official - the gentleman who hired me retired.The gentleman he reported to has taken on the role of acting executive director - and I have been asked to take the role of acting deputy director.I've never held an "acting" role before. It's...
IF you've been brought into an organization as its first product manager, most likely you've spent your first 100 days figuring out the lay of the land.AND you've probably figured out that there are changes that need to be made in order for the product and perhaps the organization to...
Consider the following.You live in a neighborhood in a city. Your neighborhood may have three (3) restaurants. No more, no less.When you are tired / hung-over / lazy / inspired / hungry you may visit one (1) of these three (3) restaurants.This is not to say that there...
brainmates - product management people
5 Minutes with Fred Lindberg, Innovation Management Specialist
Fred and I met at a Product Management conference. At the time, he was the Senior Vice President of Innovation at Experian. Fred is now moving on to other exciting innovation and Product Management projects but before he gets busy and right back into solving market problems, I nabbed...
Social media: Challenges & opportunities for product managers and marketers
For the past twelve months, brainmates has been conducting research into social media within the context of product management and product marketing. We have conducted interviews with clients and members of the wider product management community, experiments with using social media for our own operations and by keeping across the deluge...
5 Minutes with Holly Vaughn, Head of Product Management Practices SITA
I had the pleasure of meeting and hearing Holly Vaughn speak at the 2010 Product Management Leadership Summit in New York in May. Holly is from an organisation called SITA, the leading provider of telecommunications and IT solutions for airports. Some of SITA’s offerings include a 24 x 7 global...
Capturing the Right Customer Insights
Our recent Product Talks investigated one of the most significant yet often highly neglected or misunderstood areas of Product Management – market research. A deep understanding of our customers and their needs pave the way for solid business cases and effective strategies for market segmentation, pricing, and...
Apply Now: Financial Product Management Role
A large Fund Manager is looking for an additional headcount to drive new initiatives within their Product platform team. This is a brand new role which will be working on a marketing leading platform. Although it was launched in the last 3 years, it has already exceeded expectation within the...
Social Media in Product Management and Marketing – Survey Results 2010
brainmates recently conducted a survey into the use of social media by Product Managers and marketers. Functional applicaitons of social media in product management and marketing Rather than ask about what tools and technologies were used, we asked respondents to state their use of social media in four functional applications as well...
Product Management News
Netezza Develops Migrator Product to Streamline Migration from Oracle Data Warehouses
Netezza Corporation, a provider of data warehouse, analytic and monitoring appliances, announced the introduction of its Netezza Migrator product, which allows organizations to run software proprietary to Oracle databases on Netezza....
ServiceSource Names Industry Veteran Ganesh Bell as Executive Vice President of Products
Mr. Bell will spearhead key global product management, strategy and development, encompassing all cloud services offerings....
Brocade Continues to Drive Innovation for Next-Generation Data...
Brocade today announced a set of innovative HP-branded Brocade 8 Gbps Fibre Channel data centre and server connectivity products and a virtualization solution bundle....
Improve IT Security With Server Virtualization
How do you manage and measure the IT security of an enterprise? A new approach from Core Security is aiming to provide an answer a system that will be able to leverage both physical and virtual assets to test IT security -- and hitting a potentially staggering number of likely...
OnForce Appoints Bill Lucchini as Chief Operating Officer
In his new role at OnForce, Lucchini will oversee the development, product, and marketing organizations, and will focus on aligning strategic goals with operational activities....
Informatica: Informatica Marketplace Opens to Much Fanfare from...
REDWOOD CITY, Calif, Jun 23, 2010 -- Informatica Corporation the world's number one independent leader in data integration software, today announced the opening of the Informatica Marketplace....
Tech Product Management
If Serious Gaming Can Improve Politics, Why Not The Technology Business?
As readers of this blog know, I see a lot of benefits in using serious gaming to make better product and development decisions. Consulting firms like Enthiosys and Booz Allen Hamilton use different serious gaming approaches, but they ultimately have the same aim: Avoid the traps that we mere humans...
Report From HP Software Universe: Is HP Software Going To Boldly Go Where No One Has Been Before?
By Peter O'Neill Last week, I was in Washington working for HP at their Software Universe event. I moderated their customer press conference, had several strategy meetings with HP execs, continued my preview of a new product they’re planning, and even got to play golf with three of their execs. Life can...
Thoughts On The Enterprise 2.0 Conference
In the wake of the Celtics' fourth-quarter collapse that gave Kobe Bryant his fifth ring, I am endeavoring to find positive things to focus on instead of post-game analysis, which brings me to the Enterprise 2.0 Conference. This was my second year attending the event (which is conveniently located 10...
Help Us Benchmark “Social Maturity”
We recently embarked on a Forrester-wide research project to benchmark the use of social technologies across enterprise organizations. Why is this important? Well, as you may know, we cover social technologies from a wide range of perspectives – from roles in marketing to IT to technology professionals. We find that...
Nemo Versus Scotty: Who's The Better Innovator?
Since I've been talking a lot about innovation, both in print and in person, I've been running through countless metaphors to make this point or that about the innovation process. My latest inspiration uses some well-known fictional characters to encapsulate the difference between invention and adoption: Who is the better...
Your Roadmap Should Make Someone Unhappy
There's a great post about dysfunctional product roadmaps at Product Beautiful. I'll add a couple of other types to the list:read more...
Rocket Watcher Product Marketing for Startups
How Do CMOs Define Product Marketing?
I spoke at the Forrester Product Marketing Summit this week which was attended by CMO and VP level Product Marketing leaders. As a group we attempted to define Product Marketing. Here's what we came up with. Related posts:Product Marketing vs. Brand Marketing Product Marketing: Increasingly Important A New Marketing Framework ...
Product Marketing & Social Media Skills: Talk is Cheap
If you are hiring a marketer and you want social media skills, how important is it that they are heavy social media users? Pretty darn important. Related posts:Trafcom News Podcast: Product Management and Social Media Your Company Can Ignore Social Media but You Can’t Product Marketing: Increasingly Important ...
Product Marketing: Increasingly Important
Product marketing is misunderstood. When most people think of "marketing" they don't think of product marketing - they think of branding and communications or advertising. However as companies increase their spending on social media and digital marketing it may be time to invest more in product marketing. Related posts:Trafcom...
Infographics: 5 Tips for Product Marketers
Infographics have been popular with journalists for years but increasingly marketers are using them to communicate complex ideas or data in an engaging manner that also doesn't take up a lot of space. Here are some things marketers should think about when creating Infographics Related posts:5 Not Obvious Reasons Product...
What’s Market Strategy and Why Should you Care?
Market strategy is one of those things that even marketers don't always understand. Your Market Strategy outlines how you plan on moving from early adopters to more mainstream market acceptance. Here's a primer. Related posts:Choosing a New Vertical Market 3 Signs Your Market Segmentation Might Suck Microsoft and the Market for...
Twitter: Is Marketing Doing it Wrong?
Marketers love Twitter these days for a list of reasons including using it converse with customers and influencers, sharing content and driving traffic to websites. There has been so much talk about Twitter in Marketing circles, you would think that everyone would have it figured out by now. ...
The Experience is the Product | Better product management and products
Some Startup QA Tactics – Browsers, Emails, and Bugs
We recently opened up beta for our new KISSinsights product. Yay! Like many small startups, we don’t have a dedicated QA tester, and we don’t have fully automated testing practices in place. Here’s some of what we did well (and not so well) to get ready for release beyond ourselves. Browser Support Pick...
OK – you did your customer development homework. You found a market who knew they had a problem and were willing to invest time and/or money in solving it. You built a product that aligned with your customers’ pains and priorities – …but somehow, people still don’t seem to be very...
3 Marketing Mistakes You’re Probably Making
First of all, a tiny rant: Marketing is, fundamentally, telling people that you can make their lives better because you have a solution to their problem. There is lots of expensive, complicated, and sometimes fluffy stuff that can come into play later on, but I cringe when I hear entrepreneurs or...
FAQ: Customer Development for Product Managers
What is customer development? Customer development is the opposite of product development, or “if we build it, they will come” thinking. We all know that’s not the case – often you build it, and no one cares. The idea is to validate that you have a market, with problems, that they’re willing...
Customer Development Interviews How-to: What You Should Be Learning
I wrote earlier about finding people for your customer development interviews. Once you’ve found people for your interviews, you’re probably thinking, “Great, I can ask them if they’d use my product!” Wrong. OK, you’re thinking, “then what should I ask them?” A better way to think about it is, what should I be learning...
The Accidental Product Manager
Product Manager Resume Creation: Back To The Future?
It is the time of year that a product manager’s thoughts turn to … searching for a new job? During the global recession, things were so bad for so long that most product managers were just trying to hold on to the jobs that they already had. Now that things...
Product Manager Job Hunt: Do You Have The Cover Letter Covered?
When it comes time for you to go looking for your next Product Management job you’ll be facing a major decision. I’m not talking about if you should use online resume services or go with a headhunter. I’m not even talking about if creating a more technical or a more...
Free Training For Product Managers In Chicago: ProductCamp Chicago
David Radzialowski, one of the organizers of ProductCamp Chicago reached out to me the other day and said “Hey, if you think that you’re such hot stuff, why don’t you come and speak at the ProductCamp that we’re putting in in Chicago?” I’m always a sucker for taking on a...
Up In Smoke: How Do Cigarette Product Managers Do It?
How times have changed! As little as 10 years ago, cigarette smoking was no big deal – lots of people did it. Since then a lot has changed and a lot of people have very strongly held views on the topic. No matter which side of the fence you fall...
Oh, Oh – What To Do When You Don’t Get That Promotion
Things are tough all over. If you were counting on getting a promotion this year, you might want to scale your hopes back just a bit. A lot of product managers are discovering that their career plans are having to be put on hold. Maybe we should spend some time...
To Get Your Next Job, You Need To Know How Firms Hire Product Managers
So what’s your job status? You either currently have a job (yea!) or you are looking for you next one (yea!) There is no shortage of job search advice out there on the Internet and otherwise. They’ve pretty much said all that there is to say about resumes, dressing nicely,...
Tyner Blain
The High Costs of Building the Wrong Product
As product managers, we talk about creating the right solutions with our products. Understanding the very real problems our customers face, understanding the very real opportunities our markets present, and manifesting that understanding in a product roadmap. Other than being “not as good,” how expensive is it to build the...
Most companies ignore their markets – and they will struggle to survive. Some companies listen to their markets – and they have an opportunity to succeed. You have the opportunity to understand your market, and transform it into your market – but you can’t get there just by listening. Don’t listen...
“For what one idea do you want your product to stand in the mind of your customer?” I heard Roger Cauvin ask that question at the most recent ProductCamp Austin [correction - he said it here - thanks Roger], and the quote has been jumping to the front of my...
Consistency in writing requirements is important on two levels – strategic and tactical. Tactically, you need to write your requirements with grammatical consistency, so that potentially ambiguous statements will be interpreted similarly. You also need to write requirements that are logically consistent, so that you avoid “impossible” requirements and gaps...
April Dunford just presented Startup Marketing 101 at DemoCamp Toronto. Great ideas from the ‘marketing and your startup’ point of view. I’ve often said that product managers and product marketers care about much of the same market data, they just do different things with it. The idea of minimal feature...
ProductCamp Austin Spring 2010
ProductCamp Austin is here again! The Spring 2010 session is this Saturday, 27 March 2010 at the AT&T Conference Center on the UT campus in downtown Austin. Make sure and say hi when you’re there! ProductCamp ProductCamp is an unconference for product managers and product marketing professionals. This is the fourth time...
GrandViewCentral
Portfolio Management Step 2-Identify Selection Criteria
The second step of portfolio management is to identify selection criteria. This step is one of the most critical steps to the process of selecting what you should do out of everything you could do. When presented with any choice we immediately begin to take into consideration our selection criteria....
I believe Communities of Practice could help the product management community at large. Communities of Practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly. Three characteristics are crucial: •The domain: A community of practice is...
Linking PMO to the Strategic Plan
This week I attended a PMI chapter meeting/luncheon here in Austin. I couldn’t get twitter working so I feel a little ripped off that I couldn’t discuss what was being presented with anyone while it was being presented. I get a lot of insight from talking with...
Consensus or voting, which one do I use?
A lot of day to day activities within product management are about gathering and analyzing information. Information such as: your products potential market, your company’s strategic direction, competitive intelligence, your company’s capabilities and core competencies, resource availability, market trends, problem statements, business opportunities, requirement and feature status, etc. Most of...
Book Review: Making Innovation Work
Making Innovation Work: How to Manage It, Measure It, and Profit from It by Davila, Epstein, Shelton is a great book. Last year I was working with a client that was trying to incorporate the best practices in this book in his organization. It was an interesting experience, and I learned...
Strategic Roadmaps: New Product Strategy
In a recent webinar on the Product Management View, we had a discussion about Roadmapping. There was a lot of discussion about creating a strategic roadmap. In the product management world, typically this isn’t the type of roadmap product managers are responsible for. A roadmap is often thought of as...
The Productologist
The Return of the Product Management Reader: 27May10
Image by mbgrigby via Flickr Trying to get back into the swing of things. I’m starting it off slowly, so there are only 6 in today’s list of magical Product Management posts. Don’t feel bad it you didn’t make the list this time. I was looking for something specific and only...
Remember Why Our Opinion is Interesting, but Irrelevant
Way back when (does Webvan ring a bell?), I attended one of Pragmatic Marketing’s fantastic Product Management seminars. Going into the session, I thought I knew 98% of what Product Management was about, but after attending the class, I realized it was really 98% that I DIDN’T know about Product Management. One of the great...
Review: Timbuk2 Commute 2.0 Laptop Messenger Bag
I have been doing a bit more business travel lately as part of my recent job change (Well, it’s been over a year, so maybe not so recent). Not a problem, really, more of a shift, but I had noticed some shortcomings of my old laptop bag, and that, combined...
Product Management Reader: 14Dec09
This is probably the last Product Management Reader of the year. Not for sure yet, but probably. To keep you busy through the end of the year, here is an extra wonderful list of stuff to fill your days with. Unless you’ve got something better to do, which I HIGHLY...
Forrester Product Management Open House
Last week (3Dec09), Forrester Research Analyst Tom Grant led a discussion on Agile in Technology and how it pertains to Product Management. I took some copious notes on the discussion and thought I would share them here. Be forewarned, some of this may seem a bit cryptic. I was typing in...
For Those Interested in Social Media
And these days, who isn’t? My company is having a webinar this month covering how to put together a Social Media strategy for your company or organization. If you (or your company) haven’t figured out to monitor and utilize social media channels, then this is a good primer. It will be...
enthiosys agile product management
Jason Tanner Brings Innovation Games® to Øredev
Øredev Developer Conference Malmö, Sweden November 8-12, 2010 www.oredev.org/2010/courses Jason Tanner, Enthiosys President, will be teaching a two-day course, “Innovation Games for Agile Teams: Serious Games for Market Research and Collaboration” at the Øredev Developer Conference in Malmö, Sweden this coming November......
Every few weeks, I find myself itching to play the product management “heavy.” This is the moment when I want to yell ”...because I’m the product manager and I said so!” Not an ideal strategy for PMs or parents. Here’s a more productive approach, with input from many other PMs......
Innovation Games® Practitioner Course Comes to Munich
June 17-18, 2010 Munich, Germany Venue TBD http://www.it-agile.de/innovation_games.html IT-Agile and The Innovation Games Company are bringing the Innovation Games Practitioner Course to Munich......
Innovation Games® for Agile Teams Class in Research Triangle
June 4, 2010 Cary, NC Embassy Suites Raleigh-Durham/Research Triangle Register: http://innovationgamesagile.eventbrite.com/ Enthiosys President Jason Tanner will be holding a one-day Innovation Games® for Agile Teams class in the Research Triangle on June 4, 2010......
Luke Hohmann at ITSMA’s 2010 Marketing Leadership Forum
ITSMA’s 2010 Marketing Leadership Forum: The New Vision for Marketing May 25-26, 2010 / May 24 – Evening Welcome Reception Westin Verasa, Napa, CA ITSMA has announced that Luke Hohmann, founder and CEO of Enthiosys and The Innovation Games Company, and author of three books, including Innovation Games: Creating Breakthrough Products through Collaborative...
Certification is Discrimination
With all of the intense discussions about certifications in the Agile Community, I thought it would be good to share an article that James Bach and I wrote in 1999 when Ed Yourdon challenged us to take a stand. This was in the days just before Y2K, and there was...
ProductMarketing.com
Project management: the blame game
http://blogs.attask.com/blog/strategic-project-management/0/0/project-managem... "Informed decision-making comes from a long tradition of guessing and then blaming others for inadequate results."--Scott Adams Posted via email from Steve Johnson on product management...
I received a confidential internal document today via email... sent to the wrong recipient. It seems like today's email programs should be smart enough to question this. Imagine a new feature: when I mail a document with "confidential" in the text or attachment, check that all recipients are in the...
Can I pay you a premium fee for a premium service - PLEASE?
Yesterday, after one too many unanswered tech support emails, I invested in a new web hosting provider. The new provider is around 400% more expensive than the previous one, but their customer service is extremely good. I had already researched them months ago and was really impressed. via jimsmarketingblog.com Nice...
Don Norman's talk from Business of Software 2009
Imagine you’re on the first slide of your powerpoint presentation and want to move to the next slide. Your remote control has two buttons. They are unmarked, but one button points up and one button points down. Which button do you press? Now, spend five minutes watching this video of...
Rules and Laws Product Managers Should Understand (part 1)
there are a whole set of laws and rules that virtually all software product managers should know. via onproductmanagement.net Saeed looks at laws from Newton, Pareto, and others that apply to product management. Nice post! Posted via web from Steve Johnson on product management...
It's amazing what an engineer with too much idle time and too many legos can do! I want one! Posted via email from Steve Johnson on product management...
Effectivus Product Management
New Revenues from Existing Technology
effectivus helps client develop win-win partnerships Related posts:for technology companies technology portfolio Effectivus’s predictions for 2010’s technology products ...
How user interviews led to a new segmentation of a market. Related posts:Mari case study client list Matador ...
Authoritarian leadership and innovation
What has Korean Air flight 801 got to do with creativity and innovation in your company? Related posts:Mind the creative minds coaching Skin deep customer focus ...
Getting into the detail of how a product really meets a customer’s needs. Related posts:Make the tough stuff look simple Redboard Mind the creative minds ...
Why some businesses are scared of creativity and why they need to embrace it fully. Related posts:Invention, discovery and the role of collaboration What to do in a Recession? Get Lucky ...
Powerful people make better liars. I wonder if the same goes for organisations? Related posts:The Secret of Good Marketing? Give Something Back! Magic Marketing Invideate ...
The Cranky Product Manager
Product Management, Czech Style
Ah, Prague. How fondly the Cranky Product Manager remembers you. Such a beautiful city. Such wonderful espresso. Such fantastic Czech beer. Plus amazing architecture. *sigh* And even better, Prague is where the Cranky Product Manager first learned the wicked awesome English word defenestration, as in "the defenestration of hotshot engineers is...
Yep, the Cranky Product Manager has been creeping around the blog-o-sphere for FOUR years now. Check out the very first post. Four years. That's a long time. Don't know whether to celebrate or cry. Probably cry. Because even though this blog has been around long enough to graduate from college, it's still...
A Blog You Should Read: Ribbonfarm
Call the Cranky Product Manager a laggard or whatever. But she has only just learned about the excellent blog, Ribbonfarm, by Venkatesh Rao. It is a blog about "business and innovation and stuff," and the Cranky Product Manager just spent the evening digging through its archives. This blog gets the Cranky...
Quick Clarification and How to Convince Your Boss to Get You Training
Just wanted to clarify the Cranky Product Manager's previous post on training. The Cranky Product Manager is NOT against training for product managers. Not at all. In fact, she HEARTS training, and any effort product professionals make to improve their skills and knowledge. There are some really great classes out there! (see...
No Excuses Product Management (Part 2)- Stop Whining About Training
In this post, The Cranky Product Manager continues her vendetta against all those sniveling product managers who trot out pathetic excuses for NOT DOING THEIR FREAKIN' JOBS. This is Part 2 of here NO EXCUSES PRODUCT MANAGEMENT series. Enjoy Part 1 here. There will be at least parts 3 and 4...
No Excuses Product Management (Part 1)
As the Esteemed Crankerati already know, the Cranky Product Manager has been creeping around the software product management universe for quite some time. Long enough that perhaps she should replace her blog's masthead photo with a less youthful and more saggy derriere. In that extended time, the Cranky Product Manager has...
Lead on Purpose
I heard the statement “feedback is the breakfast of champions” while listening to a recent podcast. There is a lot of truth to that statement. After hearing it I started to break it down to see if I could come up with a new statement for Lead on Purpose readers: Feedback:...
Book Review: Here Comes Everybody
“Revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technologies–it happens when society adopts new behaviors.” Clay Shirky, author of the book Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations, provides an eye-opening look at how technology is changing the way we think, work and live. The book helped me understand more clearly...
Five questions to ask each week
I ran across a great audio blog post by Mark Sanborn where he poses five questions we should ask ourselves at the beginning of each week. These questions serve as a guide to live by design and not just react to things as they come. They will improve your personal...
One of the most amazing sports records in the history of all sports is 401 wins and 9 losses. This is the career record of Larry Gelwix, coach of the Highland High rugby team (Salt Lake City) for more than three decades. This team was featured in the recent movie Forever Strong....
This past week I had the pleasure of attending a social media summit. This half-day event included three speakers: Mitch Joel, author of Six Pixels of Separation and Julien Smith and Chris Brogan, co-authors of Trust Agents. The presentations were excellent. I had the privilege of spending a few minutes talking with Chris; he was an...
One of the key tenets of leadership is the learning. Great leaders are learners. They read voraciously. They write and teach what they learn. Learning is as much a part of their life as eating. These are a few of my favorite quotes that illustrate the importance of learning: In...
On Product Management
Rules and Laws Product Managers Should Understand (part 2)
Continuing from Part 1, here are more Rules and Laws to help Product Managers in their jobs. Thackara’s Laws John Thackara can best be described as a thinker, designer and innovator. He defined 2 laws (in his 2005 book In the Bubble) that are probably more obvious to all of...
Rules and Laws Product Managers Should Understand (part 1)
First, let me say this post was inspired by a tweet from the CrankyPM asking the following question. (click to enlarge) Now, I’m pretty certain she was looking for answers like Section 508, Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, Open Source licensing etc. But those are all pretty boring subject areas, quite honestly. As...
ProductCamp Toronto 2010 roundup
It’s been about 10 days since we help ProductCamp Toronto Spring 2010. Despite being a bright sunny and unusually warm day here in Toronto, a large crowd gathered downtown to hear a number of speakers talk on topics related to Product Management, Startups, Innovation and Marketing. You can see the full...
Happy (belated) 3rd Birthday to us (yet again)!
3 years and 3 belated birthdays… Year 1 – Happy (belated) birthday to us! Year 2 – Happy (belated) birthday to us (again)! It’s become a bit of a tradition, missing our birthday by a day or two. Officially it was June 1, 2010. Well, no one else remembered. By my count we...
Hi, We’re going to be doing some maintenance on the blog in the coming days. Most of it should be transparent to you, but we are moving hosting providers so the site may be down for a short period while the various DNS settings are propogated wherever they need to go. But...
From only 3 events a couple of years ago — Silicon Valley, Austin, Toronto — the number of ProductCamps has grown steadily. In fact, there are 3 events in the next 8 days, and there are 9 events on 3 continents in the next 2 months! I find that simply...
Product Beautiful: Building Product Management by Paul Young
A good roadmap informs the business, guides tactics, and prevents us from distractions. Unfortunately there are problems with how roadmaps are built today....
Too Hot for TV! BANNED from ProductCamp!
We recently completed Austin's fourth ProductCamp about 10 days ago. I'm always humbled by the PCA planning team and the volunteers that step up to make ProductCamp Austin awesome. Because of ProductCamp Austin's successes, many other leaders in other cities have been inspired to make a...
ProductCamp Austin Spring 2010
ProductCamp Austin is back! If in Austin on March 27 we would love for you to join us for Austin's 4th ProductCamp....
By now, many of you have been to ProductCamps in or around your city. The ProductCamp brand has exploded – there have now been ProductCamps in well over a dozen U.S. cities, at least 3 countries, and 2 continents! ProductCamp is an exciting, fun event that everyone should participate in,...
ProductCamp Wrap-up, and Introducing ProductPotluck!
ProductCamp has been a great success. Now, to extend that experience between camps, we are introducing a new mini-version of ProductCamp called ProductPotluck....
ProductCamp Austin Summer 2009
ProductCamp, the free unconference for marketing and product management, is teaming with the McCombs School of Business to return to Austin for its Summer edition! ProductCamp is a must-go event for marketing and product management professionals. ProductCamp is a free, collaborative, gathering for interesting, smart people to network and learn...