As product managers, our workload intensity tends to be cyclical and sometimes these cycles can stack up. I’ve had a hectic couple of months, which explains the lack of new posts recently. I thought you might be interested in a few coping strategies I’ve used to keep my head above water.
Link of the day: MindJet Connect
Hurray! MindJet has made a free, cloud-based version of its mindmapping tool available and it’s lovely to use. It’s now a much better alternative to FreeMind (sorry guys), and being browser-based, avoids any corporate IT restrictions on installing software.
16: You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone – Joni Mitchell
I’m writing about one hundred things I’ve learned about being a product manager.
People value something most when they’ve just lost it or come close to doing so. If your product prevents this happening, you need to save your client this ball-ache by helping them remember how much they value what they have now so that they don’t take it for granted.
15: Product management is selling
I’m writing about one hundred things I’ve learned about being a product manager.
Contrary to what you may think, most of product management is actually selling. You are continually selling new product concepts, ideas for improvement as well as pitches for projects. What you may not realise is that what most people think is selling isn’t actually selling. Selling is listening, understanding, empathy and only then does persuasion factor in.
Drowning in documentation? Start swimming – Part 2
Does this sound familiar?
- Write document ‘A’
- Copy most of its contents into template ‘B’
- Rework same content into slideshow ‘C’
- Copy slide images into document ‘D’
- PDF and circulate an executive summary of document ‘D’ for feedback from EVERYONE IN THE COMPANY
- File documents A-D in a folder no-one will ever inspect again
If so, read on…
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