Practical Product Management · 2024-07-10 · 36 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
31 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
Two seasoned product leaders reflect on launches that succeeded and failed, drawing practical lessons that shaped their careers. Marilyn highlights a small cross-functional team that discovered a breakthrough customer support solution - combining screen recording, console logs, and video - after an engineer's weekend hack reframed the problem around outcome metrics rather than features. Speaker A describes empowering engineers to find high-impact, low-hanging-fruit improvements within a clear long-term roadmap, which generated momentum and eliminated the need to artificially manufacture urgency. Both emphasize iterative wins over big-bang two-year bets. Their shared failure - a two-year, scope-creep-plagued product that launched but never realized its potential - taught them to ruthlessly hone customer segments, resist the temptation to build for all platforms (HTML5 apps on mobile), and avoid matrix organizational structures where decision-making is diffused across 18 people and multiple dotted lines. Marilyn's second major win came from inheriting a team that hadn't shipped in three years; by applying Conway's Law, clarifying four strategic big rocks, and reorganizing around clear ownership, she moved the team from zero launches to three major releases in the first year and monthly deployments thereafter. Both speakers stress that successful product leadership means adapting frameworks to context, never executing playbooks identically twice, and building psychologically safe, empowered teams aligned to a shared north star.
Uncontrolled scope creep, inability to commit to a specific customer subset or problem, trying to make the product work across all platforms (HTML5 apps on mobile and native OS), and a highly matrix organizational structure with ~18 decision-makers and 7-8 highly paid executives all believing they owned the decision.
She identified four strategic big rocks to focus on, reorganized the team around those discrete objectives following Conway's Law, broke up the codebase to match the new structure, and reduced decision-makers and complexity - resulting in three major launches in year one and monthly deployments thereafter, while cutting the budget in half.
An engineer created a proof of concept that let customers record their screen and send console logs to customer service engineers in real time, allowing them to see exactly what was happening and close tickets much faster - a patentable solution that solved the vague ticket-description problem.
By setting a clear long-term vision and mid-term roadmap, then empowering the team to find high-impact, low-friction improvements that moved toward those goals; small wins generated momentum naturally, and the team self-motivated once they experienced success rather than requiring artificial sense of urgency.
Matrix teams with overlapping roles, dotted lines, and shared decision-making create confusion about who is accountable, lead to unresolved conflicts where everyone disagrees but is also right in their own space, and slow product development by requiring extensive negotiation instead of clear ownership.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
A few reusable ideas surface (Conway's Law, big rocks, matrix team dysfunction, scope creep), but they're buried in vague reminiscing and mutual agreement with little depth or new angle on any of them.
Let's talk about Conway's Law, my friend. Uh, we shipped our org chart
the structure unlocks the power of the team
The 'business vs tech separation' failure pattern and the product-owner-as-job critique are moderately fresh takes, but most content recycles familiar product-management wisdom (empower small teams, avoid scope creep, iterate).
I think that people mistake job family with scrum actor role
air gaps between the teams because the teams, if they're healthy, will reach across and close the gap
Both speakers are clearly experienced product leaders with real turnaround stories, but there's no named guest, no verifiable track record, and it's just two hosts reminiscing anonymously.
I inherited, uh, a team that had not delivered in three years, was double over budget
when I build a team, I tend to build teams that have discrete roles and responsibilities
Everything is anonymized and abstract - no company names, no dollar figures, no product names. The one metric (three launches in year one, releases every two weeks, half the budget) is the rare concrete moment amid pervasive vagueness.
the first year I had that team, they had three major launches after not delivering for three years
Every two weeks, we were going to production with new things
This is two hosts violently agreeing with each other - almost no probing questions, no pushback, and constant 'I love that, I love that' affirmation rather than genuine inquiry or challenge.
I love that, I love that, I love that.
How about you give me one of yours?
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
In this episode, Leah and Marilyn dive into their personal experiences with the highs and lows of product management. They share captivating stories of successful product launches that significantly impacted their organizations and frustrating failures that came with costly lessons. Through these anecdotes, they highlight the importance of iterative development, the power of small, empowered teams, and the challenges of working within highly matrixed organizations. The discussion also covers the crucial role of clear roles and responsibilities and the importance of aligning the company’s vision and mission to create a supportive and collaborative environment for product development. Key Takeaways: Iterative Development: Iterative development is more impactful and valuable than big bang product launches, benefiting both the user and the business. Empowering Teams: Small teams with a common goal can achieve significant wins, creating momentum and a sense of urgency. Clear Roles: Highly matrixed organizations with unclear roles and responsibilities can hinder product development and lead to failures.
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Speaker A: Welcome to Practical Product Management, a podcast where we talk about how product management should be practical in context instead of just theory. And like this is what the book says, right Marilyn?
Speaker B: Exactly right.
Speaker A: So today we thought we would talk about big wins, big losers, big wins, losers. And like products that we've built that were like oo, that was a uh, that was a killer. I loved it. And products that were like w. That was a hard, hard fail.
Speaker B: So, so basically this is kind of a retro, isn't it?
Speaker A: Yes, exactly. What did you do that we. That you're proud of? What did you do that. What are you going to do next?
Speaker B: Exactly right. Mhm.
Speaker A: All right, you go first. Pick good or bad and dive in and then I'll um.
Speaker B: All right, I'd like. Let's go good. Let's start with the good. Leah. I think it's funny, um, because when I was thinking about this, I um, feel like some of my bad, my bads uh, are massive bads. Like they're pretty big. My wins tend to be a little smaller and more iterative. And I think that's sort of like my philosophy is um, you know, big bang products where you know, like it's going to come out in two years and it's going to be perfect. Like from my practical experience, it doesn't really work that way. Um, I think I see the most value and I'm the most proud when you get iterative development that actually makes a difference to both the user and the business, uh, as quickly as possible. Right. We like to, we'd like to. I've never been in a company that's
Speaker A: like spend, spend for two years. Right. Don't worry, you're, you know, Marilyn, you're going to fast. That's never been said.
Speaker B: Right. Perfect enough. Take another six months. No said. Nobody ever, nobody ever said that. Um, so let's, let's talk about win. I think the. One of the wins that I was most surprised by that still delights me to this day, um, was a very small team that I had that was really focused on. It was. It was a funny um, like customer service problem. M. Um and they needed the ability to uh, allow the customer to communicate, um, what they were, what they were seeing on their screen. It was very complex thing and um, and they needed to be able to like tell someone what was happening. And all of our customer service interactions were so vague that it was just frustrating. So tickets took a long time to, to close and, and these are, you know, these are customers that had financial transactions and you Know that they, like, might have had been a big impact. And so time was not our friend. Yeah. Um, and the product manager, who is running the area had done a really good job of getting the engineers really sort of like, soaked in what the customer was experiencing and filling what the person on the other side was experiencing and feeling. And they were iterating as a team, trying to figure something out. And one of the engineers went home for a weekend and he was a little bored. Um, and he hacked together a proof of concept that was just so fundamentally different than anything anybody had been thinking about.
Speaker A: Nice.
Speaker B: And came back the next Monday and was like, hey, guys, what do you think about this completely, um, different approach? It was focused on the outcome metrics, not the, like, not the feature or even the area of the product we were even looking at. Um, and it was just such a pop of genius that the team then took it and stuck it in front of users. Um, and it ended up being this really cool, patentable, um, solution that actually allowed the customer to do some fun things on their end to record the problem. And on the, on the other end, it actually, um, sent the video, it sent the console log so the engineers could actually see in real time what was happening. Um, and it ended up allowing us to close customer tickets, like, super quickly.
Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. That's awesome.
Speaker B: Uh, it was, it was awesome. Uh, so that. That's one of my favorites. How about you give me one of yours?
Speaker A: Let's see. I was, as you were talking, I was thinking same thing. Like, like the thing I'm thinking of. Like, I was real clear on where we were going sort of midterm and long term, and the short term was a little bit, like, still up for debate. And I wasn't real clear on it because I was still kind of new in terms of leading, leading the team, but. But I knew where we were headed, and I kept really reiterating where we were headed. And same thing. The team sort of went away, and when they came back, they were like, what if we do here this first? And I was like, oh, okay. Like, I was not thinking about that problem at all.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: And, And. But what they were doing, what they did, because I kept telling them, like, whatever we do, no throwaway work, it needs to be on the road to this. Like, this is where we're headed, but we need to start making some impact now. So what would that look like?
Speaker B: What do you.
Speaker A: What ideas do we have? And they sort of went away into a little, you know, a little room and came back to me with like, we think we should do this first. And I was like, okay, like, how long will that take? What are we, you know? And they set about doing it and it was a game changer. Like, it actually changed conversion. It changed how people were interacting with the product. And I was just like, I would not have thought, I would definitely not have thought of that myself. Right. For sure. Was not the person who was going to come up with that. And it was, it was like you said, it was impactful quickly. It was kind, uh, of low hanging fruit, but not so low that it was like boring. Right. It was still an actual innovation, an actual move forward. And it actually then allowed us to think about the milestones of like, what's the next step? And the next step and the next step that had been missing to get us to sort of the midterm into the long term plan. So I think that just like, it was like just the clip chipped away at it a bit in a way that I hadn't seen. Right.
Speaker B: I love that, I love that, I love that. Um, I feel like both of those examples were sort of the framing around that was like the vision mission was really set long, um, term. So the long term plan was there, the midterm like where we need to go, and the short term was a little more ambiguous. But everybody had a common understanding and was, um, free to, to try to, to figure out how to accelerate the team towards the midterm long term goal. So it's about unleashing the power of your team to a large degree.
Speaker A: Totally. And I think those. And I think what happens when we do that is then you, you have this. I, I'm a like really big believer in wins, like small wins. Then push sort of, you know, I don't want to measure velocity because I don't have to if we win. Yeah, right. I don't need to track velocity. If we get a couple of nice hits in there of winning, the team will push the velocity.
Speaker B: Right? Yeah.
Speaker A: And suddenly you get this little momentum and this like little, like nobody has to talk about sense of urgency once you have a winner. Yeah, right. Because I mean, if one more person says, I feel like the team doesn't have a sense of urgency, I'm gonna
Speaker B: be like, it's because their job sucks and they don't know what they're doing. They don't know how to solve a problem, like.
Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Why do they. What, what do you want them to be urgent about? We don't even give them anything cool to do.
Speaker B: Right. They're urgent about delivering another feature that they don't understand or care about.
Speaker A: Care about. Yay. Yeah. All right, so what about a, um, what about like a, Ah, a stinker?
Speaker B: Well, so I feel like we have a shared stinker, and it would be, it would be not addressing the elephant in the room to not talk about that one.
Speaker A: Okay.
Speaker B: That was a heartbreaker for me because I, you know, it. Ultimately, it was a product that actually launched. I mean, I remember the day it launched, I sat in, I sat in a shop at six o' clock in the morning, waiting for that first transaction to go through and that, like, you were on the phone watching the back end. Like, I think I cried when that first transaction went through.
Speaker A: Totally. Two years. Two years. I mean, I think every August I have a little bit of a twitch because we were late to August and finally launched that.
Speaker B: Like, I think I, I bought, read and fully understood the book Death March during that project.
Speaker A: Yes, yes. No, for sure. And I mean, when I look at that one, what I always, I mean, I'm the same. It's a, it's still sort of. There's a little, little gut punch every time that I think about it, because it had, it was probably the product in my career that had the most potential, if we nailed it, to, to change things, not, not just the thing we were doing, but things. Make things.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: Whole ecosystems. Right. And yet, man, the scope creep crushed us. Yeah.
Speaker B: Yeah, we never, we never really stuck to a, uh, customer subset, a problem. Um, we added people and complexity along the way, which brought in more. Well, we can't do that. We have to also add.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, and, oh, by the way, you can't launch without this.
Speaker A: And it's like, why not? Right?
Speaker B: Uncontrolled.
Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. I think that scope creep was a big thing for me. And when I think about it, just the, like, the, the fact that we didn't hone in on what we were great at and chase the hell out of that instead of chasing a competitor.
Speaker B: And then we tried to make it work for all things. So this was in the era of, uh, okay, so this was in the era of HTML5 apps, um, with a promise of, like, build it once and it'll work for everything. Uh, and then when you add the complexity of mobile devices and, you know, things having to work with sort of the, the native OS of the phone and the carrier, um, we just, we just, we just tried to build it all.
Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah. I mean, I, I, when I look back at, I built the platform behind it twice because I had time.
Speaker B: Ow, ow, ow.
Speaker A: Like when I first arrived on the scene, I had no time, but the front end was going to be ready and I needed to hustle around and get the back end built because it didn't exist.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: Um, and, and so I'm like, okay, like I was nervous and pretty soon I'm like, I got all the time in the world.
Speaker B: I got another year. They're just not saying it right.
Speaker A: And it was like, well, we're going to add a little of this and add a little of that. It wasn't like the pieces you were doing. It was like, we're going to add all these things in. But there I also, when I look back on it, some of it is I, I wish that I had been braver to say the hell are we doing? Like, I think I said that sometimes, but I think there was probably a moment in there when I should have been a little bit more like, this is a waste of time. What are we doing?
Speaker B: My, uh, what my biggest, I mean I have so many lessons learned out of this project. Um, my biggest lesson learned that has impacted my career, um, is that, uh, I don't like highly matrix teams.
Speaker A: Yes.
Speaker B: Um, I, when I build a team, I tend to build teams that have discrete roles and responsibilities, discrete areas of ownership and in fact sometimes air gaps between the teams because the teams, if they're healthy, will reach across and close the gap.
Speaker A: Yes.
Speaker B: Negotiate that gap. Um, highly matrix teams where no one is in charge and no one gets a say and everybody has an opinion and everybody, everybody disagrees but is also right in their own space. Um, I just think it's a recipe for disaster. I don't want to work in highly matrix teams. I don't want to lead highly matrix teams.
Speaker A: Right.
Speaker B: Um, and it's really hard to do, to do product development in environments like that. I think you set your teams up to fail, um, a lot.
Speaker A: So bad. It's so funny you say that because as you're saying it, I'm imagining in my head, I can close my eyes and there are like 18 of us standing around the launch. Go. No go table.
Speaker B: Yes.
Speaker A: In what planet do you need 18 people to make that decision?
Speaker B: And uh, we, huh, had to have a racy to decide who got to decide what piece.
Speaker A: Right. And I'm like, no. And really there were four people in the room who could decide. Yes.
Speaker B: Like, shouldn't there have been one?
Speaker A: Yes, totally. And I would have, I for my part, would have given up my vote if we would have Said, uh, this is one person's decision. You go, yeah. I would have been like, awesome. Carry on, Marilyn. Make the decision. I'm with you. I'll. I'll. I'm riding hard with you. Let's go. Right there were.
Speaker B: There were. There were probably like, I don't like, now I'm going to count. Uh, there are probably seven or eight extremely highly paid executives, um, who all believed it was their decision.
Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. And then there were another, like six or seven product managers in the room
Speaker B: at the minimum. There was more than that.
Speaker A: Counting TPMS. Like, that's so. I mean, like, like for 30 engineers. Right, right.
Speaker B: So let's talk about the ratio of doers to decision makers. Yeah.
Speaker A: Uh, yeah, totally. Totally. And I think when I think about that, that decision making framework and the, like you said, this really, this matrix framework. I'm with you. I mean, it's the reason why now anytime someone says, I have a dotted line to so and so, I'm like, I don't know. I'm not. I don't want to. Dotted line.
Speaker B: Is that a rope?
Speaker A: That's about to change. Exactly. Who's in charge of the space between the dots? That's what I. Ew. Yeah.
Speaker B: Way to have two bosses.
Speaker A: It's so confusing.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: And the worst. And I was. I was a dotted line pm. Right. I was in a totally separate space, but everybody was like, oh, you gotta ask so and so. And I'm like, I. I have too many bosses. I have no idea. All right.
Speaker B: You know, and unfortunately, corporations use dotted lines to try to solve problems, but they. They end up. They end up making more, I think.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Like, you won't.
Speaker A: You.
Speaker B: You don't want to choose thing A or thing B, so you choose a and a half. Like, it's not a choice.
Speaker A: No, no. And I mean, on the other hand, uh, like, like what you said, like, I learned so much that changed how I moved forward, how I led, um, how I thought about products, the next products I built, even there. Right. And I walked away from that experience with some of the best friends in my.
Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A: You know, you, Gino, others like that. I'm like, these are people. Like, you got a room full of crazy smart people and you want to work with them again.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: And that's also. I think that's part of the downfall of this, is that was a room full of re. A lot of brilliance.
Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker A: If we had been able to really harness the power of all that brilliance, we should have been able to be like, right yeah, but it was like. There's, like spinning in the same spot. So that was tough.
Speaker B: That was. That was a tough one.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, okay. Wins. So this is more of a. I, um, will tell you that, uh, this more from a leadership perspective, not a doer perspective. Um, I was fortunate enough. And it's funny, because now that I'm thinking about this, Leah, all of this comes back to, um, empowering small teams to go fast against a common gold. So, um, I inherited. I inherited, uh, a team that had not delivered in three years, was double over budget. Um, uh, you know, but the organization didn't know what was going on. There was no clarity, there was no transparency. Um, they were doing stuff, but nothing ever, ever launched. Three years.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, and, uh, they were like, yeah, Marilyn, good luck. Fix this. You gotta launch. Um, yeah. Ah, there was a consultant they'd hired in to, like, redesign it. And, like, everybody was in battle and everybody hated each other. It was awful. So hopped on that bandwagon, um, I had to, uh, like, get up to speed super fast, figure out what the team needed to do, stop a whole bunch of stuff because it didn't matter. Uh, give them a North Star, um, a set of what I would call, I call them big rocks. Your big rocks. These are your big things that you're going to chase. There were four.
Speaker A: That's it.
Speaker B: Um, you're going to chase four big things. And each of those four big things can have a couple smaller goals, but that's it. Yeah, reorganize, um, the team around those objectives. Uh, figure out how to break up the code. Let's talk about Conway's Law, my friend. Uh, we shipped our org chart, and because everybody was one big blob, we shipped our org chart. You know, I got a lot of pushback. Like, you can't reorganize. We can't figure this out. And I'm like, if I don't reorganize, you're never going to figure it out. If I reorganize you, it's going to be painful enough that you're going to start to break up the code, and then we're actually going to be able to do something. Um, I, uh, and, and what happened was, within six months, we had our first launch. So the first year I had that team, they had three major launches after not delivering for three years. Um, the second year I had that team, they delivered multiple, multiple product releases every single month.
Speaker A: That's amazing.
Speaker B: Every two weeks, we were going to production with new things that were delivering customer Value. So we went from, like, the company feeling like it was just a waste of money, um, to delivering every single month with half the budget. I cut half the budget in the process, and the team was net happier, uh, and they felt successful, and there was no more fighting. And so for me, that was like, you know, the structure unlocks the power of the team.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Yeah. How about you?
Speaker A: No, I want to say something about that. I think what's interesting about that is that that, to me, is where the theory and the practicality meet. Yeah. Because the theory is right. Like, if we talk about Marty Kagan and the theory of empowered teams and all of that, the theory is correct. I don't have a problem with the theory. It's the. You have to take the bits of theory and put it into practice in the environment you're walking into.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: Can have a whole. Like, it's like a hornet's nest. You don't just get to walk in and be like, I would like to change the team structure. Like, it's not a dance, right. You gotta come in and be like, okay, let me pull this all apart. This is the. This is the spaghetti I was handed. Right. And you start unpacking it and going, okay, now I've gotta put some. I gotta. You gotta, like, infuse some power back in.
Speaker B: Yeah. What is this thing?
Speaker A: Right.
Speaker B: What do we want to do with it? What is the value of the company? How do we want to structure it? Does that also align to the way the code. Like, again, Conway's Law.
Speaker A: Yep.
Speaker B: Does it align to the way we want the architecture to look? Uh, and then communication. So you layer on the communication, because that's also going to be influenced by how you structure your team. And then can you build a team that is psychologically safe, enjoys each other, can iterate quickly and understands the goal? And can you, as a leader, get the hell out of the way and stop us?
Speaker A: You're like, I did all the things go right? It's like, yeah, totally. And. Yeah. So, uh, I just wanted to say that I think that that's. That, to me, is sort of what lays under a lot of this. Like, when. When you have a win, you can also often look at. I took some framework and some theory and some stuff.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: And I figured out how to wrestle it into working in this environment. Right. Which meant that sometimes I had to cut a corner on the thing that someone in the world says you must do. And I'm like. So I. I cut. I just carved the corner off of that. And did it anyway, right? And I think that's. That's practicality, that's context, right? That's gonna do it in context, right?
Speaker B: And interestingly enough, I've. I've sort of done that in multiple places. Like, got. I. I have this sort of, like, reputation, I guess. So I often get gifted the worst area and they're like, go, transform. Um, I've never done it exactly the same way twice.
Speaker A: Never? Never. Me too. Like, the. I mean, I used to joke that I was the. Like, just hand me a pile of garbage and I'll fix it and then I'll hand it back to you. Like, look, I made you a garden, right? Like, it's like I used the compost and made you a garden, right? But same. Like, it's you. I never did it the same way twice. I use some principles and some ideas and some frameworks that are in my brain, right? But I didn't. Never the same. Because they're not the same people or same problems, right?
Speaker B: Not the same company. Not, uh, the same user base, not
Speaker A: the same season of the company. Like, it can be completely different. So, I mean, the other one for me, similar to you, is probably more of a leadership one. I stepped into what was a company with a great idea, okay, that claimed to be a tech company that was not right. And they really needed somebody to come in and be like, let's wrestle you into being a tech company. Right? Otherwise you're kind of a sales organization. Um, which is lovely if you want to do that. That's who you want to be. But I mean, VCs don't give you money for that. So. So generally, um. So really coming in and very similar to what you said. Like, I had to go fast. I had to understand quickly, I had to ask a lot of questions and. And then by accident, a pandemic hit in the middle of it, right? Like, at the very. In the very early stages for me. Um, and I then had to really. I had to overhaul things. Like, things. I went from, you know, one role to a much different role to a much different season of the company to a, oh, it's kind of good this happened, or we were going to have a problem. You know, Like, I now can look back and be like, it's actually kind of worked out for us that it happened as bad as it was because we were technically in bad shape, right? Uh, there were some. There were some real gems in there, but technically we were in bad shape. Um, and so coming in and through, really, I always say it was like the ultimate MBA in running a business. Right. Because I came into such a hard spot and had to really dig in. There was nothing we didn't reconsider.
Speaker B: Wow.
Speaker A: Everything needed to be rethought.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: And. And there were pieces that we kept, for sure. Right. And there was. Because there were. It was good. Good bones.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: The idea was good. The starting point was good, but it wasn't going to scale. Right. So coming in and saying, who do you want to be? Like, this is who you are. Who do you want to be? And really getting clear on that fast and saying, okay, then we have to go in another direction.
Speaker B: Right. Yeah.
Speaker A: Uh, we need to. To your point, I need to pick these teams apart differently. I need different. I need. In some cases, I need a different people. Right. And we need to be willing to. I need to, like, turn the heat up slowly so that when we get to. I can crank the heat, we're ready to go. Right.
Speaker B: Um.
Speaker A: And it took.
Speaker B: It took.
Speaker A: It took a while, but it was. I'm. It's the thing, like, I'll get choked up thinking about it. Right. I'm so proud of it. Right.
Speaker B: Uh, it was hard.
Speaker A: It was. Every day was hard. I used to ask my boss, who was the CEO, uh, is there going to be a week that's not difficult? And he was like, oh, no, Right. You're the one making it difficult. Good. Good point. M. You know, but it was. It was hard, but it was so rewarding.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: And I. The people that surround that, you know, that I brought in, but also the people that were there and stayed and really bought into what we were trying to do. Like, you can't recreate that everywhere.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: You have this little pocket of sunshine that you're just like, oof, this is my team.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: And it was just. It was really. It was good. It was really, really good.
Speaker B: I love that because, uh, you, um. Know, like, you know, we talk a lot about taking tools and making them practical, and it sounds like in that instance, like, you had the company rallied around that vision and mission. You were all on the same page. You were all pursuing the same goals, and. And, uh, you create where. Where, you know, collective success outweighed individual success, and that's sort of where the magic happened.
Speaker A: Yeah. And. And it just, like, you have these moments where you're just like, oh, that's right. We're winning.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: And, like, we would do these little things and magic would happen, and I'm like, yeah, now we're doing. Now we're. Now we're Humming. Right. And so, I mean, I just, I look at that and think, man, that, that felt good. Right? It felt good. It was hard and challenging and there were, I mean, there were definitely tears, right?
Speaker B: There's always tears.
Speaker A: There's always tears. So that's how, that's how I roll. Right? So, um, but definitely, definitely so proud of it. And it was just. It was, it was, it was great. I mean, that's why we do it, right?
Speaker B: Like, that's why we do it, why
Speaker A: we do it, right?
Speaker B: So, yeah, I mean, I always tell people, like, uh, in my job, I actually don't do very much once I've got the right structure and team in place. After that, like, my, my only job is to look for those places where the engine parts are rubbing against each other. Like, look for the friction.
Speaker A: Yes.
Speaker B: Um, and try to tune the engine. Like you got. You build the car first. But then it's just all about going to meetings.
Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. I would say, like, I become. We're going down the highway and we're on the. We're in the road and I become the guardrails and I'm just there to be like, no, uh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. We're turning a corner. Right? But I don't have to. I'm not driving the car.
Speaker B: No, right. I road or, or I don't have
Speaker A: to do any of those things. I'm now just like, we're going there, get on the road. Right? And if we need to change directions on the road, I'll help with that. Right. But I can then just make sure we don't go off in a ditch, right. That, uh, that becomes the job, which I love.
Speaker B: Ah.
Speaker A: I think. Do you have another. Do you have another bad one or another great one that you want to mention?
Speaker B: I mean, I think I was just thinking, um. But the bad ones, the bad ones I've seen all have a common flavor. So let's talk about that.
Speaker A: Okay.
Speaker B: Um, and we. I think we've talked about it in previous episodes. It's companies where they try to separate the business from the tech. Um, and the business gets to sit over in the fancy office, uh, uptown, and they get to have all these agencies that do all this research maybe, or just charge them a lot of money. Um, and then they create exactly what should happen and you throw it over the fence to the tech team that typically sits in a lower cost base area. Um, and then it's your right mission just to deliver it. And oh, by the way, it's due in six weeks.
Speaker A: Right. Yeah.
Speaker B: Every, every, every challenging product or thing that has not really had great success from a product market fit perspective follows that similar pattern is that division of, um, and it typically happens in companies that are older because they grew up. They're not what I would call digitally native companies, but even, even in some of the newer companies I've seen the pattern. Um, and I think that until they do, until you make the commitment to, um, shift the structure, which shifts the power structure at the top and it shifts the budget and it shifts everything else. Um, and it actually in a lot of ways makes more traditional executives nervous because they don't come from tech and they don't like. Right. Uh, those are the places where I've seen companies really stutter. Uh, and it's a pity because I've worked with some just brilliant peers. Uh, and there's a couple that I'm thinking of, uh, by name and, and I'm going to try to get you on the podcast. So, uh, if you, if you see me coming, you know that I was thinking of you in this book. Um, who have, who, who have the ability to learn the business.
Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B: They're not dummies. Like they have multiple degrees, but they also happen to be technical. Um, and the, the company would not accept them on the business side.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, and that the people on the business side didn't have any understanding of technology. Um, nor did they really have any interest in learning. Being vulnerable and kind of like admitting that you like, you don't know something. Because they had spent their whole career being knowledgeable. Um, and so they wasted the company, wasted a ton of money, um, a ton of time. Uh, ultimately just pissed people off, made people unhappy and really didn't progress their product development, um, or satisfying customer needs at the rate that it needed to. I'm not going to say they didn't like, build things.
Speaker A: Of course you built something, but it
Speaker B: was really damn expensive.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, and ultimately I think those are failures. And I can think of three companies in my past that have exhibited the same behavior. Mhm. And then they're like, why is it so slow? Why is it so.
Speaker A: Why is it not. Why are we not doing the thing you promised? Yeah, why are you not doing the thing you promised you could do? Because you won't let me do it.
Speaker B: Why are we spending so much on agencies? You know, it's like, well, your structure is wrong, my friends.
Speaker A: Yeah. It's interesting you say that because as you're talking I'm thinking like There is this space where we say what you just said, like, product is product and it's part of tech and it's not the business. Right. And, and it's like, okay, then what do they do? Right. On one hand. And then there's the space where product is over here and they're not tech. Yeah.
Speaker B: That's also a problem.
Speaker A: So you're like, okay, you cannot. This is not an island team. The person that is the product manager needs to be able to play in all the playgrounds. Like, they're not standing alone. Like, no one will play with me. Like, they have to go work in all the directions. Right. It's the reason why, like, I don't like the product owner model that says, oh, go be part of the tech team as this role on a team. Right. I don't like that because I want the person who plays a role on that team to also be having the conversation with the leadership team about what we're trying to actually achieve. They are the business. You are.
Speaker B: Ah.
Speaker A: You should be also the business and part of tech. That's, that's where the M magic is.
Speaker B: That's why they hire real product managers. I, uh, had a visceral reaction when you said product owner. Um, I think that people mistake job family with scrum actor role.
Speaker A: Yes.
Speaker B: And this notion that product owner, this activity that needs to be done in service of the scrum operating model is a job.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Makes me freaking insane. Insane. Like, I just had like several brain cells just.
Speaker A: No. And I think, and that's what I'm saying. I think that when you, uh, don't understand that the role of product manager is very multi directional, not even just bi directional. It's mult. You're. You're standing in, you're standing in a spot and looking in all the directions and behind you. Right. That if you don't understand that and you want them to go play, go do your job. Stay in your lane.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: Like, listen, my lane runs all over the, all over the place.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: I'm a product person. Right. And that's what makes the job hard. It's what makes the job fun. It's what makes the job tricky for other people to understand if they've never done it or never seen it done. Well, like, I get it, but man, I'm with you. Like, I've seen, I've seen. Like, it's about how are you going to set your company up? What is your operating model?
Speaker B: Yes. It's foundational.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: Um, and if you're not ready for it, then just do outsourced. Big I t. Call it. It.
Speaker A: Exactly.
Speaker B: No one will want to work there. You'll get the right people. You'll get the right people. Throw on some program managers and. And outsource some engineering teams, and you'll be good. You'll do exactly what you paid for.
Speaker A: And I think. I mean, I know we need to wrap things up, but I think. I think this goes to. You know, I think I've told you this personally as friends, like, over the years. The times that I have felt like I was being sort of, like, held back or pushed down or put in my place, usually the company had hired me to do something, and then when I set out about. Set about to do it, they then were like, no, we don't want that.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: And I'm m. Like, well, then you hired the wrong girl. Because that's what I do.
Speaker B: I do the job description. Like, there.
Speaker A: I don't do this other thing that you're trying to do. I don't. I don't do it, and I don't want to do it. Oh.
Speaker B: A lot less to do, like, Exactly.
Speaker A: Pay for that thing. Not this thing. Exactly. And so I think what I. The reason I want to say that is I think there are probably people like me, like you, like others, who feel like they've been told that their magic power is not power. It's. You're just wrong. The fact of the matter is your magic. I'm saying this to every product manager out there who's experienced this. Your magic power is magic. You are good at it, and you're doing the right thing. You're probably in the wrong place that doesn't value the thing that you do.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: So either find out if they can change their mind or get the hell out.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: Right. Like, don't. Don't sit there. At least don't sit there and believe that you're wrong and doing poorly when you're doing what they hired you to do. We don't. We're. We're not doing that anymore.
Speaker B: No. Or they misunderstood what they hired. Right.
Speaker A: Again, also fine. That.
Speaker B: That doesn't mean that you're not. You're not great.
Speaker A: Right. And I think that's the thing, is, like, all of that's fine. If a company decides it's not what they wanted, if they decide they didn't understand it, all of that is a conversation.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: And then we can negotiate. Is it right? Can I make it work? If not. But it's not about that person. Doesn't know what they're doing or are wrong or doing it. Doing it wrong.
Speaker B: Yeah, they thought they were getting a cute kitten, and they. They brought in a jaguar.
Speaker A: It's.
Speaker B: It's not the same. Right. You're getting a different outcome.
Speaker A: Totally.
Speaker B: There's different. There's different feeding and care requirements.
Speaker A: Totally, totally. That, uh, and I need a different, uh, playground than. I don't need just a little cat. Cat tree in the window. I need.
Speaker B: Shred your whole couch.
Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. No, I love that. I love that. Well, this was fun. This is good.
Speaker B: It's like, reminiscing, right?
Speaker A: Like, it was a little bit of a retro. It was fun. So. And we probably both thought of, like, three people that were like, oh, let's interview that person.
Speaker B: Uh, I got a list now. I'm coming for you guys.
Speaker A: I love it. I love it. All right, well, then we will see everyone. Oh, I think, like, if you have had this experience, come talk to us, share it with us. Like, ping us with questions of, like, how do you handle it? Or tell us about your experience of when you have been like, oh, I felt held down, and maybe it was a misunderstanding of what I, uh. What the job is. Right.
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker A: Also.
Speaker B: And also tell us about your best product.
Speaker A: Yes, yes.
Speaker B: Why? What happened?
Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Come tell us about that. We would love to hear from. From you. Awesome. All right, Marilyn, see you next time. See ya, Sam.
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