Last week I wrote that good product managers prioritise more than features—for example, considering security and performance requirements. This isn’t everyone’s experience, unfortunately, but such people do exist. Once I … Continue reading Responsibilities beyond delivering features
I’m quite certain that when I first encountered product managers working with software teams I didn’t really appreciate the value they brought. I certainly did appreciate the people themselves—they provided … Continue reading Appreciating product management
Some time ago I needed to get an estimate a piece of work, so I arranged a meeting with a senior engineer. The precise success criteria of the work was … Continue reading Product/market fit is a dance
A short time ago I wrote that productive conversations come from intellectual honesty and engaging positively. But intellectual honesty is important for organisational culture, too. Without this things can go … Continue reading Intellectual honesty for sustainable progress
This week I was writing a business case, and for a moment caught myself wondering why I was spending so much time fiddling around with the paragraph spacing. But very … Continue reading The value of presentational details
When we want to make a time-saving investment we often have to create a formal business justification. When I say “time-saving investment” I’m thinking about addressing tech debt, buying and … Continue reading Three financial benefits of time-saving investments
Fairly early in my career I needed to make a change in my team—I needed to make a couple of people line managers, because the number of direct reports I … Continue reading Ask the people impacted
Most people I know want to improve things, and many have ideas about how to do that. In presenting these ideas it’s easy to become possessive of them, however, and … Continue reading Keeping ideas open
Some time ago I got talking to a colleague about “ownership” of risks. Now I don’t like the idea of a risk as a tangible thing that can be counted … Continue reading Owning cyber risk
The other day I was talking to a friend about the pandemic (some topics are evergreen), and we were marvelling how, up until then, so many organisations were adamant that … Continue reading Never say never
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