Product Management Foundations – Strategy to Launch

In this section, we’ll learn about the product development process. This is how great products and features come to life!

In this lesson we’ll cover discovery – the steps that product teams take to figure out the right thing to build.

In this lesson, we’re covering delivery (phases 3, 4, & 5 of the product development process) plus what happens after delivery (phase 6), and what this whole process looks like in real life.

In this lesson, we’ll talk about how to navigate the product development process as a product manager. We’ll cover the work you need to do in each phase, and I’ll share a handy dandy checklist to help you stay on track.

In this section, we’re learning all about PRDs: the Product Requirements Document.

Grab my PRD template (link in the next lesson) and get ready for a walkthrough of the four most critical sections of any PRD.

In this lesson, we’ll cover the rest of the sections in my PRD template and talk about additional sections you might find in your company’s PRD template.

We’re getting tactical. In this lesson, I’ll share how I write PRDs.

After development starts, your PRD is still essential. Let’s learn how to use your PRD throughout the product development process.

In this lesson, we’ll learn about common pitfalls and how to avoid them.

As a bonus, in this lesson, I’ll introduce you to influence without authority and share two of the top ways to improve your ability to influence.

In this section, we’re learning how to talk to users to identify opportunities.

Talking to your users often is critical for product managers. I’ll share a story about my biggest failure as a product manager to convince you how important this is.

There are many varieties of users. Your product may even have more than one type of user. We'll learn about different types of users and common terminology to help you get to know your users.

In this lesson, we’ll learn how to talk to users to increase your chances of walking away with valuable insights. We will cover two big things: your attitude and your questions.

I know we’re not astronauts here, but in this lesson, we will learn why we need to spend more time in the problem space.

A big part of your job is synthesizing user feedback into actionable insights. In this lesson, we’ll learn three standard methods teams use to communicate user problems: user stories, Jobs to Be Done, and user personas.

In this lesson, we will talk about people you can partner with in your company to uncover more user insights.

So, you’ve explored the problem space, and you found a bunch of user problems. Now what? In this lesson, we’ll cover how to determine if a user problem is worth solving and how to build a business case to get buy-in and approval to start solving that problem.

In this section, we’ll learn how to design and validate solution ideas for all the great opportunities you uncovered from Section 4. Dreaming up solutions is fun, but we’ll also learn how to de-risk our ideas through validation.

As the product manager, you don’t need to come up with all the ideas on your own. Ideas for features and products will come from many sources. Your job is to determine which ideas are good and to throw out bad ideas. In this lesson, we’ll learn about idea sources and how to track ideas.

Now, you’ll work with your teammates to design how you will solve the problem.

Before we learn how to validate ideas, let’s revisit my failure story from Section 4 to see why validation is critical. We’ll also learn why we should consider every launch a bet.

In this lesson, we will learn how to validate your team's ideas by evaluating the risk behind those ideas. We'll look at two helpful frameworks for assessing risk.

We will learn how to approach validation like a scientist and review validation methods that you can use to collect evidence for your ideas.

We’ll wrap up this section with tips on developing a critical product manager skill: product sense.

In this section, we are learning how to build solutions.

Before discussing your role as the product manager, we should learn a bit about how software gets built in the first place. This lesson covers three things: the types of engineers you’ll typically work with, how engineers build new features and project management frameworks.

In this lesson, we’ll learn about your role in the delivery phase. We’ll look at what tasks you should complete and learn a few pro tips to excel at execution.

In this lesson, we’ll learn about testing that the engineering team does and testing that you should do as the product manager.

Most product teams have weekly or monthly status update meetings where you must report the status of each project. You don’t need to dread these meetings. In this lesson, we’ll talk about what to do in these meetings, how to get the most out of them, and how to handle setbacks in your projects.

Every once in a while, you will need engineering help from other teams to complete your projects; these are called cross-team dependencies. In this lesson, we’ll learn tips for influencing the product managers of other teams to help you out.

You’re usually going to be the final decision-maker for your product, and often, there will not be a clear, correct answer for the decisions you have to make. You’ll often find yourself dealing with ambiguity. In this lesson, we’ll learn how you can practice this essential PM skill.

We’re learning about all things launch-related.

In this lesson, we’re learning how to prepare for launch.

In this lesson, we’ll meet your sales, marketing, and PMM partners to learn what they do, what matters to them, and how to work with them.

We’re moving on to phase five of the Product Development Process, the launch. Before discussing your role during the launch, let’s learn about different types of launches.

Launches are another moment of significant coordination for the product manager. In this lesson, we’ll cover your role in the launch.

In this lesson, we’ll learn how to handle constructive feedback from users, which you’ll typically get in the form of feature requests and bugs.

In this lesson, we’ll learn about the final phase of the Product Development Process. In phase six, you’ll observe how users interact with your new feature to determine your next steps.

In this section, we’re looking at the big picture: strategy and goals.

Strategy can be one of the most challenging product manager skills to develop. So, in this lesson, we will learn what a strategy is, how to write a good strategy, and why PMs need to be strategic.

In this lesson, we’ll walk through the steps to develop a product strategy, using a real example from my past. I’ll also share and demo a worksheet that you can use to create and communicate your product strategy.

In this lesson, we’ll discuss steps you can take to be more strategic.

In this lesson, we will learn how to create team goals, we’ll learn about the OKR framework, and I’ll leave you with tips to make the most out of your goals.

Getting user feedback is critical, but looking at your product and business data is also crucial. In this lesson, we’ll learn about the types of metrics product teams usually care about.

Product managers need to be fluent in data. In this lesson, we’ll review a worksheet and tips to help you increase your data fluency.

This section is all about the roadmap.

Before we learn how to create a roadmap, let’s look at an essential concept that product teams talk about: outcomes vs outputs. In this lesson, we’ll learn why it’s a best practice to focus on outcomes over outputs.

In this lesson, we’ll learn what a roadmap is and look at a typical roadmap planning process to see how product teams create roadmaps.

Product roadmaps are essential, but they can have considerable downsides. In this lesson, we’ll learn how to avoid the most significant downsides to roadmaps, and I’ll share tips to get the most out of your roadmaps.

Sharing your roadmap internally in your company is an important step in the roadmap planning process. If your company has tools or templates for sharing roadmaps, use those, but if you don’t, you can use mine! In this lesson, I’ll walk through two roadmap templates you can copy and use with your internal teams.

Sharing your roadmap with customers and other external audiences is a great way to build up excitement for what your team is building, but it can also be a slippery slope. In this lesson, I’ll share a few things to consider when sharing your roadmap externally.

We’ll close out this section with one more lesson on the top eight product manager skills. In this lesson, we’ll practice clear communication.

You did it! Congratulations on completing Product Management Foundations!