The Pulse of Productization

A collection of news, insights, and product leaders we admire

FEARLESS Book - Sneak Peek!

Anyone who has been on a Zoom call with me could easily guess that I’m a big soccer fan by observing the dozens of soccer scarves from around the world that hang on my wall. As someone rooting for the success of US Soccer players, April and May can be very stressful times when the fate (both pride and financial fortunes) of clubs and players hangs in the balance based on the performance of the last few games of the European season (e.g. will Leeds United and their 3 American players avoid relegation?). If these final weeks of the season are stressful for fans, they are orders of magnitude more stressful for the players and coaches.

Fearless: How to Transform a Services Culture and Successfully Productize
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Building a Culture of Digital Fluency for Innovation and Growth

A few weeks ago I was speaking with a prospective client who had recently sold his consulting firm to a larger, global firm. He wanted help persuading the parent company to invest in growing a niche SaaS product that his team created. He was frustrated by the parent company’s inability to understand why it would be useful to supplement their consulting services with this SaaS product. At one point in the conversation, I asked him to drop a hyperlink into the chat. He said, “I don’t know how to do that.” 

Digital fluency and product innovation
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What Financial Skills are Necessary to be a Product Manager?

A company developed a successful AI product based on thorough customer research and launched it quickly, generating revenue. However, the cost of maintaining the necessary tool infrastructure for a growing customer base and promised price tiers made the product unprofitable. Despite doing almost everything correctly, the product team was directed to shut down the product because it was losing money for the company. The company needed to build a good pro forma for the product.

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Can Incentives Help You Productize?

One CEO recently shared with me, “We need to restructure our incentive plan. Our consultants are all incented on short-term revenue, which is making it very hard to get traction with our new products that have lower price points but better margins and more revenue visibility.”

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Maximizing Success: The Power of Quarterly Product Reviews

Quarterly product reviews are a critical component of an organization's product strategy. They provide an opportunity to assess the performance of the product portfolio, evaluate new product ideas, and make informed decisions about resource allocation. Additionally, QPRs hold teams accountable, ensure alignment across the organization, and help prioritize the right ideas in the pipeline. 

maximizing success of quarterly product reviews
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