Michael Cowen’s Post

Procrastination is real! Get to start that side project takes a lot of energy, but guess what? You can read as much as you want about push-ups, but if you don't actually do it, you won't get fit ever! Here are a few tips on time Management written by Regina (give her a follow). I particularly really enjoy blocking time for certain activities and combine with "Eat the frog" doing the least enjoyable tasks early in the morning. What is the hack missing here? ------------ I am Luiz Santana, CTO at Digitale Patientenhilfe and former Tech Lead/Manager at Google. I share tips about Management, Interviews and Engineering. Follow me if you'd like to get some interesting content!

“I hear Neo is a tough place to work. Why?” Here are 3 traits that characterize us. This question was the key takeaway from a conversation with a friend recently. My simple answer: "Yes, it is." Here are 3 reasons why, and 3 attitudes I’ve adopted: 1. 𝗜𝘁’𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝘀𝘁-𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗲𝗱. Neo moves at lightning speed. Companies have short-, medium-, and long-term goals. At Neo, they often feel like: - Short-term: Today - Medium-term: Tomorrow - Long-term: Next week 𝘈𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘦: Bring an agile mindset every day. 2. 𝗜𝘁’𝘀 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴. You’ll push the limits of your knowledge and experience, solving complex problems and taking on tasks you’ve never tackled before. 𝘈𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘦: Embrace a growth mindset. 3. 𝗜𝘁’𝘀 𝗱𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴. Some goals are big and audacious. Solving the problems that arise often requires putting in the time and effort to get the job done. 𝘈𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘦: Practice work-life flow. If it takes a weekend to solve, that’s where my energy goes. I'll rest when I'm done. Yes, Neo is a tough place to work—but that’s why it gets results and fosters development. In under 3 years, I’ve gained experience in business, marketing, customer lifecycles, data and analytics engineering, and product analytics. I’m not sure where else I could have achieved such breadth. This has been my experience. I hope this perspective helps anyone thinking of a role at a startup.

What a great example of a thought-provoking post! Going down the path of exploring an idea requires money (time & effort). The initial set of questions in #2 is great! However, in a disciplined product organization, a "plan" should exist already. We should have assessed the business outcomes we want to influence, the product outcomes we need to achieve, we evaluated opportunities and we started execution. Often, asking everyone to FOCUS on the target is the most healthy response to the "explore ideas" conversation. There's just no time to derail. Product Leaders need to have strong opinions and the ability to influence everyone, including C-levels and execs. We are hired as experts in bringing business value, so we need to provide a clear response on what that means if we change priorities. Now, there's an art component here. You need to balance: 1. Being a positive leader 2. Channel/pursue the best ideas for the business 3. Focus: Ensure the organization is aligned on the most important tasks 4. Don't burnout / maintain your sanity "How" you say NO is important. What works for me is to bring the existing plans to the table, why we are pursuing that, the tight dates we have, the cost of changing priorities now. I promise to bring this up when we plan the next cycle. Then I'm diligent about keeping a backlog with ideas that are worth pursuing and I ensure it's me who brings it up at the right time. So I agree with the post headline: "You never say NO to the CEO". Often you need to tell them "NOT NOW, SOON". Exploring ideas must be part of the product process and must happen at the right time.

Are you a blocker or an enabler? How would your stakeholders answer that question about you? Our CEO was frustrated. She was used to a process where an idea went straight from her head into sprint. Now every time she proposed a new idea, we talked about speaking with users, running experiments and understanding the best solution.  To her, all this discovery work appeared like it was blocking progress. Instead of getting on with building features we were delaying the developers starting. She started to see the product team as a blocker. This resulted in low trust, low investment and no base to influence change. We needed to change our approach. Here’s how: 🤸 We flipped our comms to talk about delivery first. We limited the time spent talking about discovery - execs care about results not process. ⏪ We reverse engineered outcomes and success metrics. This grew our literacy in outcomes and gave sight of our results v's costs. ✅ We never said no…straight away. We treated ideas with enthusiasm, asked for more context, created a product brief and prototype to test with users. If it still wasn’t delivering value, sometimes we… 🚗 Disagreed and committed. We treated internal trust as an additional value metric. Sometimes this meant building the wrong thing for the right reasons. Over time, we built up a stronger relationship with our stakeholders and were therefore in a better position to influence change. It’s true that the role of a product person is often to say no. There are always more ideas than capacity to deliver them. If this is a contentious issue in your business, think about how you might approach this from an enabling perspective and you'll build up a better base for future change.

I posted Mastering Your New Role: The Art of Asking the Right Questions for Success in August. It's helpful to look more closely at advice and how-tos so you can actually use them. 1. Grasp the Bigger Picture Action Steps: Ask Strategic Questions: Aim to understand the overall point of your role and how it aligns with the company’s goals. (Is this written down? Have you talked it through with your supervisor or team leader? Do you understand what you're going to work to do?) Examples of Questions: “What are the primary objectives of my role and this project?” “How does my work directly support the team’s or company’s success?” “What key performance indicators (KPIs) will measure my impact?” Example from the Field: At a mid-sized tech startup, an operations analyst met with their manager to discuss the goals for the quarter. By asking how the metrics they tracked aligned with company-wide performance, they gained a clearer sense of how to prioritize tasks that directly affected the company’s growth. Making It Manageable: It’s easy to get overwhelmed with new information. Try summarizing key objectives after your initial discussions. Ask a coach or mentor to help break these down into achievable steps to keep your efforts focused on what matters most. What is your experience with understanding the purpose of your role is, and how it aligns with the overall mission of your company or agency?

🕵️ We Product people spend a lot of time dissecting problems. We brainstorm solutions with our architecture, engineering, and strategy teams. We talk to customers. We look at data. We look for that elusive, comprehensive, and innovative solution that will solve all of our customer problems and bring immense business value. Often that doesn’t happen. ➡️ And that’s ok. Not every feature you launch will be a game-changer (see what I did there?). Keep shipping features, no matter how small. ⭐️ Small features are progress. It shows your customers that you want to improve their experience. It shows your stakeholders that you are listening to them and bringing value to the business. So keep working with your engineering team. Keep interviewing customers. Keep assessing the market. Keep working with your stakeholders. Keep solving problems. 👀 And keep your eye out for that elusive solution. You just might find it.

Do you struggle to navigate your ever-growing to-do list? Here's a game-changing framework by Shreyas Doshi that focuses on impact over volume. It's as simple as tagging each task with a letter: L, N, or O. Leverage (L): These are your power moves, tasks that promise a 10X return. Neutral (N): Steady as they go, tasks with a reliable 1X impact. Overhead (O): Necessary evils, tasks with less than 1X return but still need attention. Read more here : https://lnkd.in/g2SpyKXh It's been a year, and this has truly transformed how I tackle my daily tasks, allowing me to zero in on what truly matters and amplify my impact. Do you have any frameworks or strategies that have worked for you? #productivity #productmanagement #shreyasdoshi #lnoframework

Founders juggling two conflicting roles: product-builder and company-builder. Responsibilities evolve.  Tensions grow. The key is understanding the transitory nature of a founder's role through the stages. Study the attached document. Notice how in the 'Ideation Stage', prioritization is everything. By 'Maturity', product-builder and company-builder are further apart than ever. And this reflects in their roles and responsibilities. - Product Development - Financial Responsibilities - Management Responsibilities   I hope these resources can offer some CLARITY for smoother transitions through the stages.

Real solid advice this that any PM can apply regardless of company size, stage, sector, B2B or B2C.

Decision-making as it pertains to our team or organization is only difficult because we allow it to be. The next time you're faced with a tough decision, give this process a try: 1. Ask "Does this compromise our culture?" - If the answer is "Yes or Maybe"; you're done - don't do it. - If the answer is "No"; proceed to step 2. 2. Ask "Does this enhance our culture?" - If the answer is "No"; you're done - don't do it. - If the answer is "Yes"; proceed to step 3. 3. Now you have a decision to make. Ask yourself: Is it worth the trade-offs (there are always trade-offs)? What specific area does it enhance? How significantly? Is it sustainable? Steps 1 and 2 will eliminate about about 80% of the decisions you face. If you can't answer 1 and 2, then you need to gain clarity around your culture. #ChopChop Checkout our latest blog post at https://lnkd.in/g_kVZJGg