The Value of the Startup Product Manager

I'm a big fan of Steve Blank. I think he is spot on about the Customer Development model in startups. I regularly read his blog and have read his book, The Four Steps to the Epiphany.

That said, he posted recently about speaking at the Silicon Valley Product Management Association, and, from what I can tell, he's missing the point about product management in a startup environment.

He is correct that in many ways, product management in a startup is drastically different than product management in a larger organization. However, those differences are surface-level details, more the deliverables of product management than the actual purpose of product management.

Product managers are experts at collating all the information sources that come into an organization about a product, filtering out the meaningless information, and ensuring good decisions get made based on objective facts and not subjective feelings.

Many (if not most) startup founders are emotional, passionate people. They make decisions based on what feels right, and those instincts serve them well to get a company started. As Blank knows, though, listening to those instincts over a long period of time instead of getting objective will cause problems. That is, after all, the whole point of "getting out there" in Customer Development.

So here is my list of what a startup product manager does:

1. Ensures decisions being made by the founders are consistent and in-line with the current goals of the company and not because the founders saw something shiny.
2. Extrapolates and defines the actual market from the individuals being talked to because, no matter how much the founders may believe it, everybody is not a market.
3. Ensures a product is being produced instead of a bunch of closely related code by monitoring user experience, evaluating final fit-and-finish, and driving organizational release readiness among others.
4. Balances the passion of the founders with the rationality of getting a product ready for a market.
5. Maintains the development backlog, keeping things out of development that don't belong there and making sure the things that do belong there get done (see #3).

And that is what your startup's product manager does. He is not a secretary setting up customer appointments for the founders; he brings discernment to a murky environment and order to chaos. And that is why you should hire product management first.

To be fair, I did not see the presentation at the SVPA and am going off what I'm inferring from his blog post. I also know I am overstating the comment on being a secretary, but this is the blogosphere, so it's OK, right?

"Night at the Museum" at a Toy Factory - Quickly Framing Your Product

I just published an article for the day-job blog about Paramount losing an email message that discusses films they have in development.

I love the way movies initially get pitched, and I think there is a lot for product people (whether product managers or entrepreneurs) to learn from it. Today's topic is the high concept, which originated with a need to pack as much punch as possible into two lines of text in TV Guide back when it was a dead tree and space mattered. [1]

Robert Kosberg wrote,

The essence of high concept is that it is both brief and provocative. It piques the imagination and promises that big things are going to happen out of an ordinary situation.

And we even see a few high concepts in Paramount's email:

• "Night at the Museum" at a Toy Factory
• Fugitive meets Taken
• Oceans 11 Years Old [2]

If you are familiar with movies, you now have a good idea what these movies are about.

If you are trying to bring a new product into the market, comparing yourself to a known entity will give the listener a lot of context that you can begin altering to describe your product. You leverage the marketing the 800 pound gorilla has done to your advantage.

See how much information one sentence can give you?

• It's like Siebel hosted for you in the cloud.
• It's like Powerpoint with one big slide.

But we can do better. Neither of these are very provocative. The cloud doesn't really say anything. One slide doesn't even sound appealing. In either case, we aren't really piqued.

Let's try again:

• It's like Siebel, but we have to deal with the bearded guys in the data center.
• It's like Powerpoint from a helicopter instead of a 70's slide projector.

Well, I think they are more compelling, anyway.

I'd love to hear your product's high concept. Put it in the comments or tweet them using #prodmgmt #concept tags.

[1] There are a lot of conflicting opinions on what High Concept really means. I'm going with the definition from the provided link based off its etymology.

[2] Oceans 11 Years Old - a heist movie featuring middle school kids.

A Product Management Elevator Pitch

Tondin Banks asked this recently:

Every product manager I've met has problems answering this question, and the answers tend to vary depending on who you are talking to. How many times have you answered cynically:

What do I do? Well, I'm a janitor, mopping up messes created by people in order to get a polished tur...umm...product out the door. Sometimes I babysit, sometimes I whine, sometimes I threaten, sometimes I cry myself to sleep. If I'm really lucky, I find enough time to talk to customers and figure out what color polish they want.

Doesn't really portray product management (and, therefore, you) in the best light, does it? I thinking Tondin was right in asking about the elevator pitch. Remember, an elevator pitch is a 30-60 second spiel (the amount of time it takes an elevator to get from one floor to another) meant to get somebody to invest or buy. In this case, you are trying to get them to invest in you and in product management.

While that may work for a tweet, it isn't really an elevator pitch. Remember, you are trying to sell your personal value and the value of product management here.

What do you do?

I am a product manager, but what that really means is that I produce software. Just like a producer in the entertainment business, my job is to understand what the consumer is going to buy, make sure that it gets built, and ensure it is done for a profit. I am the hub of the software development process, making sure the right people are given the right information to do their jobs, whether that is listening to customers and potential customers, teaching sales about who the buyers are, providing requirements to development and QA, or collating feedback from support. I know that I've succeeded, not by my software being successfully delivered (after all, that could be done by a project manager), but rather by customers buying, using and loving that software.

How do you describe what you do?

Changing the World

Will your product change the world?

Every product manager should be asking this question. I don't mean will everybody in the world use your product. Instead, will the people who use your product have their world changed (in a positive way!!) as a result of using your product?

But my product is a boring, enterprise product with no possibility of being exciting.

Well, with an attitude like that...

But more importantly, even if that is the case, you can still change the world for your customers. You can put in the extra effort involved in understanding their key pains and find solutions for them. I can guarantee you are changing their world for the negative if you aren't trying for the positive!

Who knows, changing your customer's world may free up enough time for them to get out there and really change the world!

From the Intrawebs - June 28

I haven't had much time this month for reading or writing as I've settled into the new responsibilities. That should change as I get some of the critical things-that-must-be-done-yesterday finished.

You can subscribe to the live feed of this list in your choice of feed readers. You can also follow @FromTheIntraWeb to get instant gratification.

If you find something that you think belongs on this list, send it to me via @SoftwareMaven on Twitter.

What's New

• The Social Internet Survey Software & Online Survey Tool - Inexpensive target market research with built-in respondants. Looks interesting, but I'm curious about the respondants.
• IORAD, The Instructional Appliance - From screen capture to SWF. An interesting way to approach building reference material (user guides and such) for you web application.

Worth Reading

• A Bias for Scamminess - It is sad when a company uses deceptive practices to "earn" money instead of ensuring the product provides more value than the customer thinks she's paying for. Even worse when it is tied to a government entity.
• Rules and Laws Product Managers Should Understand (part 1) - Nicely relevant.
• Why We Haven't Taken Venture Capital - It is always good to know what drives you individually when you get into the world of entrepreneurship. If you don't know what is driving you, you are bound to end up unhappy.
• 10 Simple Strategies for Business Blog Content - As a blogger, I always appreciate good information on how to be a better blogger. This list, while targeted at business blogging, is valuable even outside that space.

Disclaimer: Unless otherwise noted, I have no affiliation with linked properties other than being an interested reader, a happy user, or a potential customer: Nobody pays to receive a link. Any opinions of linked properties are theirs, not mine. I may or may not agree, but to be on this list I think their opinion is at least interesting.