Three types of Product Managers, per @sachinrekhi:
1) Builders
2) Tuners
3) Innovators

I really like this framework because it’s quite accurate without being too prescriptive.

The blog post:
sachinrekhi.com/3-types-of-pro…

My high-level thoughts👇🏾
Each of the "3 Senses of a PM" maps to a type preference:
Analytical sense → Tuner
Product sense → Innovator
Execution sense → Builder

(*preference* being the key word there—in practice, each type will benefit from each of the 3 senses)

As a reminder:
When looking for your next PM job, ask the Hiring Manager the primary type for the role.

2 benefits
-If HM doesn’t know about these types, they’ll learn something new from you
-If HM can’t articulate the primary type, it’s at least a yellow flag (eg. HM lacks clarity of thought)
Companies should seriously consider using this vocabulary in their PM job postings. Much clearer to say that “this role is best suited for a Builder type” than to list 15 bullets with excruciating details & fine-tuned qualifications (which tend not to be all that useful anyway).
This would be harder for larger companies to do today (because of the need for consensus at such companies). But it can start with smaller companies & their hiring managers, and will over time be picked up by larger companies as these types get better understood in the industry.
Why is this framework important for hiring?
Too often, brand names & raw intelligence end up being the biggest factors in PM hiring decisions:
“You seem smart, able to get things done, and you worked at Google AND Facebook. That’s good enough for me!”
What I’ve learned in practice is that type mismatch severely limits an otherwise-talented PM’s impact in a new role. And when you end up in a “high expectations, not enough actual impact” situation, that leads to frustration and tough conversations later on.
This is not to say that you should never work in a role that is mismatched with your default type. Rather, that both the hiring manager & the PM should recognize when that’s the case & give adequate time (& training/mentorship) for things to click when there’s a mismatch. Intent!
As @sachinrekhi says in the blog post, it can be a good idea to seek each of these 3 roles early on in one’s career as a PM.

And once you’ve gained mastery over the broad set of PM skills...
...You will, at times, want to buck conventional wisdom e.g. operate as an Innovator in what is viewed by others as a Builder role. Doing this thoughtfully & with intent can yield surprisingly larger outcomes for your product & create major differentiation for you personally.

👍🏾
Last but not least, if you're a Product Manager, you may want to follow @sachinrekhi if you don't already
See also @KentBeck's 3X model - Explore, Expand, Extract

(h/t @chrizbot)

medium.com/@kentbeck_7670…

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More from @shreyas

15 Nov
Tao Te Ching is ~25 centuries old, written in 81 brief chapters.

Its word economy is exemplary—each reading reveals new layers.

Besides being a life manual, it imparts superb leadership wisdom.

A thread of 7 profound leadership lessons from Tao Te Ching:
1/
Wise leaders lead from below
2/
Wise leaders know it’s okay to not know everything
Read 12 tweets
14 Nov
Product Manager proposes X, a solution to a thorny product issue with major business impact.

CEO gently asks if we can do Y instead
(where Y is very different from X)

PM responds “sure, let's do Y”.

Should this make the CEO
a) happy, or
b) sad

Like a tweet👇🏾with your answer
a) This should make the CEO happy
b) This should make the CEO sad
Read 5 tweets
14 Nov
The CEO Test, a thread about compromising with conviction:

(1/20)
The scene: At the Product Review

You share your detailed plan with the CEO. You glance at the execs. Their body language says it all. Something is wrong. The CEO says that your plan needs to be more ambitious. “Think bigger”, is the feedback you get afterwards from your manager.
My friend, you may have just failed The CEO Test.

Another scenario👇🏾
Read 27 tweets
12 Nov
Sometimes there's a difference between the product & The Product.

"the lowercase-p product" is the thing you’ve been assigned to directly work on.

But that’s not necessarily "The uppercase-p Product".

The Product is The Main Thing that makes or breaks the user value prop.

👇🏾
Often:
product == Product

For example:
If you manage Google Calendar, the pixels on the screen (the product) are also what the user views as The Main Thing (The Product).
Sometimes:
product ≠ Product

For example:
If you manage the Netflix app, you are managing the product, but that isn't The Product

The Product is all the content that Netflix has licensed.

the product you manage is merely a delivery mechanism for the real Product for the user.
Read 16 tweets
10 Nov
What we need in Product Management:

1)
Less “How will we build this?”
More “How will we differentiate?”

2)
Less “How to enforce accountability?”
More “How to foster ownership?”

3)
Less “What problems can we solve?”
More “What problems are worthwhile?”

👇🏾
What we need:

4)
Less “What is the 3-yr roadmap?”
More “What is the 3-yr strategy?”

5)
Less “How to run growth experiments?”
More “How to get more distribution?”

6)
Less “What is the process for X?”
More “What is the purpose of X?”
What we need:

7)
Less “Does this team run well?”
More “Does this team learn well?”

8)
Less “What are top user requests?”
More “What are top user needs?”

9)
Less “What is the template for Y?”
More “What is my goal with Y?”
Read 16 tweets
7 Nov
When a team is so dysfunctional that it can only hire idiots: gonna call this “the Philly Four Seasons Effect” in honor of Team Trump’s epic stupidity.
If you're as intrigued as me, some very high quality replies here on what might have happened:
Read 6 tweets

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