The Productologist

I have read (examples here and here) and heard in numerous places that a Product Manager is like the CEO of the product. I’ve even used it to describe what I do to folks who are unfamiliar with the job. It makes for a nice visual and makes Product Managers feel good about themselves and the role that they play in a company. But it’s not really true.

Many years ago, when I was going off to start grad school, BW (at the time, she wasn’t BW, just B) and I rented a big yellow truck to haul all of our prized personal belongings to our new home (at least for the next two years). It was a long trip (2 days worth of driving), so we did the prudent traveler thing and went to AAA and got a bunch of maps to plan our route. The maps were not only for us, but others, too. Since this was the age before cell phone ubiquity, for safety reasons, we gave a copy to BW’s parents so that they would know what route we were following in case we didn’t show up at our destination or check in periodically.

Ever bought something expensive that you really wanted on sale at a massive discount? Or walked out of car dealership with a new (or used…er, previously-owned) car that you got for WAY below the asking price? That feeling is what drives sales people (of course, they tend to be on the other side of the equation, but the feeling is the same). Today, I got that feeling.

I didn’t get a new car or something expensive that I had been pining for. What I got was a discount on OEM hardware. Well, the truth is that I didn’t just get the discount…I negotiated it.

On my way back from a trade show, I spied an article in the airline magazine about how companies are starting to use the “novel” technique of Ethnography to understand how customers really use their products or to test out prototypes in real-world situations (this seems to be a hot topic, because after seeing the article in the airline mag, I also found a recent post about it at Requirements Defined, a blog from the folks at Seilevel and Experientia).

One of my goals for this year is to establish Product Councils for my products. Product Councils, or Product Advisory Boards, as they are sometimes called, are made up of people who are familiar with your product and/or the market. In most cases, they are external, meaning that the members are customers or industry experts who can provide strategic guidance or provide feedback on tactical implementations, but they can also be made up of, wholly or in part, internal members.

I plan to have two; one made up of internal team members and one made up of customers. Both are necessary to help me grow the product to meet the needs of the market.