Jordan Hooper | Jun 22, 2024

Story Samurai

In this conversation, Jordan discusses the importance of building trust with different stakeholders in product management, including the engineering team, customer success, sales, and marketing. He emphasizes the need for transparency, clear communication, and collaboration. Jordan also highlights the significance of aligning the product strategy with the company strategy and the importance of having a strong product roadmap that is driven by the mission, vision, and OKRs. He shares insights on how to navigate challenges such as feature requests, changing priorities, and organizational culture. Additionally, Jordan shares a story about transitioning from a customer-driven approach to a strategy-driven approach and the challenges and benefits that came with it.

Keywords

product management, trust, transparency, communication, collaboration, engineering team, customer success, sales, marketing, product strategy, company strategy, product roadmap, feature requests, organizational culture

Takeaways

• Building trust with stakeholders, such as the engineering team and customer success, is crucial for effective product management.
• Transparency and clear communication are key to maintaining trust and alignment with stakeholders.
• Aligning the product strategy with the company strategy is essential for driving product development and achieving business goals.
• Having a strong product roadmap that is driven by the mission, vision, and OKRs helps prioritize and focus efforts.
• Navigating challenges, such as feature requests and changing priorities, requires balancing flexibility and maintaining a cohesive approach.
• Organizational culture plays a significant role in product management success, and a lack of transparency and a feature-focused mindset can hinder progress.
• Transitioning from a customer-driven approach to a strategy-driven approach requires time, building relationships, and helping stakeholders connect the dots.
• Product managers should strive for a balance between meeting customer needs and driving business outcomes.

Titles

• Navigating Challenges in Product Management
• Aligning Product Strategy with Company Strategy

Sound Bites

• "Customer success can often feel underappreciated and like an underutilized input into product strategy."
• "The biggest way for trust with the engineering team to go wrong is showing that it's important and then you understand why it's important."
• "Sales and marketing tend to get very excited when you talk about potential new features and forget that word at the beginning of things."

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