You know the drill… a key customer wants you and their Account Manager to show up and present your latest roadmap, so they can see when they’ll be receiving their long-awaited products or enhancement requests.  Of course, you did that nine months ago, promising said enhancement requests would be delivered… um… last month.  Ahem.  “Yes, well, ...

Great product managers know when they should speak up and when they shouldn’t – a key leadership skill that comes with long experience.  But if you don’t have the long experience, how do you develop this skill? Verbal Leadership - The Right Time to Speak Up One of the ways that product managers make their leadership evident ...

In the circle of influence, what is your proximity to key executives or managers?  Do you have daily contact and/or rapport?  Or is your proximity infrequent, rare or non-existent?  If you struggle from a credibility gap, consider paying attention to the language that executives use.  Think of the executives who have influence over your product.  ...

Probably the best and the worst things about cross-functional teams are that they’re … cross functional. They’re great because you get all those functional experts working together to make your product more successful.  But the bad news is that each person on your team already has a full-time job, and making time to work on your ...

Tom Grant’s recent post “Product Managers Must Have The Opportunity to Be Leaders” got me thinking again about this concept of authority and Product Management. Tom wraps up his post with this thought: “Best practices for PM’s role in innovation, or any other job function, are great, as long as PMs have the authority, capability, and ...

We’ve heard lots of discussion on how to fit Product Owners into organizations.  The answer is often  “It depends” … but we don’t see much discussion of the primary driver of that decision.  It’s not your culture, not the org chart, or the existing skill sets. Or necessarily what your Agile consultant/coach recommends.  It depends ...

With an economy that’s shifting toward expansion, many of us will have opportunities to propose new business cases in the coming months.  If you’re working on one now, or will be soon, be sure to avoid these common mistakes that can cause your business case to fail: 1. Forgetting the customer’s problem and current solution –  When ...

Welcome to 2010!  For most of us, January brings a flurry of activity preparing for the annual Sales Kickoff.  Your Sales team is an important “window” into what’s going on in your market place.  Here are three of our favorite ways to make sure the window stays open and the right information flows both ways. 

At first glance, last month’s survey responses make it seem like the relationship between PM and Sales is a one-way street. Product Managers train sales reps, answer their questions, provide input into RFPs, and even go on sales calls. So far, that describes almost every respondent’s relationship with Sales. But when it comes time to reciprocate, Sales ...

In case you haven’t figured it out, I read Fortune magazine regularly. This issue includes the “Best Advice I Ever Got” feature, with an interview of Wilbur Ross (of International Steel fame). He quotes a mentor as saying “You’re better off backing a mediocre idea that’s brilliantly implemented than a brilliant idea that’s ...