Knowledge shared by our community

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.

Avoiding Hard Conversations

This article discusses the importance of having hard conversations and how culture can play a role in how people approach them. It suggests using the radical candor framework to practice caring and trustful relationships while providing feedback. It also recommends not waiting too long to deliver feedback, avoiding Slack, and being open to listening. It emphasizes not putting permanent labels on people and making a balance between criticizing and praising them.

Coaching for Compassion

This article discusses how managers can use one-on-ones to coach for compassion and inspire their reports, rather than just motivate them. It suggests talking about yourself, your dreams, and making it clear who does what by when. The overall objective is to come up with comprehensive personal development plans that incorporate personal mission statements, dreams, and action items. The main lesson is that managers should inspire, not just motivate, their reports and use silence to learn more about themselves and others.

Enemies of Growth

This article discusses the concept of "enemies of growth" which can impede a company's efforts to expand its team and product scope. It identifies four enemies of growth, such as underdeveloped leaders, lack of a solid onboarding process, complex processes, and getting the best from people. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding the root causes of these enemies and pursuing growth without haste or shortcuts.

How to Be a Great Leader in Times of Crises

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a leader took several actions to make the transition to remote work easier for their team. These included frequent check-ins, one-on-ones focused on career development, mental health support, and health check-ins. The leader also shared their passion to inspire the team and emphasized the importance of listening with empathy.

A Long Road to Product Management

This article details the journey of an engineer transitioning to a product management role. It outlines the steps taken to bridge the gap between engineering and product management, such as taking courses, working in data science and product analytics, and wearing multiple hats in a small startup. It also highlights the importance of planning ahead, taking courses, and reading through available documentation when transitioning to a new role.

Avoiding the Gossip Trap at Work

This article discusses the importance of avoiding gossip in the workplace, especially for leaders. It emphasizes the need to maintain a professional relationship with coworkers and to nip gossip in the bud. It also stresses the importance of transparency and honesty in the workplace, and how gossip can have detrimental effects on productivity.

Eight Proven Tactics for Salary Negotiations

This article provides eight tactics for negotiating salary, such as making sure your agenda is clear, doing research to understand your market value and position within the company, and using body language and non-verbal cues. It also encourages people to find common ground with their boss, be flexible, and use the "Powerlessness" and "No" cards when necessary. Lastly, it advises to not use precise numbers and to be the first to mention a number when negotiating.

From a Dysfunctional Group to a High Performing Team

A team lead joined a company and found the team to be dysfunctional due to lack of leadership for a year. He developed a three-step strategy to help the team become more cohesive and functional. This included positioning himself in the middle of everything, introducing chaos by putting people who didn't like each other on common tasks, and creating a unifying vision. He learned that it is important to be patient, create a safe playing field, observe carefully, and establish principles to build culture.

Why AB Testing Is Good for Your Company Culture

Six years ago, my company had a problem with inefficient projects and too many meetings. To solve this, we implemented a data warehouse, built an AB testing platform, and changed our product process to incorporate more testing. This had a positive effect on our company alignment, speed, intellectual humility, and team collaboration, leading to increased revenue and a better culture.

How Hack Weeks Can Inspire Innovation and Change Culture

Hack weeks are a great way to increase creativity, collaboration, and morale in a company. After getting buy-in from the company, the leader created rules and encouraged everyone to contribute ideas and help each other. The hack week was a success, with many projects completed and launched, and it had a lasting effect on the company's culture and mindset. It became a twice-a-year event that was eagerly looked forward to by the company, and it contributed to the company's success.

Growing a Team That Embraces Culture of Freedom and Responsibility

A year ago, the author inherited a high performing team and was motivated to scale the team for higher impact and introduce product management function while continuously improving engineering practices. To do this, the author leveraged the existing cultural symbol of the 'dream team' to set expectations for the team and build trust. The dream team is built on trust, diversity, and psychological safety, and is able to make tough calls, tackle complex projects, and collaborate efficiently. The author also focused on team strategy and alignment, and empowered the team to come up with the technical vision and new initiatives. Lessons learned include the importance of building trust, setting expectations, expanding trust to stakeholders, and providing freedom in decision-making.

Trust as a Fundamental Force That Binds People Together

A tech lead experienced difficulty handling interpersonal conflicts and mediating different opinions. Through self-reflection, they realized trust is the most fundamental force that binds people together and is critical for team success. To create a safe and inclusive environment, they encouraged curiosity and courage, and developed rituals to scale communication. They learned that people need to feel valued and respected to be productive, and that communication overhead can be managed by proactively identifying bottlenecks and creating rituals and behaviors to scale the team.

Measuring the Morale of a Team

It is important for leaders to measure the morale of their teams in order to ensure productivity and good code. This can be done through frequent check-ins and one-on-ones, anonymous surveys, and tools such as 15five. Building an open and trustful relationship with employees is key to understanding their morale, as well as tracking data to identify trends over time.

Developing Your Personal Brand: A Brief Guide to Creating an Elevator Pitch

This article discusses the importance of having an elevator pitch to present yourself in a professional setting. It provides advice on how to create a two-minute pitch that includes ten things you are good at and proud of, and how to turn those into stories. It also suggests asking friends and colleagues to help identify your strengths, and to practice the pitch to make it sound natural. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of having a consistent message about yourself across all platforms.

Achieving a Product-Market Fit

This article discusses the problem of achieving product-market fit and the steps taken to solve it. It explains that you must precisely define what product-market fit for your product is and that it differs from one product to another. To reach the right customers, you must work backward and answer two main questions: what is the problem you are trying to solve and who are the customers who will buy your product. The article also provides lessons learned, such as looking for a person who decides on and approves the purchase and aligning the pricing, product, and sales process to make it a competitive product.

Adding More PMs in the Early Startup Phase

This article discusses the problem of adding more PMs during the early startup phase. It details the four key aspects of this problem: when to add a PM, the right profile for a PM, how to mentor them, and how to hand off things to them. The author shares his experience of founding a company in 2014 and not hiring a PM until 2017, when the company had grown to over 40 people. He explains the process of finding the right PM, including doing an analysis of his own strengths, looking for someone who was less of a PM and more of a TPM, and using a service called Hired to target people with specific domain knowledge. Lastly, he shares lessons learned, such as creating a full-stack product management set of requirements and building a team with diverse people who complement each other.

How to Build a Disruptive Product

This case study discusses the process of developing a successful product in the Industrial IoT space. Through market studies, mockups, and data science work, the team was able to identify the customer's pain points and develop a data contextualization SaaS solution. The team also learned the importance of working backward and putting themselves in the customer's shoes in order to come up with a disruptive product, as well as validating their hypothesis before building something.

AI Products Are Data Products

This article discusses the author's experience working on three different AI projects. The author learned that all AI projects start with data and that structured data is the best form of data to start with. They also learned that having lots of data is better than complicated algorithms and that text data can be used if structured data is not available. Finally, they learned the importance of considering race, ethnicity, bias, and inclusion when building AI products.

How Different Is Enterprise Product Management

This article discusses the differences between enterprise and consumer product management, and the lessons learned by the author from his experience in both. The author identifies key differences such as the speed of change, customer interaction, and metrics of success. He also notes that enterprise product management works well with the waterfall methodology, while agile is becoming increasingly popular. Additionally, he highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between hardware and software in the enterprise world.

How Stand-Up Comedy Helped Me Better Understand People

At a TED conference in India in 2009, a TED staff member used stand-up comedy to lighten the mood. This inspired the speaker to use comedy to enhance interactions with people and understanding of other people. He started going to a bar telling jokes and researching the audience to write jokes for them. He then applied this experience to his workplace, researching the attendees before meetings and using jokes to convey messages that require self-reflection. He learned that it is important to focus on the audience and their needs, and to listen to their response to jokes.