The Product Experience

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Dr Cat Hicks is a psychological scientist and the founder of Catharsis, a human-centred research consultancy that works with engineering organisations. After self-funding her first open-access study into developer motivation, she was recruited to lead the Developer Success Lab at Pluralsight — a three-year programme that generated large-scale empirical research across hundreds of companies and more than 11,000 developers. Her book, The Psychology of Software Teams, published in July 2026, brings that evidence to bear on the question her industry keeps asking: why do smart people in smart organisations so often struggle to work well together? We talk about the hidden costs of treating developers as interchangeable units, what large-scale cycle time data reveals about individual performance, and how product managers can build the conditions for teams to actually thrive.

Key takeaways

The "brains and jars" model — treating developers as interchangeable, isolated computing units — does not just feel demeaning; it actively undermines the collaborative, social work that makes software teams effective, and is linked to burnout, self-censorship, and a breakdown of trust.
Cycle time data from 216 companies and over 11,000 developers shows that individual performance fluctuates dramatically week to week — it is not a stable personal trait — which means slow periods are usually an environmental problem, not a personal one.
Over-production pressure (the constant pull towards short-term delivery) has measurable cascading effects: developers stop mentoring, stop surfacing problems to managers, and stop investing in long-term code quality. It can be measured and, with committed leadership, changed within weeks.
AI is producing genuine identity threats, not just productivity disruption. Teams that lower the "threat temperature" — framing change as a shared technical challenge and affirming that new skills can always be learnt — unlock significantly more adaptive and curious behaviour.
Metacognitive scaffolding — building structured strategies for thinking about your own thinking, not just raw output — is more trainable than cognitive capacity and is almost entirely absent from how agentic coding environments are currently designed.
Superordinate goals (shared outcomes that transcend individual preferences) allow diverse teams, including those who prefer deep solo work, to collaborate productively without demanding that everyone care about the product in the same way.

Chapters

(00:00) Opening
(01:06) Cat's background and the book
(04:40) Defining a software team
(07:02) Building the Developer Success Lab
(10:26) The brains and jars model
(13:14) What the model costs teams
(17:54) Why communicating value is so hard
(19:04) What change looks like in practice
(23:01) Code review anxiety and cycle time research
(27:55) AI's effect on developer identity
(31:57) Agentic coding and cognitive fatigue
(35:46) Threat, play, and psychological safety
(38:19) Working across disciplines
(43:04) What product managers can do
(48:00) Wrap-up

Referenced

The Psychology of Software Teams by Dr Cat Hicks
The Programmer's Brain by Felienne Hermans
The Psychology of Computer Programming by Gerald Weinberg
Developer Success Lab (Pluralsight)
DORA project
Catharsis — Dr Cat Hicks's consultancy
Fight for the Human — Dr Cat Hicks's newsletter
Dr Cat Hicks
Learning Opportunities Claude skill — by Dr Cat Hicks
Deliberate practice and chess improvement study (44,000 Chess.com players)

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Faith Forster has spent 15 years in product leadership. She was VP of product at Dex, acquired for approximately $600 million, and went on to serve as CPO at Legal, a payments and compliance platform. She now runs discovery.com, an AI-native platform that helps product leaders and teams make faster, better product decisions by connecting to their tools and synthesising competitor, customer and growth intelligence. She is also the driving force behind the Makers Manifesto — a cross-disciplinary set of values and principles for building great products in the age of AI, developed with 45 contributors from across product, engineering, design, and business leadership.

We discuss:

The manifesto emerged from 96 conversations with product leaders whose grasp of AI ranged from fully automated pipelines to treating it as a faster way to write PRDs — a gap that revealed an industry in urgent need of a shared reference point.
Four values anchor the manifesto: purpose over possibility, value created over effort spent, learning loops over launch plans, and human accountability over full automation.
"Maker" was chosen over "builder" to signal that designers, engineers, salespeople, customer support staff, and founders all share equal ownership of the creation process — regardless of job title.
Feature parity is no longer a defensible moat: when any competitor can replicate a capability within days, durable advantage must come from data, relationships, distribution, and business model.
Product market fit can no longer be treated as a static milestone — in a market where products, competitors, and customer expectations shift simultaneously, fit must become a continuous, living part of decision-making.
"Done" now means adopted, not shipped. AI removes every excuse for clunky, one-size-fits-all experiences, and teams that still equate production deployment with completion are measuring the wrong thing.
Making context explicit — codifying strategy in a form that agents and humans can both act on daily — is the principle teams consistently identify as their most urgent, immediate priority.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction
01:12 Faith's background
02:28 Origins of the Makers Manifesto
06:18 Makers Manifesto vs the Agile Manifesto
07:23 Why "maker" not "builder"
11:42 Four values and 16 principles
15:01 Purpose over possibility
19:10 Learning loops over launch plans
22:36 Who gets to be a maker
28:55 Durable advantage in the AI era
33:22 Staying close to customers
36:04 What's next for the manifesto
43:59 Wrap-up

Referenced

Makers Manifesto — https://makersmanifesto.org
discovery.com — Faith's AI-native product decision platform

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Charity Ibhadon is a Global Product Director at WPP, where she leads the development of an AI marketing tool. With 15 years in product — including three formative years at ASOS during its high-growth heyday — she came to the discipline via a decade in investment banking and an executive MBA. She has operated at VP and CPO level, leading large international teams across consumer technology and media.

We discuss:
— Why the explosion of product frameworks, books, and LinkedIn benchmarks has made it harder, not easier, to feel like you're doing the job well — regardless of seniority
— How the physical symptoms of burnout can masquerade as markers of success, and why high-achieving women in particular are vulnerable to that misreading
— What it actually takes to recover: stepping away, finding what your body needs outside of work, and stopping short of making your job your entire identity
— Why being genuinely enjoyable to work with is a more durable career advantage than any certification or methodology
— How the Eisenhower matrix — do, defer, delegate, delete — can be a practical daily tool for protecting energy, not just a poster on a wall
— The case for "happy high status": remaining calm and unflappable under pressure as a learnable leadership behaviour, not a personality trait
— Why commercial curiosity — understanding what moves the business and staying interested in the world — will matter more for long-term product careers than AI certificates

Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
1:29 Charity's background
4:00 Why product feels harder than ever
6:34 Why fun at work matters
8:45 Recognising burnout
10:25 When burnout feels like success
12:13 Finding your way back
16:18 Fun as a strategic advantage
18:00 Staying calm under pressure
22:26 The "CEO of the product" myth
22:41 Mindset for a long career in product
24:45 Building resilience
26:35 Wrap-up

Referenced
Eisenhower matrix | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priorit...
Charity's keynote at #mtpcon London | • Product is Hard. It should still be fun: C...

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Vonny Laing is a user-centred design lead at the Student Loans Company, part of the UK government, where she oversees a service used by millions of people at every stage of their higher education journey. She has held roles spanning UX design, content design, and head of design across both public and private sectors, and completed an MBA specifically to earn the language of business — and with it, a seat at the table where design decisions get made.

We discuss why designing from the majority inward produces invisible failures, how flipping to an underserved-first model creates a halo effect for all users, and why government service assessments make the happy-path approach structurally untenable. Vonny shares how a single day of guerrilla research at a further education college surfaced a critical gap between student loan payments and universal credit eligibility that years of data had never revealed — and why synthetic users can never replicate that. We also get into her "eat your greens" principle for designing across a user's whole life; the case for disaster thinking over happy-path optimism; how stories and verbatims move executives more reliably than dashboards; and why designers who learn to speak business become a secret weapon in any organisation.

Chapters:
(00:53) Welcome and introductions
(01:23) Vonny background
(02:10) Moving fast in the civil service
(04:02) The UK government digital community
(05:05) The pyramid model
(07:03) Underserved versus edge case users
(08:09) Designing at population scale
(09:43) Service assessments and design accountability
(11:01) Discovery research methodology
(13:25) Finding users invisible in the data
(16:22) Bridging gaps you cannot fix
(18:42) Eat your greens: needs versus wants
(20:07) Designing for users over time
(21:04) Worst-case scenario thinking
(22:11) Mining complaint logs and prioritising
(25:47) Why synthetic users fall short
(28:12) Where automated testing has a role
(29:19) Leave the building: guerrilla research
(33:03) Communicating research through storytelling
(36:29) Why Vonnie did an MBA
(39:03) Design's ceiling in organisations
(42:04) Wrap-up

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Recorded live at #mtpcon London, Lily sits down with Emily Tate — former MD of Mind the Product for a broad debrief on the day's themes. They cover why product and design may matter more in an AI world than ever before, how heritage organisations can navigate transformation without the luxury of greenfield conditions, and what it actually takes to get internal stakeholders on side. Emily also makes a case for why SaaS isn't dead, why positioning fundamentals haven't changed despite the AI frenzy, and why remote work is draining the fun out of product teams.

Chapters

0:00 — Intro
1:00 — The state of AI in product: still an inflection point
3:18 — AI is a technology, not a moat
4:57 — Keeping the humanity in product work
6:13 — Advice for PMs new to the industry
8:38 — Why conferences need both practical and inspirational talks
10:24 — How to start speaking: find your local ProductTank
13:46 — You don't need a novel idea to give a great talk
16:01 — Charity Ibhadon's talk: product is hard, but it should be fun
16:19 — Remote work and the slow erosion of joy at work
19:15 — Innovating inside heritage organisations
21:39 — Stop trying to educate stakeholders about product
24:06 — April Dunford on positioning: what AI changes, and what it doesn't
27:00 — The SaaS-pocalypse myth
28:47 — Predictions: 12–18 more months of heavy AI talk
30:59 — Filtering signal from noise: where Emily reads
31:40 — Eric Ries' Incorruptible and building companies that resist corruption

Key takeaways

If your only moat is AI, you don't have a moat. AI is a capability, not a product. The question is how you're using it to serve customers better than you could before — not whether you're using it at all.
Building is no longer the bottleneck — deciding what to build is. That shift makes strong product and design thinking more important, not less.
Stop trying to teach stakeholders about product. Drop the methodology, use their language, show them something tangible, and bring them along in ways that make sense to them — not to you.
SaaS has a defensible edge. Products built on experience across hundreds of customers carry knowledge that a single company building its own solution can't replicate. That's a positioning story worth telling.
Positioning fundamentals haven't changed. Sprinkling AI on your messaging doesn't sharpen it. Outside of tech, leading with AI can actively damage trust.
You don't need a novel idea to give a great talk. Your version of a familiar concept might be the one that finally makes it click for someone. Start at a local ProductTank.
Don't try to be someone else on stage. Find your style by doing it. Authenticity beats borrowed charisma.
Remote work is eroding team joy in ways we're not measuring. The informal moments that build relationships and make work fun don't happen on Slack or in back-to-back video calls — and the resulting friction is real.

Featured links

Incorruptible by Eric Ries — https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/460881/incorruptible-by-ries-eric/9780241692028
The Decision Stack by Martin Eriksson — thedecisionstack.com
Christian Idiodi — Silicon Valley Product Group
April Dunford — aprildunford.com
Find your local ProductTank — producttank.com
Mind the Product — mindtheproduct.com

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Lindsey Jayne is an independent product adviser and coach, and former chief product officer at the Financial Times. She began her career at the Government Digital Service, where she stumbled into product management by chasing someone down a corridor holding a MacBook that actually worked. What followed was 15 years moving through startups, scaleups, and ultimately one of Britain's most storied media institutions.

Chapters
00:00 — Introduction
01:08 — Lindsey's origin story: from a broken government laptop to product management
02:48 — Why product managers burn out: accountability without authority
05:34 — Influencing stakeholders using discovery skills
07:19 — What leaders can do to clear the way for their product teams
08:44 — Stakeholder mapping: the influence and interest framework
09:41 — Recognising burnout signals in your team at scale
11:16 — Balancing passion and sustainability: when enthusiasm becomes a pattern
14:16 — When to transition from individual contributor to product leader
16:24 — Product reviews and cross-team knowledge sharing
18:42 — How to communicate effectively with senior stakeholders
20:40 — Career-defining advice: you don't have to die on every hill
21:43 — Half your job is landing the product, not just building it
22:25 — The most common mistake junior product managers make
24:05 — How to tell your story after a difficult or toxic company exit

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Dave Martin has spent more than two decades in product leadership, with a string of C-suite roles, a couple of exits and a book, The Product Momentum Gap, to his name. He is also dyslexic and ADHD, and has built a career while masking the effort it takes to "think normal".

In this episode he makes the case that the advice handed to neurotypical leaders often fails the roughly half of tech workers who are neurodivergent, and lays out a practical playbook for landing your message, leading the room and progressing without pretending to be someone else.

Chapters

00:00) Welcome, and Dave's background in product
(02:03) "I've been masking it": faking thinking normal
(02:37) The meeting where your idea is ignored, then credited to someone else
(03:28) AI as a "spell check for influence"
(04:07) The myth that growth requires pretending to be neurotypical
(05:15) Why standard leadership advice fails neurodivergent leaders
(06:45) Executive presence, signal presence and signal drift
(07:57) Is this universal, or specific to neurodivergence?
(09:48) From "dumb kid" to writing C++ at ten
(11:27) When a word processor flipped his Fs to As
(13:24) The trap: leading with detail
(15:42) The boardroom moment that gets you labelled "not strategic"
(17:05) Designing for re-tell: what the room repeats when you leave
(18:19) Three mistakes that kill your influence
(19:36) The CALM framework
(21:32) Authority and the signal prep exercise
(22:14) Three questions: outcome, one-line recommendation, re-tell
(24:44) "Minutes not months": seeding the line that gets repeated
(26:56) Learning: vulnerability and psychological safety
(28:27) Momentum, well-being and burnout
(31:21) Why burnout is a leadership fault
(32:01) Mia's story: the head of product who wanted to be CPO
(34:20) Recognising the trigger and practising signal prep
(37:06) When stakeholders started calling her strategic
(38:31) The opposite trap: abandoning detail entirely
(39:22) Why some leaders step back into IC roles
(41:16) Free training and AI as your spell checker for influence
(42:26) Closing thoughts

Key takeaways— Authenticity is not the goal; deliberate communication is. Dave's central provocation is that "be your authentic self" assumes everyone in the room thinks the way you do. For a leader who sees patterns instantly and works in deep, hyperfocused bursts, behaving authentically can mean failing to explain the obvious and struggling to empathise with those who need the journey, not just the destination.
— The symptoms are universal, the tax is not. Everybody's message gets lost in meetings. What separates neurodivergent leaders is the cognitive cost of noticing that drift and correcting it. As Randy and Dave agree, the tools discussed here help everyone, but the impact is far larger for those paying the higher tax.
— Leading with detail is the career trap. The very trait that makes someone an exceptional individual contributor, the ability to go deep and surface every edge case, can sink them in the boardroom.
— Answer a strategic question with edge cases and you are labelled "not executive" with alarming speed, and undoing that label takes months of work.
— CALM is the alternative. Clarity, authority, learning and momentum, delivered calmly. Authority comes from being clear on the outcome and the ask, asking for support and guidance rather than permission, and not feeling obliged to justify every edge case.
— Signal prep is the practical tool. Three questions: what do I need from this room; what is my one-line recommendation; and what will they repeat when I am not in the room. A bonus question for higher-stakes meetings asks what the room feels now and how you want them to feel when you leave.
— Design for re-tell. Dave's example of a leader who reduced a lengthy objective to "minutes not months for our customers", and repeated it, is the clearest illustration. That phrase, not someone else's reframe, is what got repeated in the room afterwards.
— Well-being underpins momentum. Dave nearly named the framework around well-being. Without a sustainable pace, leaders cannot lead, and the unprocessed meeting that keeps you awake at 3am is a momentum problem. He frames widespread tech burnout as a leadership failure, because leaders set the expectation.
— AI is a spell checker for influence. Just as a word processor turned Dave's Fs into As without changing his brain, AI tooling can help neurodivergent leaders translate their thinking into the right language for the room, supporting the communication without doing the thinking or the judgement for them.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Barry O’Reilly is an entrepreneur, author, and founder of Nobody Studios, an early-stage venture studio focused on building AI companies. Over the last six years he has worked with founders, executives and enterprise leadership teams to rethink how organisations operate in the age of generative AI, while simultaneously building and launching companies inside the studio model.

A former startup advisor and executive coach, Barry has spent the last several years studying why most AI transformations fail despite enormous investment. Through his coaching and advisory work with leaders from companies including American Airlines, Skyscanner, and Slack, Barry has developed practical frameworks for improving decision-making, reducing administrative overhead, and increasing what he calls "decision velocity".

In this episode, Barry explains why AI adoption fails when companies focus on tools instead of behaviour change, why judgment is becoming the most important human skill, and how teams can use AI to improve collaboration rather than replace people.

Key takeaways
— Most AI transformations fail because organisations start with tools instead of behaviours. Installing AI software does not change how people work, make decisions or collaborate.
— The most effective AI use cases amplify a person’s natural way of working. Barry realised he produced better writing by talking through ideas and using transcription tools instead of forcing himself into traditional writing workflows.
— Capturing meetings, conversations and decisions as structured data creates long-term organisational intelligence. Every interaction becomes a reusable asset that improves preparation, follow-through, and future decision-making.
— Leaders must role-model AI adoption themselves. Organisations see better outcomes when executives openly experiment with tools, share lessons learned, and create psychological safety around adoption.
— Decision velocity matters more than raw productivity. Teams improve when they arrive prepared, make decisions faster, reduce reversals, and spend more time solving meaningful problems instead of handling administration.
— AI should be used to challenge thinking, not replace it. The most valuable prompts ask for blind spots, alternative scenarios, and pressure tests rather than definitive answers.
— Teams working with AI outperform individuals working with AI. Barry cites research showing that collaborative ideation with AI produces significantly stronger outcomes than isolated use.
— Productivity gains are meaningless if they simply create more exhaustion. The real opportunity is creating space for reflection, slow thinking, and better judgment.
— Judgment is the critical human capability organisations cannot outsource. If people stop exercising judgment and rely entirely on AI-generated answers, they gradually erode their ability to make decisions under uncertainty.

Chapters
1:03 — Building AI companies at Nobody Studios
3:16 — Why AI transformations fail
5:05 — The danger of focusing on tools
6:35 — Discovering natural workflows with AI
8:51 — Turning conversations into data assets
12:02 — Measuring successful AI adoption
13:14 — Why leaders must role-model behaviour change
18:39 — Decision velocity as a leadership metric
21:33 — Escaping administrative overload
23:02 — Why leaders need time to think
26:54 — What CFOs are worried about
28:08 — Can AI replace startup teams?
29:45 — Why distribution still matters most
33:13 — Capturing and synthesising ideas with AI
34:38 — Using AI to challenge your thinking
37:11 — Avoiding top-down AI-driven strategy
39:00 — Why teams plus AI outperform individuals
42:31 — The problem with AI-generated certainty
43:12 — Preserving human judgment
44:55 — Hiring for judgment and decision-making
47:19 — Final reflections on leadership and AI

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Dan Ciruli is VP and General Manager of Cloud Native at Nutanix. A computer science graduate of UC Berkeley, Dan spent a decade in engineering before pivoting to product management in 2003, a role that barely had a name when he started. Since then he has held product leadership positions at EMC and Google, where he was part of the team that helped create Kubernetes and open source Google's cloud infrastructure.

He was a founding member of the OpenAPI Initiative and a steering committee member for the Istio service mesh project, and has spent the last two decades with one foot in commercial product development and one in the open source community.

In this episode, Dan explains why open source is not a charity exercise, how companies actually make money from code they give away for free, and what product managers get wrong when they tell their engineers to avoid it.

Key takeaways
— Open source is not crowdsourcing from individuals — much of the contribution comes from companies investing on the clock, because broad adoption benefits everyone more than proprietary lock-in.
— The CNCF succeeded because it created a neutral space where the largest and smallest organisations felt equally safe contributing and consuming. That structure — not the code itself — is what made cloud native computing universal.
— Being a product manager in open source requires the same core instinct as any other PM role: understanding the why. The difference is that your engineers may work for a competitor, and your roadmap is not entirely yours to control.
— AI is multiplying the capability of both good actors and bad actors in open source security. The answer is not to slow adoption but to keep a credible human in the loop — someone with accumulated trust, judgement and accountability.
— Before open sourcing your own work, be clear on how your company will make money, articulate it concisely for leadership, and then find at least one other organisation — even a competitor — willing to join you. A consortium signals a standard. A solo release signals a gamble.

Chapters
1:16 — From engineering to product management
3:11 — Bridging open source and commercial work
5:05 — The origin of Kubernetes at Google
6:35 — How Nutanix embraces open source
7:16 — The crowdsourcing misconception
8:51 — Why the CNCF changed everything
11:25 — Building a defensible moat in open source
12:13 — The business models behind free code
14:18 — Managing roadmaps you don't fully control
15:04 — When your competitor writes your code
16:04 — The CEO who wore his secrets around his neck
18:13 — Developing an open source strategy
19:37 — The one question every PM must ask
22:44 — What is the CNCF?
23:34 — AI, open source and the security arms race
29:45 — Chop wood, carry water: the human in the loop
31:48 — Advice for PMs running open source products
33:15 — Harnessing a community you don't manage
34:38 — Should you open source your own work?
36:35 — How messy does it really get?
39:33 — Linux is an anti-pattern

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In the private sector, product teams pick their customers, generate demand, and ship into something close to a green field. In the public sector, none of that holds. Ayushi Roy — Chief Program Officer at New America's New Practice Lab and a lecturer at the Harvard Kennedy School — joins Randy to unpack what changes when your user base is already sitting in front of you, your scrutiny is congressional, and the right answer is sometimes to delete ten systems rather than build an eleventh.

Drawing on her work on IRS Direct File, the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), the Illinois childcare voucher system, and a text-based 911 alternative that rolled out to 800,000 students across 13 universities, Ayushi makes the case for a distinct public-sector product playbook: thin-slicing for safe failure, designing for the lowest digital denominator, separating design problems from engineering problems, and treating unbuilding as a first-class option.

Chapter markers
01:48 — From aid monitoring in Jordan to digital delivery
03:37 — Why she built a text-based alternative to 911
06:33 — From a rollout to 800,000 students to Oakland City Hall
08:58 — What the New Practice Lab does, and what a CPO does inside a think tank
11:06 — Why private-sector product playbooks don't transliterate
14:03 — No marketing, no early adopters: latent demand and the curb cut effect
14:40 — Oakland's eviction tool, MacBooks, and the lowest digital denominator
17:30 — Thin-slicing IRS Direct File without losing Congress
22:36 — Building executive sponsorship that allows safe failure
23:41 — Product vs service: the rest of the job that isn't writing code
26:09 — Illinois childcare vouchers: when modernising the form makes things worse
29:22 — Design problems, engineering problems, and the laptop-hinge analogy
33:18 — Can AI prototyping close the policy–implementation gap?
35:40 — The FAFSA simplification crisis and the case for bilingual builders
37:31 — Unbuilding: how a request for a 15th CHIP system became one to remove ten
41:18 — What keeps her going

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, host Randy Silver sits down with product veteran John Cutler to explore why creating great products remains one of the hardest things organisations do. They dive into why so many companies adopt off‑the‑shelf models (“Spotify”, “SAFe”, etc) and still struggle, and how the secret often lies not in what you build but how you build it—specifically the game you design for how you work.

Chapters
00:00 — The stigma around “how you work”
00:54 — Introducing John Cutler (again)
01:25 — What John’s building at Dotwork
02:46 — From fun to formal: doing discovery at scale
04:04 — Why process became a bad word
05:10 — The “cavalier PM” mindset
06:28 — Empowered teams vs. harsh realities
08:00 — What great pockets of practice have in common
09:03 — Managing up vs. doing the right thing
10:24 — Playing the game vs. designing the game
11:20 — What makes a great internal game
12:33 — Defining success: thriving, surviving, progressing
13:46 — Environmental design: why leaders hesitate
15:10 — Making intentional design less intimidating
16:42 — Tools, rituals, and the power of checkpoints
18:23 — The behaviour design playbook
20:41 — Removing blockers: access, repetition, reflection

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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In this episode, Nina Olding, Staff Product Manager at Weights & Biases and formerly at Google DeepMind, working on trust and compliance for AI, joins Randy to explore the UX challenges of AI‑driven features. As AI becomes increasingly woven into digital products, the traditional UX cues and trust‑signals that users rely on are changing. Nina introduces her framework of the three “A’s” for AI UX: Awareness, Agency, and Assurance, and explains how product teams can build this into their AI‑enabled products without launching a massive transformation programme.

Key Takeaways
— As AI features proliferate, the UX challenge is less about the technology and more about how users perceive, understand and trust the interactions.
— Trust is based on three foundational dimensions for AI‑enabled products: Awareness, Agency, Assurance.
— Awareness: Make it clear when AI is involved (and when it isn’t). Invisible AI = risk of misunderstanding. Magical AI without context = disorientation.
— Agency: Give users control, or at least the option to opt‑out, define boundaries, choose defaults vs advanced settings.
— Assurance: Because AI can be non‑deterministic, you must design for confidence—indicators of reliability, transparency about limitations, ability to question or override outputs.

Chapters
00:00 – Intro: Why AI products are failing on trust
00:47 – Nina Old’s journey from Google DeepMind to Weights & Biases
03:20 – The UX of AI: It's not just a chat window
04:08 – Introducing the Three A’s framework: Awareness, Agency, Assurance
08:30 – Designing for Awareness: Visibility and user signals
14:40 – Agency: Giving users control and escape hatches
21:30 – Assurance: Transparency, confidence indicators, and humility
28:05 – Three key questions to assess AI UX
30:50 – The product case for trust: Compliance, loyalty, and retention
33:00 – Final thoughts: Building the trust muscle

Featured Links: Follow Nina on LinkedIn | Weights & Biases | Check out Nina's 'The hidden UX of AI' slides from Industry Conference Cleveland 2025

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily Smith speaks with Vidya Dinamani, product veteran, coach, and Co-founder of Product Rebels, about how to tell if your team is truly product-led or just paying lip service. With over a decade of experience coaching hundreds of teams, Vidya shares her insights into the critical elements of product maturity, the most overlooked barriers to effective product work, and how Product Rebels' diagnostic framework is helping companies move from chaos to clarity.

Chapters
00:00 – The customer conversation gap
01:28 – Meet Vidya Dinamani and Product Rebels
03:35 – Why they built a diagnostic, not an assessment
04:45 – Mindsets, competencies, and the missing piece: resources
06:28 – AI readiness: the new fourth pillar
07:40 – What it really means to be product-led
09:59 – How teams are using the diagnostic
13:10 – Breaking down the four pillars
16:01 – Why access to customers remains a key obstacle
17:38 – Patterns, or lack thereof, in product maturity
20:26 – AI readiness in context
23:59 – A case study: product maturity at scale
27:52 – Final thoughts on assessment vs naming

What we learned from Vidya

Most product teams lack customer access: 70–80% of PMs Product Rebels encounter say they’ve never spoken to a customer.
Being product-led requires more than intent: It demands mindset, core competencies, supportive resources—and now AI readiness.
Diagnostic, not assessment: Their tool isn’t about performance reviews; it’s a heat map that reveals where to begin your transformation.
AI is not a bolt-on: AI readiness is most effective when integrated into the broader product maturity conversation, not treated as a silo.
Start with one thing: Rather than trying to become product-led across the board, identify a single focus area and build momentum from there.
Internal PMs need customer framing too: Even teams building internal platforms need customer advocacy and insight.

Featured Links: Follow Vidya on LinkedIn | Product Rebels

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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Building the right thing is hard. Building the wrong thing is easy and costly. In this episode, Jason Sparks, Principal Product Manager at ReUp Education, dives deep into the discipline of continuous validation inside enterprise environments. From managing stakeholder pressure to proactively engaging customers in discovery, Jason shares battle-tested approaches for avoiding the classic trap of solution-first thinking.

Chapters

0:00 – The risk of unvalidated assumptions
1:02 – Meet Jason Sparks and his mission at ReUp
3:02 – From college dropout to product leader
5:19 – Product-market fit inside the enterprise
6:03 – Why most ideas don’t need building
8:10 – Misalignment: wrong product, wrong market
10:05 – Executive interference and assumption management
12:33 – Validation is not a one-off
14:44 – Continuous discovery in practice
15:38 – How to validate enterprise product ideas
17:02 – Story decks, user interviews and field testing
19:11 – Grading feedback and customer fit
21:11 – The danger of over-friendly users
23:08 – The power of early champions
25:21 – Preparing for and running discovery sessions
27:35 – Value testing and competitor awareness
29:08 – When to walk away from the wrong customer
31:17 – What happens after the meetings
33:30 – The role of AI in user research
35:46 – What Jason would do differently today

What you'll learn from Jason

— Validation should be continuous: One round of user feedback isn’t enough. Real product-market fit evolves through repeated conversations and iteration.

— Assumptions must be challenged: Build a culture where being proven wrong is celebrated, not feared.

— Don’t let leadership derail discovery: Product managers must set boundaries and bring clarity on the problem space before execution begins.

— Grading users is as critical as grading feedback: Identify the right customers to listen to—being nice isn’t the same as being the right fit.

— Use discovery decks to guide conversations: Jason uses bold assumptions, interactive sessions, and immediate iteration to refine ideas quickly.

— Tech accelerates, but doesn’t replace, human insight: AI tools for sentiment and semantic analysis are powerful but should supplement—not substitute—real human interaction.

Featured Links:

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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Why do great product ideas fail to gain traction? According to Elena Luna, it’s rarely about the strategy and more often about the storytelling. In this episode of The Product Experience, Elena Luneva, a seasoned CPO, GM, and Maven instructor, joins Randy Silver live from INDUSTRY 2025 to explore how product leaders can better communicate the why behind their product decisions.

What we learned from Elena— Speaking 'User' isn’t enough – Executives care about business impact, not just engagement metrics.
— Translate features to financials – Frame product initiatives in terms of ARPU, opex savings, or revenue impact.
— Use storytelling with data – Combine real user insights with projections to make your case.
— Seasonality matters – Product testing should account for time-of-year and market behaviour.
— Align go-to-market early – Synchronising product and sales is key to driving measurable outcomes.
— Ask better questions – Start with: What is it? Why does it matter? How much will it cost? When will we get it?

Chapters2:45 – The Ceiling for Great PMs
4:09 – Speaking Executive
5:22 – Case Study: Nextdoor Maps
9:52 – Translating Engagement to Revenue
10:49 – Embedding Finance into Product Thinking
12:43 – Pivoting During COVID
14:36 – Business Fluency at All Levels
16:00 – Building Context Across Teams
18:26 – The Four Questions
20:06 – Thinking in Horizons
22:43 – Shifting Accountability
26:23 – CPMO vs. CPTO
27:43 – Common Mistakes
29:42 – Seasonality & Cannibalisation
32:29 – Practical First Steps
34:21 – Credits & Outro

Featured Links: Follow Elena on LinkedIn | Elena's Substack | Industry Conference Cleveland 2025 recap at Mind The Product | Sign up to Elena's coaching course

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily and Randy speak with Dan Dalton (Director of Product Management at Sage) about the current state of product management, and how the role must evolve in today’s climate.

Chapters
0:00 Introduction: product management at a crossroads
1:00 Dan Dalton’s background and path into product
3:00 The evolution of product management: 2010 to today
8:15 Framework‐fundamentalism, the broken ladder & career expectations
13:45 Why many product careers are being set up to fail
19:20 Responding to disruption: returning to basics, focusing on impact
24:40 The role of soft skills and mindset in product leadership
28:55 How Dan’s team operates: fast prototyping, design system, code assets
31:10 Hiring and developing product talent: soft skills over tick‐boxes
35:30 AI, hype and bubbles: what product leaders need to keep in mind
40:15 The mental flywheel: pragmatism, curiosity, resilience, detachment
45:00 Wrap up & closing remarks

Featured Links: Follow Dan on LinkedIn | Sage | 'Why is everyone hating on Product Managers?' feature by Peter Yang

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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You can’t build great products on gut instinct, and yet, according to IBM’s global study of 1,000 enterprises, 77% of organisations using generative AI aren’t seeing any financial benefit. In this episode on The Product Experience podcast, Lily Smith sits down with Matthew Certner, Digital Product Engineering and Design Partner at IBM, to unpack the four key traits that drive ROI in AI-powered product teams: flexibility, incremental and targeted delivery, data-led decisions, and cross-functional collaboration.

Recorded live at the Industry conference, this conversation offers practical lessons for any product leader navigating the hype and reality of AI adoption.

Chapters
00:00 – The danger of building on gut instinct
00:37 – IBM’s global study on generative and agentic AI adoption
01:00 – Meet Matthew Certner, Digital Product Engineering Partner at IBM
02:00 – Why most enterprises aren’t realising ROI from AI
04:50 – What the top-performing 20% of companies do differently
05:10 – The four key behaviours driving success
07:00 – Flexibility: adapting quickly to market feedback
08:10 – Incremental and targeted delivery — the “golden thread” principle
10:30 – Data-led decision-making versus the HIPPO effect
11:45 – Cross-functional collaboration and robust adoption
13:10 – Behavioural factors that make or break AI adoption
14:20 – Inside IBM’s “value orchestration” framework
15:10 – The Golden Thread in practice — a sticky-note story from Dallas
17:10 – Transparency and traceability in product development
18:00 – How IBM helps teams that aren’t seeing value from AI
21:00 – The paradox of moving too fast or too slow with AI
24:00 – Making the Golden Thread a living document
25:20 – Inside IBM Garage: speed of a startup, scale of an enterprise
27:40 – Why productivity savings, not hype, drive AI ROI
29:00 – How large organisations structure innovation teams
30:00 – The future: 800 million new products by 2026
31:00 – Why 95% will fail — and what the 5% will get right
33:10 – Final reflections: value, purpose and the human element

Featured Links: Follow Matthew on LinkedIn | IBM Garage | Industry Conference Cleveland 2025 recap at Mind The Product

We’re taking Community Questions for The Product Experience podcast.
Got a burning product question for Lily, Randy, or an upcoming guest? Submit it here.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A...

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Christian Idiodi, Partner at Silicon Valley Product Group, and Co-author of the valuable product book Transformed, dismantles some of the most persistent myths in product leadership.

Drawing from his global perspective and work across Africa’s fast-emerging tech ecosystem, Christian makes the case for a new kind of leadership, one grounded in clarity, context, and radical trust.

Chapters
00:00 — The environment, not the people
02:00 — Building product leadership in Africa
06:00 — Stories of impact
10:00 — What real leadership means
14:00 — Managing minds, not hands
19:00 — The “first team” mindset
23:00 — Focus, not prioritisation
25:00 — Scaling and the myth of process
29:00 — AI and the redefinition of excellence
35:00 — Creating space for practice
40:00 — Product crits and leadership feedback
41:30 — Inspire Africa Conference

Key Takeaways— Better outcomes start with better environments. Leadership is about designing the conditions for people to do their best work — not managing their output.
— Africa is building for Africa, by Africans. The Inspire Africa Conference is catalysing coaching, capital, and community to accelerate meaningful innovation.
— Strategy defines focus. If prioritisation is hard, the strategy probably isn’t real.
— Leadership is a different sport. Managing people’s minds, not hands, requires context, clarity, and trust — not control.
— AI won’t replace good leaders. But it might replace bad leadership. Judgment, product sense, and curiosity are the new differentiators.
— Create practice space. Growth requires safety to make mistakes, experiment, and learn — at every level of the organisation.
— Critique is culture. Teams that coach and critique together develop sharper thinking and stronger product judgment.

Featured Links: Follow Christian on LinkedIn | Silicon Valley Product Group | Inspire Africa

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily Smith speaks with Sahil Jain, co-founder and CEO of Samepage.ai, about one of product management’s hardest challenges: keeping teams aligned.

From his early career at Yahoo and AOL to founding multiple startups, Sahil shares lessons on building products that tackle “unsolvable” problems like communication and alignment. He explains why shared understanding matters more than speed, how product managers can become better storytellers, and why early-stage startups should obsess over just a handful of teams before chasing scale.

Chapters

0:00 – Why alignment is so hard
1:14 – Sahil’s unconventional career path
4:00 – First foray into startups at AOL and beyond
6:50 – Founding AdStage and lessons from raising early capital
9:00 – Moving into product leadership after acquisition
12:53 – On delusion, motivation, and tackling “unsolvable” problems
16:34 – Starting Samepage.ai and the problem of information asymmetry
22:43 – Validating the problem and testing prototypes
27:22 – Why product managers are the perfect early adopters
29:20 – The first 10 obsessed teams: startup focus
34:00 – Neurodivergence, communication, and shared understanding
36:43 – From Claude Shannon to storytelling: frameworks for better communication
39:59 – Lessons from Duolingo on multimodal learning
41:19 – Where to find Samepage.ai

Featured Links: Follow Sahil on LinkedIn | Samepage.ai | 'What we learned at Industry conference - day one' feature by Louron Pratt at Mind the Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, hosts Lily Smith and Randy Silver speak with Damilola Adelekan, Lead Product Manager at Remedial Health, who discusses building pragmatic, people-centred solutions in Africa’s fragmented and under-resourced healthcare system.

Chapters
05:30 – Early Lessons from Volunteering and Nonprofits
07:00 – Why Digitising a Broken System Isn’t Enough
10:00 – Tackling Trust, Funding, and Fragmentation in Healthcare
12:30 – Collaborating Beyond the Organisation
14:30 – Building a Full Healthcare Supply Chain
16:00 – Pragmatism Over Perfection in Product Vision
18:00 – Cross-Team Collaboration at Scale
20:00 – Structuring Product Work Across Functions
22:00 – Communications Tips for Cross-Functional Leadership
24:00 – Increasing Tech Adoption Among Low-Digital-Literacy Users
26:00 – Customer Research in Low-Tech Contexts
28:00 – Voice of the Customer: Calls, Feedback, and Sales Teams
30:00 – What Inspires a Product Manager in Nigeria?

Featured Links: Follow Damilola on LinkedIn | Remedial Health | Inspire Africa | 'How I got my job in product' feature with Damilola at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Patrick Ndjientcheu, Chief Product and Technology Officer at Irembo, shares how his team transitioned from delivering projects for government to building a portfolio of scalable products.

Patrick talks about shifting mindsets from execution to strategy, spinning out payments and identity into independent products, and the challenges of balancing internal bias with customer needs.

He also reveals how Irembo is evolving into a super app, why sales enablement is crucial in a B2B context, and the lessons he has learned guiding teams through the move from project to product to product portfolio.

Six things we learned from Patrick

Project to product mindset: Repeat customer demand signals value, turn ad-hoc projects into structured products with identity, principles, and strategy.

Team restructuring without turnover: Shifting from project delivery to product development requires reorganising teams around capabilities.

Spinouts emerge from features: Payments and identity started as embedded features, but with scale and external demand, became standalone products.

Bias is real: Teams naturally over-index on the dominant revenue product. Separation, customer interviews, and rebranding are critical to balance focus.

Sales enablement matters: Without educating sales and customers on new platform capabilities, adoption stalls and value is under-communicated.

Leadership lesson: Product leaders must bring the whole organisation on the journey—marketing, sales, finance, and operations—not just product teams.

Featured Links: Follow Patrick on LinkedIn | Irembo | Inspire Africa

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily Smith speaks with Sally Foote, a seasoned product leader whose journey from product roles to C-suite commercial leadership spans Carwow, Go Compare, and The Guardian. They unpack the increasingly vital intersection between product, marketing, and sales.

Sally explains why growth is a shared responsibility, how product managers can become commercially fluent, and why understanding marketing economics is now critical. Expect actionable advice on working across functions, owning growth levers, and designing products that fuel acquisition and retention. Whether you’re in B2B or B2C, there’s something in here for every product leader looking to elevate their commercial impact.

Key Takeaways:— Modern product managers must understand marketing funnels, ROI, and acquisition costs to create scalable impact.
— Propositions beat PPC: In saturated digital channels, differentiation must come from product innovation.
— Stop the handoffs: A strict separation between product, marketing, and sales creates missed opportunities and inefficiencies.
— Product roadmaps matter to the business: While sometimes shunned by PMs, roadmaps help align and activate sales and marketing functions.
— Product marketing isn't enough: What’s needed is cross-functional growth thinking—not just better product copy.
— B2B is a rich source of insights: Embedding PMs in sales cycles and advisory panels unlocks product innovation directly from the source.
— AI is reshaping go-to-market: From focus groups to pricing strategies, machine learning is changing how teams make commercial decisions.
— Your funnel is only as good as your data: PMs should design products with marketing data needs in mind to drive better acquisition performance.

Featured Links: Follow Sally on LinkedIn | YourRoom AI focus group | Carwow | Watch Sally's 'Maximum Possible Products' talk at #mtpcon London 2019 | Sustainable living made easy with Bower Collective

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Product decisions built on daily-active metrics fall apart when your customers show up once a year, or once a decade. In this episode, Randy Silver talks to Vivek Kumar about building and growing low-frequency products, from property and tax to jobs and dating.

Chapters
04:25 — What makes a product “infrequent”? Episodic use and recall decay
07:05 — Rethinking PMF: penetration and market share over retention curves
10:36 — When iteration is slow: prioritising problems under seasonal cycles
14:28 — BELT framework: behaviours, enduring vs transient problems, lock-ins
21:56 — Spotting enduring problems: “what will still matter in 10 years?”
24:11 — ICE framework overview for infrequent products
26:03 — Engagement: active retention, complexity, single- vs constant-touch
29:55 — Predictable vs unpredictable retention; referrals as a strategy
31:06 — Lifetime retention: seeding frequency hooks (e.g., estimates, salary data)
33:01 — Distinctiveness and brand: why CAC collapses when you own the memory
33:48 — Control over experience: monetisation through end-to-end journeys
36:13 — Research that works: ethnography, diary studies, “follow-me-home”
40:22 — Example: discovering the real tax filing pain (document collection)
43:04 — Ethics and value: “cures vs treatments”, utility vs entertainment products

Featured Links: Follow Vivek on LinkedIn | Atlys | The Steps 'Grow and manag

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Randy Silver and Lily Smith sit down with Katja Forbes, Executive Director at Standard Chartered Bank, design leader, and lecturer, to explore the fast-approaching world of machine customers.

Katja shares why businesses must prepare for a future where AI agents, autonomous vehicles, and procurement bots act as customers, and what this means for product managers, designers, and organisations.

Key takeaways

Machine customers are here already. From booking services for Tesla cars to procurement bots closing contracts, AI-driven commerce is no longer hypothetical.
APIs are necessary but insufficient. Businesses need to think beyond plumbing and address trust, compliance, and customer experience for non-human agents.
Signal clarity matters. Organisations must make their value propositions machine-readable to remain competitive.
Trust will be quantified. Compliance signals, ESG proof, uptime guarantees, and reliability ratings will replace human gut instinct.
New roles will emerge. Trust analysts and human–machine hybrid coordinators will be critical in shaping future interactions.
Ethics cannot be ignored. Without careful design, agentic commerce could amplify consumerism and poor societal outcomes.
Practical first step. Even small businesses can prepare by structuring their product and service data into machine-readable formats.
Product managers must adapt. The skill to manage ambiguity, think systemically, and anticipate unintended consequences will be central to success.

Featured Links: Follow Katja on LinkedIn | Katja's website | Sign-up for pre sale access to Katja's forthcoming book 'The CX Evolutionist'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily Smith and Randy Silver are joined by Kirsten Mann, former CPO at Prospection and now startup founder and board member, to discuss how product leaders can play a vital role on company boards.

Drawing from her own board experience and a research series interviewing founders and directors, Kirsten explains why product, culture, and customer insight must be central to boardroom conversations.

Key Takeaways— Product’s Place on Boards: Product is a strategic lever, boards should treat it with the same seriousness as financials.
— Culture as a Strategic Asset: Culture emerged as the most frequently cited factor in board-level success—more than AI or tech.
— From Operator to Overseer: Transitioning to a board role requires stepping back from execution and focusing on governance and strategic guidance.
— Communicating with Boards: Product leaders must avoid jargon, speak in terms of customer problems, outcomes, and investment returns.
— The Risk of Exclusion: If your product team isn’t presenting to the board, that’s a red flag.
— Practical Preparation: Aspiring board members should build financial literacy, start with non-profit boards, and cultivate visibility through writing or public speaking.

Chapters00:00 – Culture over strategy: Why getting culture right matters more than clever planning
00:45 – Meet Kirsten Mann: Introduction and credentials
01:45 – Career transition: From CPO at Prospection to board member, investor, and startup founder
04:50 – Early board experience: Saving a youth club through governance and tech
06:45 – Product’s value on boards: Bringing customer and tech insight into strategic discussions
08:00 – Oversight, not execution: Adjusting from exec roles to governance roles
09:50 – Frustration sparks research: Why Kirsten began writing about product leaders on boards
11:00 – Product strategy ≠ support: The board’s risk-first mindset

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Randy Silver speaks with Dariusz Dziuk, Product Lead for Music Expression at Spotify, about the origins and evolution of Canvas, the looping visuals that accompany music tracks. From early assumptions and first principles thinking to scaling and measuring marketplace success, he shares how a bold experiment turned into one of Spotify’s most engaging features.

Key Takeaways— Balancing Art and Science: Product management often lives between structured analysis and intuitive creativity—success lies in mastering both.
— First Principles and Assumptions: Questioning defaults—like static, square cover art—can open doors to bold innovation.
— Real Stakes Drive Real Creativity: Artist engagement with Canvas only truly emerged once the stakes felt genuine and public.
— Marketplace Thinking: Canvas succeeded because it delivered value for all marketplace participants—creators, consumers, and the platform itself.
— Innovation Through Structure: Weekly design sprints and rapid prototyping allowed Spotify’s innovation lab to explore and discard ideas quickly, eventually landing on Canvas.
— Scaling Insights: Measurable impact came later—higher engagement, saves, shares, and a new visual identity for music on Spotify.
— Artist-Centric Focus: Prioritising the needs of the supply side (artists) can unlock cold start challenges and marketplace growth.

Chapters
0:00 – Marketplace Thinking at Spotify
1:20 – Darius Jurek’s Journey into Product
2:45 – From Engineering to 0-to-1 Product Innovation
4:00 – Is Product Management an Art or a Science?
6:30 – The Brief: Connecting Creators and Fans
8:20 – Building an Innovation Lab
10:00 – Exploring Dozens of Ideas
11:45 – Why Canvas Won Out
13:10 – The Challenge of Validating a New Format
16:00 – Questioning the Assumptions Around Cover Art
19:00 – Real Stakeholder Feedback and Creative Buy-In
21:00 – Marketplace Metrics of Success
23:30 – Canvas and the Evolution of Music Discovery
26:00 – Visual Design, Collaboration, and Artist Empowerment
28:00 – Darius on Supplier-Led Product Strategy

Featured Links: Follow Dariusz on LinkedIn | Dariusz's website | Spotify | '#mtpcon @ Pendomonium 2024 Encore' recap

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily and Randy dive into the nuanced world of team collaboration with Jenny Wanger, product ops consultant. Jenny challenges the overuse of RACI matrices in product teams, arguing they often obscure deeper organisational issues rather than solve them. They discuss better alternatives, the root causes behind requests for RACI, and the value of prioritising human relationships over rigid frameworks.

Chapters0:00 – The accountable vs. responsible dilemma
0:37 – Meet Jenny Wanger: Product ops and Reforge
1:20 – RACI: A quick explainer
3:16 – Why RACI falls short in product teams
7:00 – Infantilisation and territorialism
9:18 – The flaws in the terminology
10:14 – The consulted conundrum
11:05 – RACI as a conversation starter
12:01 – Better alternatives: Rapid and others
14:20 – When RACI might be useful
18:01 – Team dysfunction and RACI misuse
23:00 – A case study in resolving collaboration issues
26:00 – RACI as scaffolding, not infrastructure
28:02 – AI, documents, and relationships
30:05 – Diagnosing the real problem behind a RACI request
32:38 – Job descriptions vs. RACI
35:25 – Everyone’s a bit of everything
37:04 – Focusing on mission and collaboration
39:57 – Final thoughts and where to find Jenny’s work

Key Takeaways— RACI isn't a cure-all: It often signals deeper dysfunction like poor team structure, unclear mission, or lack of trust.
— Healthy teams don't need RACI: When collaboration and communication are strong, formal frameworks become redundant.
— Use RACI as scaffolding: Let it initiate conversations, but don’t enshrine it as a permanent solution.
— Language matters: Terms like “accountable” and “responsible” are often confused, making the framework less clear than intended.
— Consider better alternatives: Frameworks like RAPID offer more clarity around decision-making without creating silos.
— Prioritise relationships over roles: Documents don't build culture—conversations and mutual understanding do.

Featured Links: Follow Jenny on LinkedIn | Jenny's RACI feature at her website | Dave Johnson's page at The Pragmatic Agilist

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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We revisit our conversation with Frances Ibe, Chief Experience Officer at Tide. Frances shares invaluable insights on her journey from developer to product leadership and how to avoid common pitfalls during the discovery process.

Chapters
01:07 – Meet Frances Ibe
02:05 – Common Discovery Pitfalls
03:34 – Embedding Continuous Discovery
04:51 – The Myth of Talking to 20 Customers
06:38 – What is a Data Prototype?
08:03 – Building Confidence in Product Bets
10:42 – Sharing Insights Across the Business
13:52 – Keeping Sprint Reviews Engaging
15:49 – Discovery Through Observation
17:21 – Responding to Data-Driven Disruption
18:30 – The Power of Storytelling
20:49 – Training Teams in Storytelling
22:36 – Maintaining Message Consistency
23:48 – Collaborating Across Disciplines
25:01 – Francis' Game-Changing Advice

Featured Links: Follow Frances on LinkedIn | Tide | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium and #mtpcon roadshow - London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Erica Wass, Principal Product Consultant at Brainmates, joins the Product Experience podcast to share pragmatic tools for building strategic foresight into your roadmap. From horizon scanning to backcasting, this episode explores how product teams can harness future-focused techniques—bolstered by generative AI—to improve decision-making, resilience, and impact.

Chapters:
0:00 – Why foresight matters in product
1:00 – Introducing Erica Wass
2:30 – How product is changing
3:45 – The value of strategic foresight
5:00 – Clarifying the term and its importance
7:00 – Who owns foresight in the product org
10:00 – Techniques: Horizon scanning, scenario planning, backcasting
14:30 – Horizon scanning in action: Google & Android
16:00 – Scenario planning for resilience
21:00 – Tips on running scenario sessions
23:45 – Backcasting: Vision-first roadmapping
26:00 – Using AI to accelerate foresight
30:00 – Product team dynamics in the AI era
33:00 – Mistakes to avoid and balancing action with foresight
37:00 – Wrap-up and takeaways

Key Takeaways
— Horizon scanning helps teams identify early, weak signals that may grow into significant trends.
— Scenario planning enables resilience by preparing teams for a range of plausible futures.
— Backcasting flips traditional planning by working backward from a long-term goal to define near-term milestones.
— Generative AI can democratise access to foresight tools—when used with critical thinking and proper validation.
— Product professionals should take a proactive role in guiding strategic conversations, regardless of their title.
— Avoid extremes with AI: neither fear it nor over-rely on it. Use it as a pairing partner rather than a replacement.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Featured Links: Follow Brigitte on LinkedIn | DrDoctor | European Commission Public Health 'Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare' feature

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily Smith and Randy Silver speak with Dee Miller, Director of Product Strategy and Insights for Product Equity at Adobe. Dee shares her personal journey into inclusive design, and discusses how Adobe is moving beyond accessibility compliance to build genuinely usable, inclusive, and emotionally accessible products.

Featured Links: Follow Dee on LinkedIn | The Adobe Accessibility Checker | Listen to previous The Product Experience episode: 'Building Accessible Products' with Jonathan Hassell (CEO & Founder, Hassell Inclusion)

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily and Randy speak with Faith Forster about the art of aligning product work with commercial outcomes. From redefining velocity as a function of customer value to implementing impact models that quantify ROI, Faith outlines practical frameworks to help product teams think commercially without compromising user value.

She also explores the evolving role of AI in product development, the necessity of syncing planning cycles with business units, and why happy teams are the cornerstone of faster, better delivery.

Key takeaways

Velocity = Value: Product velocity isn't about coding speed—it's about reducing time to customer value to improve ROI and lower opportunity cost.
Impact Modelling: A disciplined approach to estimating commercial outcomes before development helps product teams understand and justify their work.
AI Integration: Teams are expected to primarily use AI tools within three months to boost delivery speed and build organisational capability.
Viability from Day One: Pricing and revenue potential must be considered from the outset—not after feature completion.
Cross-Functional Alignment: Successful planning requires synchronising product cycles with finance, sales, and marketing calendars.
Happy Teams, Better Results: Reducing friction between design, engineering, and product roles directly impacts delivery speed and feature quality.

Chapters
00:00 – Redefining velocity: Why speed isn’t just about code
01:05 – Faith’s journey from Dex to Legal
03:02 – Introducing the commercial value talk
04:51 – Understanding the P&L from a product lens
08:07 – Why team cost-awareness matters
10:00 – Building better impact models
12:25 – Increasing ROI through value velocity
16:37 – The AI imperative: Adoption, anxiety, and acceleration

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily and Randy sit down with Moshe Mikanovsky—product coach, educator, and host of the Product for Product podcast—to explore what makes an effective product management toolkit. From identifying the real problems in your workflow to choosing and implementing tools that stick, Moshe outlines a pragmatic, user-centric approach to tool selection.

Chapters:
2:59 – From Engineering to Product Management
5:25 – Why Choosing Tools is Hard
8:11 – Elements of a Product Stack
10:49 – From Roadmaps to Analytics
14:01 – A Framework for Selecting Tools
18:01 – Comparing Tools Beyond Features
21:18 – Test and Validate Your Tool Choices
26:01 – Why Implementation is Critical
28:04 – What’s Changing in Product Tools
29:26 – AI and the Future of Product Management
32:01 – Keeping Your Stack Modern
34:29 – Making the Case for Budget & ROI
37:23 – When ROI Forces a Change
38:45 – Final Thoughts & Listener Call to Action

Featured Links: Follow Moshe on LinkedIn | Moshe's Product Manager Toolkit | PostHog

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Transformations are hard, and too often, they fail to deliver on their promise. In this episode of The Product Experience, Lily and Randy speak with Jen Swanson, CEO of Tuckpoint Advisory Group, to unpack why transformation initiatives falter and what it truly takes to succeed.

Key Takeaways— Transformation requires intentionality: Real transformation isn't accidental or surface-level; it must be deliberate, comprehensive, and backed by leadership.
— Avoid ‘transformation theatre’: Pretending to change—without restructuring ownership, processes, or collaboration—is worse than doing nothing at all.
— Start with honest orientation: Knowing your starting point is essential before plotting a path forward.
— Executive involvement is non-negotiable: Transformations can’t be delegated. Leadership must model the change and communicate relentlessly.
— Product-led is about mindset, not just teams: Everyone should operate within the product model, but not all need to be on product teams.
— Pace matters: Organisations must assess their capacity for change and determine the right balance between ambition and sustainability.
— Give grace for the learning curve: People need space to be bad at new things before they get good—psychological safety is essential.

Chapters
0:00 – Introduction & the myth of sneaky transformations
1:01 – Jen’s background and path into product
2:53 – What transformation really means
5:53 – Defining honest orientation
8:00 – What is transformation theatre?
12:09 – When real change feels fake
13:04 – The importance of executive commitment
16:04 – Why transformations fail
19:11 – Common catalysts for transformation
22:06 – Product-led vs product thinking
25:00 – Who’s in the op

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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What does it mean to build world-class products in the age of AI? In this episode, Randy Silver talks to Ezinne and Oji Udezue, co-authors of Building Rocketships, a playbook for building high-growth companies in today’s fast-evolving tech landscape. Together, they unpack what product looks like now, how AI changes collaboration, and why ambition, clarity, and disciplined execution matter more than ever.

Key takeaways— Building world-class products starts with clear ambition and choosing big, meaningful problems
— AI isn't replacing PMs, it's changing the way product work gets done—especially in how we collaborate
— Vibe coding enables faster iteration and clearer communication through prototyping in code
— The product manager’s job is to lead teams and help the organisation build the right thing, not just anything
— Clarity, focus, and leadership buy-in are essential to successful transformation, even in legacy organisations
— Product teams need to shift from writing specs to orchestrating systems that drive customer and business outcomes
— Every product person should master the full arc: solving today's problems, helping customers succeed, and spotting future opportunities

Chapters
0:00 The "should PMs code?" debate
1:54 First product roles and how the book came to life
4:49 The mission behind Building Rocketships
7:13 Why the book is for leaders and their partners
10:01 Differences between world-class teams and everyone else
13:35 What ambition really looks like
17:10 How clarity transforms legacy companies
23:10 AI, vibe coding, and the new spec: working prototypes
30:10 Redefining the product team’s role in the AI age
35:02 What skills PMs actually need to thrive now
42:54 The one mistake PMs can't afford to make

Featured Links: Follow Ezinne on LinkedIn | Follow Oji on LinkedIn | ProductMind | Buy their new book 'Building Rocketships: Product Management for High Growth Companies'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week on The Product Experience, we revisit a great conversation with Todd Green, now President of King – the studio behind Candy Crush. Todd shares how he thinks about building products that are not only globally successful but enduringly fun.

Todd takes us behind the curtain on what it really takes to build for mass audiences, create fun at scale, and grow empowered product teams.

Key takeaways

Fun can’t be optimised: Building successful games (or products) requires capturing something visceral. Metrics help, but “fun” starts as a feeling, not a number.
Audience motivation matters more than demographics: Instead of targeting by age or gender, King focuses on why people play – whether it’s for calm, connection or challenge.
Legacy products need product management too: The real work starts when a product survives beyond launch. King invests heavily in balancing new features with legacy complexity.
Good product leaders own the business: At King, product leads (executive producers) are responsible for P&L – it's a full-stack role across delivery, team, and outcomes.
Sharing insights is a team sport: King has full-time roles and informal networks dedicated to transferring learning between game teams.
Ethical responsibility is core: King prioritises player wellbeing and long-term satisfaction – not just engagement – as a business principle.
Building great managers is a product in itself: Todd sees first-line manager development as one of his top priorities for sustaining culture and performance.

Key chapters

00:00 – Intro and Todd’s promotion
01:40 – Todd’s media roots and time at Fremantle
06:15 – Digital bibles and global format sharing
10:50 – Lessons from the Susan Boyle YouTube moment
13:40 – Shifting to King and the discovery of fun
18:30 – Motivations beyond boredom
22:45 – Building for a massive, diverse audience
26:40 – The product structure at King
30:10 – Keeping Candy Crush fresh after years at the top
35:05 – When to launch a new game
38:50 – Ethics and responsibility in game design
42:20 – Why qual and quant both matter
45:10 – How King shares knowledge across teams
48:00 – The hiring landscape and talent challenges
51:00 – Growing new managers and inclusive leadership
54:10 – Closing thoughts and Todd’s reflections

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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AI has changed the way developers work—and Stack Overflow is right at the centre of that shift. In this episode, Jody Bailey, CPTO at Stack Overflow, shares how the platform is adapting to AI, protecting its community, and embracing new revenue streams. We explore how LLMs are reshaping developer behaviour, why canonical answers still matter, and what it takes to keep trust, quality and community alive in the age of instant AI-generated code. If you’re working on dev tools, building with AI, or just wondering how to keep your product relevant through disruption, this one’s for you.

Key takeaways

AI is both a disruptor and an enabler
Engagement is shifting, not disappearing
Community remains the core asset
AI doesn't kill quality—it challenges it
Prompt engineering is the new entry-level skill
Innovation is iterative—even with AI
Stack is designing for tomorrow’s engineers
Jody’s vision is long term

Chapters
00:00 – intro to Jody Bailey and his role at Stack Overflow
03:30 – impact of AI and shift in how developers search for answers
07:45 – Stack’s new business model: licensing data to LLMs
10:15 – protecting community-contributed data and enforcing attribution
13:20 – changing nature of search and the role of AI
17:00 – trust, verification, and the evolving user experience
21:10 – internal AI experiments and lessons learned
25:00 – balancing community, learning, and AI-powered answers
28:20 – new skills required for developers in an AI world
31:40 – evolving engineering roles and the future of team structures
36:10 – making Stack Overflow accessible for the next generation
39:50 – what Jody’s most excited about for the future

Featured Links: Follow Jody on LinkedIn | Stack Overflow | ‘Yes, Artificial Intelligence Has A Creative Side, Sort Of’ feature at Forbes

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Intercom’s CPO Paul Adams joins The Product Experience to talk about how the company has radically transformed its approach in the wake of AI's acceleration. From ripping up roadmaps and reorganising teams to reinventing pricing models, Paul shares what it really takes to adapt—fast.

Key takeaways

"You’re not selling users anymore. You’re selling work."
AI has shifted Intercom’s business model from seat-based to outcome-based pricing—charging per resolution, not per person.
"We ripped up our strategy five days after ChatGPT launched."
Intercom made a bold, immediate pivot to reorient its product and vision around AI, including launching a new website and scrapping existing roadmaps.
"The only thing that’s persisted is our principles."
While teams, triads and structures were dismantled, Intercom kept its core product principles intact—like 'start with the problem'.
"This isn’t evolution—it’s a new species of company."
Intercom now compares itself to AI-native startups, not its former self. It has rebuilt the product team into flexible, role-fluid workstreams.
"People have left because it’s not for them."
The pace of change has human costs. Leadership must communicate directly and honestly to support people through radical transformation.
"I worry I’ll be left behind too."
Even senior leaders are actively relearning—Paul admits to using tools like Replit and Lovable to stay current with AI-native UX trends.

Chapters

00:00 – Opening thoughts: fear of being left behind in the AI era
00:18 – Introduction to the episode and Paul Adams
01:00 – Paul’s journey from Google and Facebook to Intercom
01:51 – What it’s like to witness Intercom evolve over 11+ years
02:22 – The energy and disruption brought on by AI
03:17 – From seat-based to value-based pricing: the big shift
05:06 – Why AI made Intercom rethink everything, fast
07:58 – Sales team challenges: retraining to sell a new model
09:43 – The business impact: Fin’s rapid growth and dual-model tension
11:02 – What it means to “sell work” instead of licences
12:58 – New kinds of jobs emerging around AI tooling
14:45 – Ripping up process: how Intercom builds products now
16:00 – Competing with AI-native startups, not legacy Intercom
17:49 – The one thing that stayed: Intercom’s product principles
18:54 – Why starting with the probl

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of The Product Experience podcast, we sit down with Product Consultant Joca Torres, whose work at Gympass is featured in Marty Cagan’s book Transformed. Joca shares the four core principles of successful digital transformation—principles he’s applied in both high-growth startups and century-old corporations.

We unpack what it really takes to shift a company from a delivery mindset to a product-led culture, the traps of discovery theatre, and how empowered teams actually behave.

Key takeaways
— Discovery should be fast and focused. Avoid drawn-out discovery phases that confirm what you already know. Good discovery is grounded in existing insights and validated quickly.
— The Four Principles of Product Culture:

Deliver Early and Often – Frequent releases drive learning and responsiveness.
Focus on the Problem – Avoid premature solutions. Spend time understanding what really needs solving.
Deliver Results – Products are a means, not an end. Success is measured in impact, not output.
Ecosystem Mindset – Recognise the full range of users and stakeholders. Product is about balancing value across them.

— Transformation is behavioural, not technical. Digital tools are important, but they won’t matter if people and processes don’t change with them.
— Executive sponsorship is essential. Cultural shifts only take hold when the leadership team actively supports and models them.
— Beware of product theatre. Following the right rituals doesn’t mean you’re creating value. Focus on outcomes, not optics.
— Empowered teams are responsible teams. True empowerment means owning the problem, the solution, and the results. It isn’t for everyone.

Chapters
00:00 – The Problem with “Discovery”
01:00 – Introducing Joca Torres
02:30 – A Surprising Need for Digital Transformation
04:00 – What Makes a True Digital Transformation
08:00 – The Four Pillars of Change
13:00 – Thinking Beyond the End User
17:00 – From Feature Delivery to Outcome Ownership

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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As startups grow, product teams often find themselves caught between speed and structure. In this episode of The Product Experience, Charlotte King, Lead Product Manager at eBay, shares practical insights from her work leading teams through this transition at companies including Moonpig, Flipdish, and ThoughtWorks.

Charlotte unpacks how to define product’s role during scaleup, build team structure around strategic value, and use tools like Wardley Mapping and Team Topologies to support organisational change. She also introduces the DHM model (Delightful, Hard to copy, Margin-enhancing) and discusses how to make strategy tangible for cross-functional teams. This conversation is especially useful for product leaders, heads of product, and founders navigating scale.

Chapters
1:13 – Charlotte’s background
2:36 – Product’s role in startups, scaleups and enterprises
4:35 – What product teams need to succeed during scale
6:42 – Defining product’s role as the company grows
9:00 – Using Wardley Mapping to assess team maturity
14:30 – Creating and communicating guiding principles
20:30 – Using the DHM model to prioritise value
25:48 – Structuring teams with Team Topologies
29:03 – Multidisciplinary collaboration in practice
30:41 – Lessons from leading transformation
32:30 – Final reflections and takeaways

Featured Links: Follow Charlotte on LinkedIn | eBay | Wardley Maps | What we learned at #mtpcon London 2025' feature by Kent McDonald and Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode on The Product Experience, we welcome back Matt LeMay—author, consultant, and champion of no-nonsense product thinking. We dig deep into the ideas behind his new book Impact First Product Teams and explore how teams can focus on what really matters: delivering business impact.

Featured Links: Follow Matt on LinkedIn and his website | Buy Matt's new book 'Impact-first Product Teams' | Sudden Compass | Randeep Sidhu's episode on The Product Experience: 'Lessons from building the UK's test and trace app'

Chapters
00:00 – The Myth of Rational Business
01:03 – Matt’s Accidental Journey into Product
02:20 – What Are “Impact-First” Teams, Really?
04:50 – Why OKRs Are Often Just Theatre
07:12 – Best Practices ≠ Business Value
10:00 – Who’s on the Product Team, and Why It Matters
12:30 – Dealing With Cross-Team Goal Conflicts
15:00 – Culture Change via Strategic Goal Alignment
17:00 – Proactive Conversations About Impact
20:00 – Commercial Awareness for Product Teams
24:00 – Platform Teams & Measuring Amplified Impact
27:00 – What Do Good Impact-First Teams Look Like?
31:00 – Customer-Centricity vs. Business Impact
34:00 – Discovery, Metrics & Mission-Critical Goals
36:00 – Culture, Strategy & Individual Leverage
41:00 – BAU vs. Innovation: Set Clear Expectations
44:00 – The Ego Trap in Product Work
46:00 – Matt’s Final Zinger on Capital and Feelings

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Sunsetting features is rarely a celebrated milestone in product, but it’s often one of the most critical. In this episode, Ronie Ben Aharon CPO and CTO of Craft.io, joins Lily and Randy to share how his team made the tough call to retire a key feature—and what they learned in the process.

Ronie walks us through a real-world example of removing Craft.io’s visual spec tool, why trying to compete with established platforms like Figma didn’t make sense, and how they approached the transition with both technical rigour and user empathy. He also explains what happens when a sunset strategy goes wrong, and the lingering costs of keeping legacy features alive.

Key takeaways
- Sunsetting is about creating space for more impactful product work.
- Features that seem harmless because they’re underused often introduce hidden costs, especially when they complicate onboarding, UX, and development cycles.
- Data-related features are the hardest to retire. Plan for thoughtful migration and clear communication with users.
- Soft approaches, like “feature starvation,” can backfire and prolong technical debt.
- Strong collaboration between product, customer success, and engineering is key to pulling off a successful sunset.

Chapters
0:00 – Why announcing a feature sunset is rarely met with applause
1:58 – What makes sunsetting necessary, and why underused features are a risk
5:01 – How to recognise when it’s time to kill a feature
6:10 – The story behind Craft.io’s visual spec feature and why they let it go
9:01 – Navigating the difficult conversations with users who still rely on a dying feature
12:27 – Handling data migration without compromising user trust
14:04 – A sunset that didn’t go as planned: learning from the feedback portal misstep
22:44 – Managing engineering expectations and avoiding unnecessary rebuilds
24:38 – How sunsetting shapes the way new features are designed
26:11 – Final reflections on doing it right—and why it’s worth it

Featured Link: Follow Roni on LinkedIn | Craft.io | Figma | 'Sunsetting success: How to strategically phase out products in the digital age' feature by Balaji Ananthanpilla and Sabah Qazi at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Most organisations dream of building products that delight users. But what happens when the users are your internal teams—and the product is the business itself? In this episode of The Product Experience, Randy Silver sits down with Jo Wickremasinghe, Chief Product & Technology Officer at BPP, to talk about leading transformation at scale.

Featured Links: Follow Jo on LinkedIn | BPP | 'What we learned at #mtpcon London 2025' feature by Kent McDonald and Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week on the podcast, we're joined by Dave Killeen, VP of Product at Pendo, who shares his go-to AI tools that can help make life a little easier for product managers—tried, tested, and ready to use.

Featured Links: Follow Dave on LinkedIn | Pendo | Claude | Manus |'What we learned at #mtpcon London 2025' feature by Kent McDonald and Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Product management is facing a crisis — and Dave Wascha calls it The Reckoning. In this episode, Dave joins Lily and Randy to unpack the growing backlash against the product profession. He shares stories from his time at Microsoft, Moonpig, and Zoopla, revealing why product people lost the room — and how to win it back.

Featured Links: Follow Dave on LinkedIn | 'Product Management is NOT dead' feature by Dan Olsen | 'What we learned at #mtpcon London 2025' feature by Kent McDonald and Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Mergers and acquisitions are often seen as boardroom strategy – but it's becoming ever more important for product leaders to be key stakeholders in the process. In this live interview recorded at #mtpcon London 2025, Randy sits down with Vincent Jong, CPO at Dealfront, to explore the real, unfiltered lessons of product leadership during M&A.

Vincent shares stories from inside two major integrations offering tactical insight into what product teams need to know, how to spot risk before it's too late, and why defining success early is critical.

Featured Links: Follow Vincent on LinkedIn and his website | Join Vincent at Saas on The Beach event in May | Buy Vincent's book 'Product-Led Sales: Combine the Best of Product-Led Growth and Sales' | 'What we learned at #mtpcon London 2025' feature by Kent McDonald and Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Featured Links: Follow Trisha on LinkedIn | Pendo | Trisha's 'The future of product management' talk at #mtpcon roadshow Amsterdam 2024

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In our latest conversation on The Product Experience podcast, Zan Gilani, Principal Product Manager at Duolingo, discusses the innovative use of AI in language learning, particularly through the video call feature with their character, Lily.

He shares lessons on creating the new video feature and highlights the principles that guide Duolingo's product management approach.

Featured Links: Follow Zan on LinkedIn and his website | Duolingo Lily feature | 'What we learned at Pendomonium and #mtpcon Raleigh: day 2' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this conversation on this week's podcast, Adam Warburton, Co-Founder of Rove, shares his journey from being a Chief Product Officer at large firms like Co-op and Travelex, to co-founding his startup, Rove. He discusses the challenges and learnings from transitioning to a startup environment, the importance of prototyping and user feedback, and the balance between being product-led and sales-led.

Featured Links

Follow Adam on LinkedIn
Rove
Co-op
Marty Cagan's book 'Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love'

Chapters

00:00 Expectation vs. Reality in Happiness
05:08 Transitioning from Corporate to Startup Life
10:05 The Importance of Prototyping and User Feedback
14:58 Navigating Product vs. Sales-Led Strategies
20:00 The Value of Co-Founders in Entrepreneurship
25:13 Learning from Experience: Shaping Product Practices
29:46 Pragmatism Over Theory in Product Management
35:08 Coaching and Training: Evolving Perspectives

Key takeaways

Happiness is expectation divided by reality.
Transitioning from corporate to startup life brings unexpected challenges.
Prototyping and user feedback are crucial in early stages.
Navigating product vs. sales led strategies is essential for growth.
Co-founders significantly enhance the entrepreneurial experience.
Pragmatism often trumps theoretical frameworks in product management.
Learning from experience shapes product practices.
The importance of being adaptable in product strategies.
Building a prototype can lead to significant traction.
Coaching should focus on maximizing impact with available resources.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's conversation on The Product Experience podcast, Yorai Gabriel discusses the concept of 'drama' in the context of innovation and product management. He explores how drama arises from tensions and conflicts within teams, particularly in diverse and creative environments. Gabriel highlights the importance of understanding these dynamics to turn drama into a productive force rather than a hindrance.

Key takeaways

Communication can escalate tensions and conflict.
Understanding the roots of drama can help manage it.
Diversity in teams can lead to creative tensions.
Drama often arises from people trying to do good.
Identifying the causes of drama can reduce its intensity.
Engineers and designers approach problems differently.
Drama can be an opportunity for learning and growth.
Misalignments in teams can lead to overwhelming drama.
Effective communication is key to resolving conflicts.
Workplace drama can be managed through understanding and communication.
Graph thinking helps visualize problems for better clarity.
The fulfillment graph articulates goals and necessary conditions.
The price of innovation highlights common misalignments.
Mindfulness towards drama can enhance productivity.
Effective communication can reduce workplace tensions.
Visual tools can accelerate conversations and decision-making.
Understanding the source of drama can lead to better outcomes.
Embracing different perspectives can foster collaboration.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Innovation and Drama
00:59 Background and Experience
01:56 The Innovator's Drama: Overview and Insights
05:06 Understanding Drama in the Workplace
08:59 The Nature of Drama: Escalation of Tensions
12:03 The Role of Diversity in Drama
14:56 Engineering vs. Design: Approaches to Problem Solving
20:39

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast episode, we speak with Shannon Scott, SVP, Global Head of Product at Airwallex, who shares insights on product leadership, career paths, hiring strategies, and the challenges of building enterprise products.

Featured links: Follow Shannon on LinkedIn | Airwallex | Grow with, not through by Shannon

Key takeaways

Understanding the product leads to better outcomes.
Career decisions in startups are reversible.
Belief in the product is crucial for success.
Hiring requires a balance of experience and adaptability.
Reference customers are vital for enterprise success.
Product management skills can be applied in various roles.
Evaluating a company's growth stage is essential before joining.
Diversity in hiring brings different perspectives to the team.
Critical thinking is key in product management roles.
Building enterprise products requires understanding complex customer needs. Your customers expect it to be complex.
Building a strong relationship with customers is crucial.
Understanding the intricacies of your product is essential.
Mistakes in startups can lead to valuable learning experiences.
Creating a culture of accountability helps prevent repeated mistakes.
It's important to adapt quickly to market changes.
The best products come from deep understanding of customer needs.
Utilizing infrastructure effectively can enhance customer experience.
Communication with customers can lead to better product fit.
A direct organizational culture fosters better outcomes.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's conversation on The Product Experience podcast, we speak with Radhika Dutt about various product diseases that can hinder effective management and the need for organizations to adopt a more systematic approach to product development.

Radhika shares insights on implementing this mindset within teams and the significance of balancing long-term vision with short-term survival needs.

Featured Links: Follow Radhika on LinkedIn | Buy Radhika's book'Radical Product Thinking: The New Mindset for Innovating Smarter' | Radical Product website | Sign up here to participate in Radhika's next book'Radically Rethinking Metrics' !

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Radical Product Thinking: The New Mindset for Innovating Smarter

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In this conversation, Karen Stroup, Chief Digital Officer at Wex, discusses her experiences with building an AI strategy at WEX, highlighting the importance of board alignment, experimentation, and employee engagement. She shares insights on setting bold goals, creating a culture of innovation, and the necessity of a robust AI governance framework, particularly in the financial services sector.

Featured Links: Follow Karen on LinkedIn | WEX | 'The decisive role of AI-powered analytics in your product strategy' feature at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast episode, Akash Gupta delves into the concept of Product-Led Growth (PLG), exploring its definition, misconceptions, and the seven essential layers that contribute to a successful PLG strategy.

Featured Links: Follow Aakash on LinkedIn | Aakash's Product Growth website | 'What we learned at Pendomonium and #mtpcon Raleigh NC: Day 2' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Burnout is a silent adversary that many of us face, and this week, we're joined by Evie Brockwell, a seasoned product consultant and coach who has faced this challenge head-on during her time at Booking.com. We unpack why burnout is alarmingly prevalent among product professionals and explore practical strategies for prevention and recovery, emphasising the importance of wellbeing in our professional lives.

Featured Links: Follow Evie on LinkedIn | Evie's burnout stats | Support each other at ProductTank

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In our latest podcast episode on The Product Experience, Glenn Block, Founder and CEO of ProdSense, discusses the concept of product equity. He emphasizes the importance of creating fair and equitable products in the tech industry, especially amid advances in AI. He shares his journey from a software developer to a product leader and the motivations behind launching his own business focused on product equity.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast episode, we speak to Laka Sriram, VP of Generative AI at GoDaddy, discussing leveraging generative AI to streamline the business setup process for entrepreneurs. We explore Laka's background, the development process of GenAI, customer engagement strategies, the ethical considerations of AI, and the importance of fostering a culture of experimentation within product teams.

Featured Links: Follow Laka on LinkedIn | GoDaddy | GoDaddy Airo

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Curious about the illusions and realities of corporate culture? Join us as we chat with Keiji Adedeji, an experienced product leadership coach with deep insights into the world of product management. Keiji shares her fascinating journey from software tester to product manager, driven by a relentless curiosity and a knack for problem-solving. With over 18 years in tech and extensive experience in B2B sectors, including her recent work with the International Baccalaureate Organization, Keiji brings to light the humorous and perplexing behaviors of large companies and the illusion of control that often drives their decisions.

In our conversation, we unpack the common pitfalls of adopting agile methodologies without truly grasping their essence, drawing from Keiji's firsthand experience with teams attempting to mirror Spotify's squad model. We highlight unusual practices, like the need to move physical cards, emphasizing the necessity of trust and focusing on outcomes rather than getting lost in the process. As our world shifts towards virtual and hybrid work environments, Keiji questions the relevance of traditional tools and underscores the importance of adaptable, outcome-driven work practices.

We also explore the challenges that come with setting strategic goals and how organizations can sometimes lose sight of their brand and mission in pursuit of metrics and revenue. By discussing the value of clear boundaries and the dangers of excessive bureaucracy, we aim to equip listeners with strategies to empower teams and drive meaningful change. From setting effective guardrails to navigating organizational complexity, Keiji offers a wealth of knowledge on building a culture of experimentation and tackling inefficiencies to enhance productivity and engagement.

Featured Links: Follow Keji on LinkedIn | Watch Keji's talk at #mtpcon 2023 | The Spotify Squad Model

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Rerun: Many organisations and teams have faced the challenge of scaling a product. This week we invited Dave Martin and Andrea Saez, authors of "Product Momentum Gap", to share their wisdom and help bring together product strategy and provide customer value.

Featured Links: Follow Andrea on LinkedIn and her website | Follow Dave on LinkedIn | Dave's page at Right To Left | Buy Andrea and Dave's book 'The Product Momentum Gap' | Dave's 'How to execute your product strategy' (using the Value Creation Plan) 10-Step Plan

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's episode, we speak with Kameron Canbaz, Product Manager at Yahoo, who shares collaboration strategies between product managers and engineers, highlighting the early involvement of engineers in the design process to preempt errors and align user goals. He provides practical tips for maintaining a user-centric mindset, urging regular communication with users and fostering a culture of empathy within product teams.

Featured Links: Follow Kameron on LinkedIn | Yahoo | "What we learned at Pendomonium + #mtpcon Raleigh: Day 1" feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode of the Product Experience Podcast, we speak with Kasia Chmielinski, co-founder of The Data Nutrition Project, who discusses their work on responsible AI, data quality, and the Data Nutrition Project. Kasia highlights the importance of balancing innovation with ethical considerations in product management, the challenges of working within large organizations like the UN, and the need for transparency in data usage.

Featured Links: Follow Kasia on LinkedIn | The Data Nutrition Project | 'What we learned at Pendomonium and #mtpcon 2024 Raleigh: Day 2' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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We welcome back Thor Mitchell, who shares his journey from being a CPO at CrowdCube to becoming a VP of Product at Miro, where he established an Associate Product Manager (APM) program. Thor discusses the importance of structured APM programs, the qualities to look for in candidates, and the benefits of bringing fresh talent into companies.

Featured Links: Follow Thor on LinkedIn | Miro | Apply for one of Miro's graduate programs

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's episode on The Product Experience podcast, we speak with Hanneke Hoogewerf, Sr Strategic Experience Designer, IKEA. Hanneke opens up about the emotional journey of project handovers and maintaining consistency across digital platforms. She discusses the challenges of translating IKEA's playful essence into the online realm and the importance of standardizing experiences for customer interaction.

Featured Links: Follow Hanneke on LinkedIn | IKEA | IKEA Kreativ | 'Five things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow - Amsterdam 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this episode, Dariusz Dziuk, product lead for music expression at Spotify, discusses his journey in product management, the balance between art and science in the field, and the innovative process behind creating dynamic cover art for artists. He shares insights on how to connect creators with fans, the importance of validating assumptions through real artist engagement, and the metrics used to measure success in a marketplace. Dariusz Dziuk emphasizes the need to listen to artists and adapt to their creative needs while exploring future directions for Spotify's artist tools.

Featured Links: Follow Dariusz on LinkedIn | Dariusz's website | Spotify | '#mtpcon @ Pendomonium 2024 Encore' recap feature

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Unlock the secrets of impactful product management in our latest episode with Nacho Bacino, a distinguished product leader and coach. Ever wondered about the true difference between staying busy and making a real business impact? Join us as Nacho shares his enlightening journey from software engineering to product management, revealing how companies are reshaping product roles to prioritize business outcomes over mere outputs. Learn how this shift is essential for aligning modern product teams with ever-evolving business expectations.

Discover the art of mapping user outcomes to business impact as we dive into the world of KPI trees and OKRs. Nacho walks us through the critical role of senior product managers in bridging customer behavior with business metrics, ensuring that teams focus on metrics that truly matter. We explore common pitfalls in structuring KPIs and the importance of fostering a shared understanding among teams to prevent miscommunication and ensure alignment with business goals.

Our conversation concludes with strategies for elevating your product impact through effective communication and collaboration. Learn how to transform your feature deliveries into compelling narratives that highlight measurable outcomes and drive stakeholder conversations. With practical tips on setting measurable business goals and involving stakeholders in strategy refinement, this episode is packed with insights to enhance your influence and secure recognition within your organization. Join us for a thought-provoking discussion on making your work truly count.

Featured Links: Follow Nacho on LinkedIn | Work with Nacho at Product Direction | 'Five things we learned at the #mtpcon + Pendomonium roadshow - Berlin 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this conversation, we speak with Miku Jia, the Director for AI and ML at Google Cloud, about the practical applications of AI in enterprises. We discuss Miku's journey into AI, the importance of addressing real business problems with AI solutions, and the key success factors for implementing AI effectively. The conversation also covers the challenges of AI hallucinations, the need for responsible AI practices, and the significance of data strategy in leveraging AI technologies. Miku emphasizes the accessibility of AI tools for entrepreneurs and the potential for solving complex challenges with generative AI.

Featured Links: Follow Miku on LinkedIn | Google Cloud | '#mtpcon @ Pendomonium 2024 Encore' recap feature

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week on the podcast, we speak with Andrew Martinez-Fonts, VP of Product at Honeysales, to discuss product strategy and how that should always come before any technological advances. Andrew stresses the need to truly understand customer needs and align strategies with business goals.

Featured Links: Follow Andrew on LinkedIn | Honeysales | 'Five things we learned at the #mtpcon + Pendomonium roadshow - Berlin 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Connor Joyce, a Senior User Researcher at Microsoft and author of "Bridging Intention to Impact." joins us on the podcast this week to discuss building features that are built with evidence and collaboration, fostering not only successful launches but also long-term user satisfaction.

Featured Links: Follow Connor on LinkedIn | Microsoft User Research | Desired Outcome Labs | Buy Connor's new book 'Bridging Intention to Impact: Transforming Digital Product Development through Evidence-Based Decision-Making'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast episode, Partho Ghosh, VP of Products at Uberall, shares his transformative journey from computer science graduate to product management leader, revealing the intricacies of implementing product-led growth (PLG) strategies.

Having played a key role at Hootsuite, Partho now navigates the challenges of scaling at Uberall, bringing profound insights into how PLG drives significant company growth and development. This episode delivers a deeper understanding of the landscape of PLG, making it a must-listen for anyone interested in product management and business growth.

Featured Links: Follow Partho on LinkedIn | Uberall | 'Definition of Product-Led Growth' feature by Wes Bush

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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What happens when you blend the power of AI with the world of healthcare? Join us for our conversation with Tetiana Telensak, the Head of Product for Data and AI at Merck Group, who reveals how she uses AI to improve healthcare products.

Featured Links: Follow Tatiana on LinkedIn | Merck | 'Five things we learned at the #mtpcon + Pendomonium roadshow - Berlin 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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How is AI reshaping the landscape of product-led growth? Join us as we chat with Nicole Mace, the SVP of Product and User Experience at Pendo, who offers an insider’s perspective on the AI revolution within product management.

Featured Links: Follow Nichole on LinkedIn | Pendo | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Discover the secrets of successful product management with Heather Williams, Director of Product at Elsevier, as she shares her transformative journey from UX design to leading product teams. Recorded live at the Mind the Product Roadshow in Amsterdam, Heather unpacks the power of user research and interaction design in shaping innovative product strategies. Learn how Elsevier's product teams integrate data-driven decision-making through cross-functional collaboration, including roles for data analysts, UX designers, and subject matter experts, all working towards enhancing product experiences.

Featured Links: Follow Heather on LinkedIn | Elsevier | 'Five things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow - Amsterdam 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us for this week's podcast episode, where we sit down with Miguel Fernandez, Slack's VP of Product Design, to discuss the art and science of creating products that resonate on a deeply human level and leading effective product design teams.

Featured Links: Follow Miguel on LinkedIn | Miguel's website | Slack

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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What does it take to integrate Generative AI into the highly regulated world of banking? Join us as we sit down with Tariq Maonah, SVP of Product and Engineering for Generative AI at Citi, who reveals the secrets to navigating the complexities of AI-driven product development in the financial sector.

Featured Links: Follow Tariq on LinkedIn | Citi | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Product managers have been spending the last few weeks looking at their OKRs and thinking about the direction of their products. To help us better understand product strategy and direction, we spoke with Product Leader Chiedza Muguti to discuss making your product strategy come alive.

Featured Links: Follow Chiedza on LinkedIn | World Health Organisation | Alteos | ‘Giving direction in product with Janna Bastow, Chiedza Muguti, and Nacho Bassino’ feature at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week, we're joined by Claire Bauden, the SVP of Global Product Design at Global Payments, who shares her expertise on embedding inclusivity and accessibility into every layer of design.

Featured Links: Follow Claire on LinkedIn | Global Payments Inc. | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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What role do company values play in shaping successful product teams? Find out as we chat with Brian Walsh, SVP of Product at Pendo, who uncovers the power of open communication and collaboration in fostering a thriving product culture.

Featured Links: Follow Brian on LinkedIn | Brian's blog at Pendo | Brian's talk at the Pendomonium and #mtpcon roadshow in Amsterdam 2024 | 'Five things we learned at the Pendomonium and #mtpcon roadshow - Amsterdam 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week’s episode on The Product Experience podcast, Arne Kittler, Product Leadership Consultant and Co-Founder of Product at Heart, delves into the importance of providing clarity in building great products, and what it means in practical terms.

Featured Links: Follow Arne on LinkedIn | Arne's website | Product at Heart conference Hamburg | '5 things we learned at the #mtpcon + Pendomonium roadshow Berlin 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In our latest episode, Joe Leech, a seasoned coach with a background in tech, user experience, and product management, provides an insider's look at the unique challenges and transitions faced by different types of CEOs, and how product teams can work better with the C-suite.

Featured Links: Follow Joe on LinkedIn | Joe's website | 'Managing Change' - Joe's previous podcast episode with The Product Experience

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Can treating a business like a product revolutionise your approach to management and strategy? Join us as we sit down with Jonty Sharples, an experienced product and strategy consultant, who discusses product management and business design evolution. Listen to his reflections on career disruption and the significant impact of current economic trends, including job losses in the tech industry and the potential game-changing influence of AI.

Featured Links: Follow Jonty on LinkedIn and X | Design Leaders Community | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium + #mtpcon roadshow London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us this week on The Product Experience podcast as we sit down with Janet Bumpas, a veteran Product Advisor with a wealth of experience in both startups and large corporations, to unravel the secrets behind creating compelling product visions.

Featured Links: Follow Janet on LinkedIn | Janet's website | 'How to find out what your customers want' feature by Janet Bumpas at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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For this week's podcast, we had a great conversation with Javier Andrés Bargas-Avila, Google's UX Director. Ever wonder how Google ensures its products cater to user needs while balancing business and engineering demands? Javier shares his journey from psychology student to UX research leader, revealing the intricate process of integrating user insights into product development. From prioritization challenges to the concept of Critical User Journeys (CUJs).

Featured Links: Follow Javier on LinkedIn | Javier's website | 'Five things we learned at the Pendomonium and #mtpcon roadshow - Berlin 2024' feature by Louron Pratt | About Google

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Listen to our conversation with Frances Ibe, the SVP of Product at Tide. Frances shares invaluable insights on her journey from developer to product leadership and how to avoid common pitfalls during the discovery process.

Featured Links: Follow Frances on LinkedIn | Tide | 'Six things we learned at the Pendomonium and #mtpcon roadshow - London 2024' feature by Louron Pratt

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Unlock the secrets to building a powerful product community with Thomas Leiterman, co-organizer for Product Tank in Amsterdam and Senior Growth Product Manager at Personio. Thomas takes us on a journey through his own experiences, starting a community from scratch inspired by Mind the Product Engage in Hamburg, and later merging into Amsterdam's vibrant scene.

Featured Links: Follow Thomas on LinkedIn | Product Tank Amsterdam | Personio | '5 things we learned at the Pendomonium / #mtpcon Amsterdam 2024 roadshow' feature by Louron Pratt at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Listen to our conversation with Neil Vass, Engineering Manager at Co-op. We unravel the intricacies of making estimations in product and discuss the fine balance between setting attainable goals and avoiding undue stress on your team.

In our discussion, we address the common pitfalls in estimation, from the pressure to deliver overly optimistic figures to the misuse of estimates as bargaining chips rather than planning tools.

Featured Links: Follow Neil on LinkedIn | Neil's website | Neil's 'Minimum Viable Estimation - Part 4' feature | Neil's 'Minimum Viable Estimation - Part 5' feature | 'Estimating Complexity' - Liz Keogh episode on The Product Experience | Buy 'How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business' book by Douglas W. Hubbard

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business

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What are the common pitfalls that product teams face? Join us this week on the podcast for a discussion with David Pereira, CEO and CPO of omoqo GmbH, as he shares his unique insights into building an effective product strategy and avoiding common traps that product-led organisations face.

Featured Links: Follow David on LinkedIn | David's website | Buy David's book 'Untrapping Product Teams' | Omoqo

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Can organisational change truly rely on quick fixes, or are we missing the bigger picture? Join our engaging discussion with Steve Hearsum, Author of "No Silver Bullet: Bursting the Bubble of the Organizational Quick Fix." Steve shares his journey into the field and reveals the flawed belief in miracle solutions for complex challenges. We tackle the often-overlooked challenges faced by product managers who are expected to perform at senior leadership levels without adequate support.

Featured Links: Follow Steve on LinkedIn | Buy Steve's book 'No Silver Bullet: Bursting the Bubble of the Organisational Quick Fix' | Edge + Stretch | 'The Life Cycle of a Silver Bullet' piece at What's the PONT Blog

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Is the traditional view of product management losing its relevance in today's global landscape? Join us as we chat with Graeme Stuart, Head of Product at Aflac Northern Ireland and Co-founder of ProductTank Belfast, about his rich, two-decade-long journey through the evolving world of product management.

Featured Links: Follow Graeme on LinkedIn | Deep Labs | Dovetail | John Cutler feature on The North Star Framework | 'Testing Business Ideas' - David Bland episode on The Product Experience

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us on this week's podcast as we explore international product growth with Chui Chui Tan of Beyō Global, an expert in culturalisation. Discover how she helps businesses thrive in new markets by understanding cultural nuances and values. From her user experience roots to her role as a global consultant, Chui Chui highlights the importance of cultural intelligence in product development and international strategy, offering tips even small enterprises can use for growth.

Featured Links: Follow Chui Chui on LinkedIn | Beyō Global| Buy Chui Chui's book 'Research for Global Growth - Strategies and Guidelines for Cross-Cultural Insights'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Discover the intricacies of bias in generative AI in product management with John Haggerty, Founder of The PM Insider. In this week's episode, John unveils the layered complexities of AI innovation, navigating the ethical realm of the AI revolution reshaping businesses.

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join our conversation with Anuja More, Product Lead at Meta. We delve into the lessons she learned while transitioning from engineering to product management. In our discussion, Anuja unveils the change required to switch from a mindset fixated on technical hurdles to one adept at unravelling customer needs, underscoring the vitality of curiosity and problem-solving along the way.

Featured Links: Follow Anuja on LinkedIn and Instagram | Meta | 'How I Moved from Engineering into Product Management' feature by Victor Kosonen at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join our conversation with Atif Faruiqui, Director of Developer Products and Platforms at Pfizer, as he illuminates the path the pharmaceutical colossus took towards a product-focused approach. He takes us behind the scenes of Pfizer's strategic pivot, highlighting the signals that spurred the company's leadership to champion a customer-centric approach.

Featured Links: Follow Atif on LinkedIn | Pfizer | 'What's a Proof of Concept? The Complete Beginner's Guide' feature at Career Foundry | 'The Rising Importance of Product Managers in Digital Transformation' piece at Emergn

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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We've all heard about the Jobs to Be Done framework - but do you know how to really make the most of it? We went straight to the source - Bob Moesta, who developed the approach alongside Harvard Business School's Clayton Christensen - to really get into the approach.

In this episode, we cover:

How to get started with JTBD - and what to do after you've conducted a bunch of interviews.
Case studies, including SAAS, candy bars, and selling houses.
When not to use the approach
And the mistakes that most people make.

Featured Links: Follow Bob on LinkedIn | The Re-Wired Group | Jobs To Be Done website | Buy the'Never Split The Difference' book by Chris Voss and Tahl Raz | Buy the 'Job Moves' book by Ethan Bernstein, Michael B. Horn and Bob Moesta

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It

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If you’re starting a new role in product at whatever level, it can sometimes be difficult to get started, especially if you’re chucked in the deep end. In this week’s podcast episode, we speak with Leah Tharin, currently the Chief Product and Growth Officer at gotphotocom. She provides some insights on your first 90 days in a new product role, challenges the conventional wisdom of the 30, 60, 90-day plan, and goes into the best ways to gain trust from your new team.

Featured Links: Follow Leah on LinkedIn and Twitter | Leah’s website | Leah’s ‘Productea with Leah’ podcast | ‘The Shit Sandwich and Other Terrible Ways to Give Feedback’ piece at I Done This Blog

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Listen to our conversation with Ipsita Basu, Product Management Leader at BILL all about rediscovering our passion in product. In this episode, Ipsita shares practical advice for product managers looking to get out of a rut and build innovative products that customers love.

Featured Links: Follow Ipsita on LinkedIn | Bill | Read Ipsita's 'Product managers, stop being jaded' article at Mind The Product

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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When you have questions about roadmaps, it pays to talk to someone who has spent way too much of her life thinking about them. Janna Bastow – co-founder of both Mind the Product and ProdPad joins us to give advice to anyone ready to break up with their roadmap.

Featured Links: Follow Janna on Twitter and LinkedIn ｜ ProdPad on Twitter, and read more of her posts ｜ Troubleshooting Agile – Jeffery Fredrick & Douglas Squirrel’s episode of The Product Experience ｜Killing Zombies – Lisa Long’s episode of The Product Experience

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Tune into our latest conversation with Dominique Jost, Head of Product at Doist. In this episode, we peel back the layers on why product managers are especially vulnerable to this modern malaise, with Dominic offering an enlightening breakdown of stressors and personal amplifiers that escalate work pressures into health hazards.

Featured Links: Follow Dominique on LinkedIn | Calmr Works self-care management tool | Work with Dominique at Doist | Buy 'Deep Work: Rules for Focussed Success in a Distracted World' book by Cal Newport

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World

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How much should you be charging? Are you leaving money on the table, or are you scaring away potential customers? Pricing strategy can be one of the biggest challenges for product people, so we asked Founders Factory coach Fanni Fejes to share some of the lessons she teaches founders.

(Since we originally ran this episode, Fanni has moved on to take the Head of Product role at Bequest.)

In this episode, listen to learn about:

Having a good pricing strategy
Applying anchor pricing
Using metrics well

Quote of the Episode

If the pilot is free, make sure that it’s for a certain amount of time – and then you have the chance to renegotiate from there… In my personal experience, it’s easier to ask for more money than to ask for money at all.

Featured Links: Follow Fanni on LinkedIn | Bequest | Founders Factory | Fanni's 'How to Price Your Product in a Startup' article

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week on the podcast, we sit down with Yana Welinder, CEO of Kraftful. Yana shares insights into how today's product managers are transforming their roles by leveraging AI to create compelling user stories, fine-tuning financial models, and even hiring.

As AI interfaces grow more intuitive, we navigate the importance of a product manager's openness to these advancements, the significant role AI plays in amplifying diverse customer feedback, and the ongoing responsibility of product professionals to shape AI to reflect the values that drive their visions forward.

Featured Links: Follow Yana on LinkedIn | Yana's website | Kraftful | Yana's 'Product management in the age of ChatGPT' talk at ProductTank San Francisco 2023

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In our latest episode on The Product Experience, we delve into a great discussion with Katie Marcus, Product Lead at Progression. Katie gives us a deep insight into the trials and tribulations of fostering continuous discovery within a B2B environment and the start-up space.

Featured Links: Follow Katie on LinkedIn | Progression | Katie's 'Lessons learnt from a quarter of continuous discovery' feature | Tools: Maze / Dovetail / Supernormal / Mixpanel / Flipper

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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For many of us in product, building products that have long-lasting impacts on people's lives is the dream. In this episode, we speak to Omer Kaplan from Sonara Health. We discuss his mission in forging a path in healthcare technology to combat the opioid crisis. We also explore the principles of equity-first design and the meticulous testing strategies that ensure their technology serves everyone effectively.

Featured Links: Follow Omer on LinkedIn and Facebook | Sonara Health | The Lancet feature on North America's opioid crisis

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us on this week's podcast for a conversation with Nesrine Changuel, Senior Product Manager at Google, as she shares key insights on how we can delight users.

Featured Links: Follow Nesrine on LinkedIn | Nesrine's website | 'The Emotion Wheel: What it is and How to Use it' piece by Hokuma Karimova | 'Keeping Track of Your HEART' - Tomer Sharon on The Product Experience | 'The HaTS - Happiness Tracking Survey' feature by Prasanta Kumar Mohanty

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us on this week's podcast episode with Todd Olson, CEO and Co-Founder of Pendo.
We venture into the world of AI, software, and how launching AI-powered products can generate real outcomes for your business and customers.

Featured Links: Follow Todd on LinkedIn | Pendo | Register for AI Academy Lisbon 2024

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week on the podcast, Kate Leto, Executive Product Leadership Coach, makes a return to the Product Experience spotlight. Join us as she shares insights on improving leadership, communication, conflict, and stakeholder management as a product leader.

Featured Links: Follow Kate on LinkedIn | Kate's website | Sign up for the 'Essential Coaching Skills for Product Leaders' course with Kate in March 2024 | 'Understanding the Circles of Influence, Concern, and Control' feature by Anna Katharina Schaffner | 'About the Drama Triangle - and how to escape it' piece at Listening Partnership

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Liz Immer, brilliant Head of Product at Frontiers, brings a wealth of knowledge from the realm of behavioral science to the Product Experience podcast. Join us as Liz unravels the intricate connection between human behavior, product design, and team environments, offering a rare peek into the craft of creating products that don't just solve problems but align with the nuanced ways people think and act.

Featured Links: Follow Liz on LinkedIn | Frontiers | Behavioural Economics: 'A 'Fresh' Start for Collections at Swisscom' feature

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Crafting effective messaging is key for product success. In this podcast episode, Diane Wierdu, Founder and Messaging Strategist for Lion Works, underscores the significance of this key element. In the realm of product management, Diane breaks down a step by step guide on effective messaging, while also providing insights on engaging customers and growing products.

Features Links: Follow Diane on LinkedIn | Lion Words | Product Messaging feature at PMA

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us on this week's podcast with Dominik Busching, Head of Product Management at Tado. In this episode, Dominik guides us through the intricate landscapes of hardware product management.

Featured Links: Follow Dominik on LinkedIn | Tado° | 'How to Build an IoT Product Roadmap' piece by Daniel Elizalde | Designing for Play - Melissa Pickering on The Product Experience podcast

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This episode on The Product Experience unlocks the secrets to elevating your product management skills with insights from our distinguished guests Andrew Skotzko, Alex Watson, Liz Clow, and Daniel Stillman. Tune in to hear what some great product experts had to say!

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | 'A well-rounded personal growth plan' feature at Mind The Product | Guests included in this episode: Andrew Skotzko, Daniel Stillman, Tanguy Crusson, Leah Tharin, Liz Clow, Manon Dave, Erica Jorgensen, Dr J Harrison, Vishal Kapoor, Omar Sallam, Mel McVeigh, Lucie Buisson, Alex Watson, Ben Foster, Tobias Freudenreich, Itamar Gilad, Kax Uson, Kirsten Mann, Amy Wagner

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this exclusive episode of The Product Experience podcast, we bring together a diverse panel of product experts from around the world to share their invaluable insights on the essential aspects of recruiting top-notch product managers. Additionally, we delve into actionable tips for candidates seeking to distinguish themselves in the competitive landscape of the product job market.

Join us for a compelling discussion featuring Mel McVeigh (VP Digital Product, Condé Nast), Namrata Sarmah (Chief Product Officer), Itamar Gilad (Product Coach), and other industry luminaries.

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | 'Hiring and Developing Product Managers' feature at Mind The Product | Guests included in this episode: Mel McVeigh, Lucie Buisson, Dinushi Pieries, Alex Watson, Hoang Nguyen, Ben Foster, Tobias Freudenreich, Itamar Gilad, Kax Uson, Namrata Sarmah, Kirsten Mann, Amy Wagner

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us for our conversation with Diana Stepner, Head of Product at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. Diana shares a refreshing reminder that putting people at the heart of product management isn't just nice to have; it's essential. As Diana unfolds her journey from user experience research to leading product innovation, she champions a transformative approach that empowers individuals, fosters collaboration, and resonates deeply on a human level.

Featured Links: Follow Diana on LinkedIn | Diana's website | Try Diana's 'People-First Product Leadership' course at Maven | Diana's profile at Substack

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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What is the secret to exponential product growth? Daphne Tideman, Growth and Startup coach, joins us on the podcast this week. She discusses Product/market fit, the importance of business/channel models, and where companies go wrong when looking to grow their products.

Featured Links: Follow Daphne on LinkedIn and Twitter | Daphne’s book ‘Growing Happy Clients’ | Read Daphne’s articles on Medium | Reid Hoffman ‘Blitzscaling’ book | ‘Thriving In Hypergrowth’ – Cassidy Fein on The Product Experience

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Blitzscaling: The Lightning-Fast Path to Building Massively Valuable Companies

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In this week's podcast episode, Tami Reiss, Product leader coach, dissects the fundamental questions that guide successful product managers: envisioning the destination, understanding the current position, and strategically planning the next move.

Our conversation with Tami delves into her career journey, offering valuable insights on how product management principles influence not only team dynamics but also resonate within broader business contexts and individual career development.

Featured Links: Follow Tami on LinkedIn | Product Leader Coach | Tami's book 'What do Product Managers do?' | Watch Tami's talk 'The Only Three Questions You EVER Need'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Tune into our conversation with Esther Weinberg to hear about how product people can deal with company transformation during times of turbulence.

Featured Links: Follow Esther on LinkedIn and Twitter | The Ready Zone | Esther's article' The Power of a Reality Check, Moving from Reactive to Responsive' | Better.com CEO fires 900 employees over Zoom - CNN Business | Work Trend Index Report - Microsoft's latest research on the ways we work

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us for an insightful conversation with Martin Eriksson, EQT Product Partner and Co-founder of Mind the Product. Martin unveils The Decision Stack, a model to empower product teams in making more effective decisions.

We dissect the five steps of this model, demonstrating the power of a defined vision, cohesive strategy, and an understanding of objectives, opportunities, and principles.

Featured Links: Follow Martin on LinkedIn and mas.to | Martin's website | The Decision Stack | Buy 'Product Leadership: How Top Product Managers Launch Awesome Products and Build Successful Teams' book | Opportunity Solution Tree model feature by Teresa Torres

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Join us for an insightful conversation with Martin Eriksson, EQT Product Partner and Co-founder of Mind the Product. Martin unveils The Decision Stack, a model to empower product teams in making more effective decisions.

We dissect the five steps of this model, demonstrating the power of a defined vision, cohesive strategy, and an understanding of objectives, opportunities, and principles.

Featured Links: Follow Martin on LinkedIn and mas.to | Martin's website | The Decision Stack | Buy 'Product Leadership: How Top Product Managers Launch Awesome Products and Build Successful Teams' book | Opportunity Solution Tree model feature by Teresa Torres

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Navigating the job market, finding your specialization, and making career decisions that suit your needs can be a complex process. That's why we sat down with HHoang Nguyen , Director of Product at Westwing, to dig into these intricate topics and offer some insight. In the realm of AI, not only do we discuss its fascinating aspects, but we also delve into how to discover innate talents and develop a passion for product management within it.

Featured Links: Follow Hoang on LinkedIn | Hoang's 'How To Evaluate Your Next Career Opportunities' talk at PMF 2022 | 'Unlocking Your Superhero - How To Find Your Specialization' video

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week's episode on The Product Experience podcast demystifies what it truly means to lead an empowered team and helps you navigate the tricky waters of autonomy and accountability. Uncover invaluable advice on earning and extending trust, understanding the power dynamics in a team setting, and transforming company relationships.

Featured Links: Follow Andrew on LinkedIn | Make Things That Matter | Marty Cagan's article 'Product vs Feature Teams' | Buy Charles Feltman's book 'The Thin Book of Trust: an Essential Primer for Building Trust at Work'

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

The Thin Book of Trust: An Essential Primer For Building Trust at Work

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Today, on a very special episode on The Product Experience, Randy Silver joins us for a change on the other side of the mic as a guest! Lily Smith interviews Randy to talk all about what differentiates good product managers from exceptional ones as well as touching upon his experience in speaking at #mtpcon London 2023.

Featured Links: Follow Randy on LinkedIn | Get the Product Environment Canvas: outofowls.com/mtp | CPO Circles | Product in the (A)ether |

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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Experimentation is a key aspect of product management. What are the most important things to consider when experimenting and testing new product features? And when do you know when it's the right time to do just that? At #mtpcon London 2023, Randy Silver and Lily Smith, were joined by Faith Forster, VP of Product at Dext, and Iqbal Ali, Experimentation coach and consultant for a live podcast episode of The Product Experience! Tune in for an uncut conversation on testing in product, along with a Q&A section from the audience that witnessed and participated in the discussion.

Featured Links: Follow Faith on LinkedIn | Follow Iqbal on LinkedIn | Follow Lily on LinkedIn | Follow Randy on LinkedIn | AI, failings, and product villains: 9 lessons from #MTPCon London

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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This week, we go back into the archives when Susana Lopes, Director of Product at Abatable, joined us on the podcast. In this episode, we discuss how she used the State of the Product presentation to manage stakeholders and drive alignment. Tune in for an episode filled with practical insights and invaluable resources.

Featured Links: Follow Susana on LinkedIn | Susana’s State of Product Slide Deck | Porter’s 5 Forces model | ‘What is SWOT analysis?’ piece | Buy Melissa Perri’s book 'Escaping The Build Trap' | Buy Marco Iansiti & Karim R. Lakhani’s book 'Competing In The Age Of AI' | Tools to Help Product Managers Think Strategically and Commercially

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Competing in the Age of AI: Strategy and Leadership When Algorithms and Networks Run the World

Escaping the Build Trap: How Effective Product Management Creates Real Value

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In this week's podcast, Dan Balcauski shares his thoughts on the challenge of measuring uncertainty in pricing strategy and how tools like Fermi decomposition can be game-changers. Additionally, if you've ever wondered how to manage existing customers when you decide to tweak pricing and packaging, we've got you covered. Tune in for some pragmatic advice on pricing strategy, indicative pricing, and the reasoning behind 'contact us for a quote' approach.

Featured Links: Follow Dan on LinkedIn | Product Tranquility | Buy 'How to Measure Anything Workbook: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business' book by Douglas Hubbard | Fermi Estimate examples | 'Decoding the mysteries of pricing strategies' - Part 1 of Dan Balcauski on The Product Experience

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast, we invited Mel McVeigh, VP of Product at Condé Nast. In our conversation, we discuss all of the unique challenges of building products within a global mass media company and hear from Mel how to transform products and build teams.

Featured Links: Follow Mel on LinkedIn | Mel's website | Condé Nast | Watch the full Met Gala 2023 at Vogue

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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On this week's podcast episode, product veteran Itamar Gilad joins us on the podcast to provide insights on implementing evidence-guided principles into product management. He argues that as product managers, we must be driven by evidence to find product success.

Featured Links: Follow Itamar on LinkedIn | Buy Itamar's new book 'Evidence-Guided: Creating High Impact Products in the Face of Uncertainty' | Free e-book downloads on Testing Product ideas, ICE Prioritisation, OKRs done right, and many other resources at Itamar's website | Sign-up for Itamar's 'High-Impact Product Management' newsletter | 'High-Integrity Commitments' feature at SVG | Itamar's previous episodes on The Product Experience podcast

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's podcast, we were joined by Dan Balcauski, Founder and Chief Pricing Officer at Product Tranquility. Dan sheds light on the common misconceptions around pricing and gives valuable advice on aligning your pricing strategy with your business objectives.

Featured Links: Follow Dan on LinkedIn | Product Tranquility | 'How To Price Your Product: A Guide To The Van Westendorp Pricing Model' feature at Forbes | 'Identifying and multiplying your best customers' - Tamara Grominsky on The Product Experience | Buy 'What Customers Want: Using Outcome-Driven Innovation to Create Breakthrough Products and Services' book by Anthony Ulwick

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

What Customers Want: Using Outcome-Driven Innovation to Create Breakthrough Products and Services

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Many organisations and teams have faced the challenge of scaling a product. This week we invited Dave Martin and Andrea Saez, authors of "Product Momentum Gap", to share their wisdom and help bring together product strategy and provide customer value.

Featured Links: Follow Andrea on LinkedIn and her website | Follow Dave on LinkedIn | Dave's page at Right To Left | Sign up for release updates for Andrea and Dave's forthcoming book 'The Product Momentum Gap' | Dave's 'How to execute your product strategy' (using the Value Creation Plan) 10-Step Plan

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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With only 30 days to go until our flagship conference, #mtpcon London, we thought that this week, we'd take a trip down memory lane to when we invited AI and Health Tech leader, Randeep Sidhu on the podcast.

Randeep, who will be speaking on the #mtpcon main stage on 20 October, spoke to us about lessons learned from building the Covid-19 tes t and trace app in the midst of the pandemic.

Featured Links: Follow Randeep on LinkedIn | NHS COVID-19 app | Gov.UK NHS Covid-19 App Privacy Notice | Understanding the Impact of Covid-19 on BAME Groups NHS Data Report

Our Hosts
Lily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath.

Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

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In this week's episode, we sit down with Alex Watson, Product Director at Spotify's Core Experience. Together, we unpack the tools and mindset necessary for anyone navigating a career in product management. We delve into the critical aspects of understanding your motivation for career progression and the unique benefits that different levels of seniority hold.

Featured Links: Follow Alex on LinkedIn | The Wired Jester | 'Managing Internal Communications for Big Projects' feature at Mind The Product | Alex's thoughts on 'Self development and Career Progression as a PM in Spotify'

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In this week's podcast, we were joined by Tobias Freudenreich, a product leadership coach and consultant based in Hamburg. This episode dives deep into the structure of cross-functional teams and explains how this structure can help us build great products that people love.

Featured Links: Follow Tobias on LinkedIn and his website | Tobias' 'Introducing Cross-Functional Leadership' blog post | Tobias' 'Product Leadership' talk at ProductTank Berlin | Martin Eriksson's 'The Decision Stack' framework | 'Getting Started With Outcomes' post by Josh Seiden

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Transitioning from a CPO to a CEO is a daunting task, requiring more than just technical skills. In the second half of our chat, Namarata delves into the importance of long-term planning and developing skills. Specifically, we discuss the intricacies of combining sales and product roles, highlighting the potential challenges that come with it. The discussion brings to the forefront the need for product management professionals to develop a comprehensive suite of business and sales skills.

Apart from Namarata’s journey, our conversation also takes a turn into the world of product communities and their impact.

Featured Links: Follow Namrata on LinkedIn | Namrata's website | Women In Product UK on Instagram

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Are you ready to unlock the secrets of scaling product teams without compromising on quality or innovation? That's exactly what Lucy Buisson, Chief Product Officer at Content Square, graciously shares with us in this episode. Lucy is a master at building high-performing teams who focus on creating value for customers while striking a balance between scalability and feature development. She's got loads of experience and wisdom to share, whether you're leading a team or being part of one.

Lucy is a firm believer in the power of delegation and empowering others. She reveals her strategy of building a team with individuals who can outperform her, and the crucial role intuition plays in it. We even dive into how MTP Con London offers a golden opportunity for leaders to learn and grow with their incredible lineup of speakers, workshops, and an exclusive Leadership Forum.

But, it isn't all just about building high-performing teams. Lucy shares her unique "rhino methodology" her team has adopted to prioritize must-haves while ensuring efficiency. We also discuss how customer success and sales teams can empower product development with their insights. Lucy also emphasizes the importance of maintaining close relationships with customers and celebrating successes amidst new challenges. So, buckle up for an episode you won't want to miss!

Featured Links: Follow Lucie on LinkedIn and Twitter | Contentsquare | Hypergrowth feature at Tech Blast

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Rerun: OKRs are a simple concept — but deceptively hard to get right. There’s an awful lot of horror stories about implementations gone wrong, along with any number of gurus and guides on how to get it right. Storm Fagan — now the Chief Product Officer at the BBC, formerly at JustEat — joined us on the podcast to break down how she made OKRs scale at a big company by keeping them simple. (Hint: that wasn’t her first approach.)

Featured Links: Follow Storm on LinkedIn and Twitter | Work with Storm at the BBC | Just Eat | 'How to write OKRs that don't suck' MTP piece by Adrian Howard

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On this week's podcast, we sit down with Merela Moose, Founder and CPO of Product People, as we unbox the career progression in product management. We decode the vital differences between various product leadership roles, from VPs to Directors and Heads of Product. Listen as Merela details her incredible journey into product management and learn how Product People has set themselves apart by focusing wholeheartedly on career opportunities and meeting client needs.

Featured Links: Follow Mirela on LinkedIn and Twitter | Product People | 'No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention' book by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer | Open Roles at Product People

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Product Operations has been the talk of the town over the past two years, but why is it so important in product management, and what does the role entail? In this week's podcast, Antonia Landi, Product Operations Consultant, leads us on a journey through the world of product ops, outlining its purpose, significance, and how its role can vary based on a company's specific needs. We delve into the misconceptions around product ops and discover that it’s not just about creating mural boards but is an essential cog in the product development machinery.

Featured Links: Follow Antonia on LinkedIn and Twitter | Antonia's website | The Product Operations Manifesto | Product Ops Overview feature at SVPG | 'Product Operations - The Fuel for Winning Product Strategies' piece on Product Lab.

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Ever wondered what it takes to thrive in product management across different sizes of organizations? We welcome experienced product leader, Liz Clow, Chief Product Officer at memmo.me.

We journey through her experiences across diverse organizations, you'll learn how to put OKRs into practice to steer teams effectively and maintain laser focus. We'll explore the delicate art of saying 'no' to certain initiatives to retain focus and the importance of adaptability when a strategy misfires.

In addition, we dig into the nuances of leadership styles in different organizational contexts. Learn how data-driven decision making and a robust product mindset can transform any company, regardless of size.

Featured Links: Follow Liz on LinkedIn and Twitter | Memmo | Liz's 'Navigating different org sizes as a product leader' piece at Mind The Product

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Join us on the podcast this week where we uncover the world of content design with Erica Jorgensen, seasoned content designer at Chewy and author of 'Strategic Content Design Tools and Research Techniques for Better UX'. Erica graciously walks us through her professional journey and how she fell into the realm of content strategy. She enlightens us on the significance of using quantitative research in understanding why words work or not, and how different businesses can reap enormous benefits from a content designer.

Our chat with Erica takes an intriguing turn as we dig into the kinship between content design and user experience. She opens up about the importance of quality content as an engineering issue, and when it's prime time to make the case for hiring a content designer early in a project

Featured Links: Follow Erica on LinkedIn and Twitter | Erica's website | Buy Erica's book 'Strategic Content Design - Tools and Research Techniques for Better UX' | The Content Design Manifesto | Screaming Frog SEO Spider

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Christian Idiodi, Partner and SVPG joins us on the podcast this week! We speak with Christian about onboarding new product hires, and the work he is doing for the first in-person product conference for the African continent.

Featured Links: Follow Christian on LinkedIn and Twitter | Innovate Africa Foundation | Inspire Africa | The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

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This week on the podcast, we speak to Kax Uson, Head of Product at Adevinta. She tells us all about her story of going from IC to her product leadership, and the key lessons learned along the way.

Featured Links: Follow Kax on LinkedIn and Twitter | Kax's website | Women In Product | Kax's 'Coaching for Confident Product People' page

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Tune back into our chat with Donna Lichaw on this week's podcast. In part two of the episode, she continues to share key insights in reinventing product leadership and success in product.

Featured Links: Follow Donna on LinkedIn and Twitter | Donna's website | Donna's book 'The Leader's Journey' | Career and alignment: Part 1 - Donna Lichaw on The Product Experience

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Donna Lichaw, product expert, consultant, and author of ‘The Leader’s Journey’ joins us on the podcast this week. She shares the lessons to reinvent your leadership journey, by activating your superpowers, transforming your team, and poising your business for success in product.

Featured Links: Follow Donna on LinkedIn and Twitter | Donna's website | Donna's book 'The Leader's Journey' |

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In product, basic business analyst skills often get misrepresented in the midst of the plethora of tasks that product managers have to juggle. In this weeks' podcast, Dr J Harrison joins us on the podcast to discuss how product can collaborate more effectively with business analysts.

Featured Links: Follow Dr J on LinkedIn and Twitter | Dr J's website | Dr J and Josephine Baird's 'It Is Complicated' podcast | 'Lean Experimentation in Action: A Concise Guide to Validating Product Ideas and Avoiding Failure' book by Kylie Castellaw and Maryam Aidini

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How can pricing of a product be affected by supply and demand? In this weeks' podcast we spoke with Vishal Kapoor, Senior Director or Product Management at Shipt, he discussed the process behind dynamic product pricing strategy, when it's right to introduce this strategy, and the lessons he has learned along the way.

Featured Links: Follow Vishal on LinkedIn | Shipt | The Innovation Dispatch | 'Prioritisation: Bringing order out of chaos' feature at Mind The Product |

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Have you encountered the challenge of delivering more features quickly with limited resources in your product? Many product managers tend to fall into the trap of becoming feature factories.

In this week's podcast, we had a conversation with Assaph Mehr, a product leader and coach, who shared insights into the analogy of transitioning from a feature factory to a garden.

Join us to learn how to adopt a gardener's mindset as a product manager, inviting people in, creating new attractions, and ensuring the consistent quality of your garden for your customers throughout the year. And let's face it, who doesn't appreciate the beauty of gardens?

Featured Links: Follow Assaph on LinkedIn and Twitter | Assaph's 'Product development: or how to turn factories into gardens' piece at Mind The Product | Felix The Fox Mysteries | Taylorism / Scientific Management definition | "Always be closing!" scene from Glengarry Glenn Ross (1992) | 'Pave the cow's path' piece on Three Saplings

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Dinushi Pieries, VP of Product Management at J.P. Morgan, has years of experience in the product space, having worked for prominent tech organizations for several years. Her expertise ranges from managing services to spearheading the development of innovative portals. In this week's podcast, we spoke with her on the topics of platform product management, open source, and her approach to measuring success when working on new tools.

Featured Links: Follow Dinushi on LinkedIn and Tik Tok | The Open Source Software Security Mobilization Plan | GitHub Copilot | Amazon CodeWhisperer | IBM Project CodeNet

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Tune into our conversation with Kirsten Mann, CPO at Prospection to hear her key lessons learned from moving the organisation from services-led to product-led.

Featured Links: Follow Kirsten on LinkedIn and Instagram | Kirsten's feature 'A case study: The journey to becoming a product-led company' at Mind The Product | Prospection

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How can product managers design the right conversations with stakeholders, teams, and customers alike? Tune into our conversation with Daniel Stillman, Author of Good Talk - How To Design Conversations That Matter' to find out.

Featured Links: Follow Daniel on LinkedIn and Twitter | Daniel's website | The Conversation Factory | Daniel's book 'Good Talk - How To Design Conversations That Matter' | 'The Rose, Bud, Thorn Retrospective' technique | 'Six Guidelines For Getting To Yes' piece at Harvard Law School Blog

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Tanguy Crusson, Product leader at Atlassian joins us on The Product Experience podcast this week to talk all about product launches. Tune in to find out his thoughts on why most products fail, and learn how he successfully launched a new product at Atlassian.

Featured Links: Follow Tanguy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Atlassian Presents: Unleash - 'How we created Jira Product Discovery' video | Sean Ellis Test: 'A successful method to figure out product/market fit' piece

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We all have passions and desires in life by how can we use our individual passions and channel this into creating products that customers love? In this week's podcast we speak with Manon Dave, Chief Product Officer to get our creative juices flowing in product management.

Featured Links: Follow Manon on LinkedIn and Twitter | Manon's website | Manon's 'Keeping product creative, innovative... and fun!' talk at #mtpcon London 2022

We’d love to hear your feedback on how we can improve The Product Experience podcast. Let us know your thoughts by filling out this quick form!

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Data has been the talk of the town for product managers over the past few years. To provide some insights on data as a product, how to manage data products, and conclude whether it's pronounced 'Dayta' or 'Daata', we spoke to data expert, Omar Sallam, Senior Product Manager at Booking.com.

Featured Links: Follow Omar on LinkedIn and Twitter | Omar's Product School 'How to manage data-as-a-product' webinar | ProductTank Cairo

We’d love to hear your feedback on how we can improve The Product Experience podcast. Let us know your thoughts by filling out this quick form!

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Tim Herbig has made many mistakes (who hasn’t?). Fortunately for us, Tim not only owns up to his mistakes, he’s written a book to help the rest of us avoid making the same ones. We’ve all had issues with how to work best – not only within our individual teams, but with the rest of the organisation as well. In our conversation, he shares some simple and practical methods to diagnose when you have a problem and how to solve it.

Featured Links: Follow Tim on LinkedIn and Twitter | Tim's official website | Buy Tim's book 'Lateral Leadership: A Practical Guide for Product Managers' | The Auftragsklärung Framework |

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If you're starting a new role in product at whatever level, it can sometimes be difficult to get started, especially if you're chucked in the deep end. In this week's podcast episode, we speak with Leah Tharin. She provides some insights on your first 90 days in a new product role and the best ways to gain trust from your new team.

Featured Links: Follow Leah on LinkedIn and Twitter | Leah's website | Leah's 'Productea with Leah' podcast | 'The Shit Sandwich and Other Terrible Ways to Give Feedback' piece at I Done This Blog

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This week on the podcast, we jump straight back into our conversation with Ben Foster. Tune in to hear what he had to say about war, peace, vision, strategy, and how to tie it all together in a perfect bun.

Featured Links: Follow Ben on LinkedIn and Twitter | Prodify | Ben's book 'Build What Matters: Delivering Key Outcomes with Vision-Led Product Management' | Ben's 'Product Vision and Strategy in the Real World' talk at INDUSTRY Global '22 | Product Vision and Strategy: Part 1 - Ben Foster on The Product Experience

Build What Matters: Delivering Key Outcomes with Vision-Led Product Management

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Vision and strategy in product go hand in hand. In this week's podcast episode we speak to product expert Ben Foster about how to craft these two aspects of product in the real world.

Visit AnswerLab.com/mtp to fill in a form for your chance to win a free ticket to Mind The Product San Francisco 2023. Use promo code mtp to enter!

Featured Links: Follow Ben on LinkedIn and Twitter | Prodify | Ben's book 'Build What Matters: Delivering Key Outcomes with Vision-Led Product Management' | Ben's 'Product Vision and Strategy in the Real World' talk at INDUSTRY Global '22

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After nearly 200 episodes on The Product Experience podcast, and four years of interviewing amazing guests, Lily and Randy decided to take on the topic of product coaching by themselves.

Based on their expertise in coaching and leading product teams, they dive deep into this topic to share insights for anyone who might be coaching curious.

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | BBC Maestro | Out of Owls |

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What is design debt and how do so many teams end up in this conundrum during or after the design phase? In this week's podcast, Bansi Mehta, CEO of Koru UX Design teaches us a lesson on how product teams can work with design teams to recognise, avoid, or even tackle design debt.

Featured Links: Follow Bansi on LinkedIn and Twitter | Koru UX | '5 Practical Tips for PMs to Effectively Manage Design Backlogs' piece by Renuka Savant

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It's not always so easy being green in product management. Listen to our conversation with Amy Wagner, Agile Consultant and Coach, where we discuss permaculture for agile teams and why it's important to inherit a green culture in product.

Visit AnswerLab.com/mtp to fill in a form for your chance to win a free ticket to Mind The Product San Francisco 2023. Use promo code mtp to enter!

Featured Links: Follow Amy on LinkedIn and her website | Perennial | 'What people think building a sustainable internet involves vs what it might actually be' feature by Hannah Smith / The Green Web Foundation | 'Carbon Neutral Roadmaps': Chris Adams on The Product Experience | 'Permaculture Principles' feature by David Holmgren | 'Permaculture Principles' piece by Bill Mollison | The Green Web Foundation

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OKRs here OKRs there. Every product team seems to have an opinion on how effective they are and their best approach to making best use of the metric model. We spoke with OKR expert Sten Pittet, to find out ways on how to get the most out of this goal setting strategy, and discuss where most product people go wrong.

Featured Links: Follow Sten on LinkedIn and Twitter | Tability | Slides from Sten's talk 'OKRs are the new Git' | 'OKRs are hard. But I still love them' feature by Camille Fournier | 'Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results' book by Christina R Wodtke | 'Measure What Matters: The Simple Idea that Drives 10X Growth' book by John Doerr

Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results

Measure What Matters: How Google, Bono, and the Gates Foundation Rock the World with OKRs

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There's a ton of stuff going on in the product and wider workspace today. Tune into our conversation with Esther Weinberg to hear about how product people can deal with company transformation during times of disruption.

Featured Links: Follow Esther on LinkedIn and Twitter | The Ready Zone | Esther's article 'The Power of a Reality Check, Moving from Reactive to Responsive' | Better.com CEO fires 900 employees over Zoom - CNN Business | Work Trend Index Report - Microsoft's latest research on the ways we work

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What are the keys to making a quality product for quality customers? There was no one better to talk with than Lina Zubyte, Head of Quality, at Doodle AG to discuss this. Jump into this quality conversation in this weeks' podcast episode.

Featured Links: Follow Lina on LinkedIn and Twitter | Quality Bits | 'What is quality?' article

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In this weeks' podcast, we jump straight back into our conversation with Lucy Spence where we speak with her about trade-offs in product management.

Featured Links: Follow Lucy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Lucy's page at Medium | Lucy's 'Trade offs' talk at UX Brighton 2022 | Listen to Lucy's part 1 episode her.

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Today on the product experience podcast is all about trade-offs in product. Lucy Spence, Product Director at Appvia talks to us about her unique take on this important aspect of product management.

Featured Links: Follow Lucy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Lucy's page at Medium | Lucy's 'Trade offs' talk at UX Brighton 2022

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What is it like starting a brand new job in product with a shiny new title? How do you approach onboarding and ensure that you have a smooth transition into your new team? Lily and Randy in this podcast episode provide their top tips on getting things off on the right foot.

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | BBC Maestro | Randy's 'Your First 2 Weeks' article at Out Of Owls

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There's a stage in many product interviews where the hiring manager asks you to prepare a presentation. With limited information about the level of detail and the quality of your competition, how are you meant to know what flies and what doesn't?

On this weeks' podcast, we spoke with Edward Biden, Founder of Hustle Badger and former CPO at Future Learn and YunoJuno to guide us through this challenging interview stage.

Featured Links: Follow Ed on LinkedIn and Twitter | Ed's website | Hustle Badger | Ed's JobandTalent interview deck

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Featured Links: Follow Andy on LinkedIn, Twitter and Mastodon | Andy's website | Andy's 'Mind Your Product Language' Speaker Deck from MTP Engage Hamburg 2022 | Buy Andy's book 'Service Design' | Andy's newsletter 'Doctor's Note' | Andy's podcast 'The Power of Ten'

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Some of the most successful people we know credit their mentors for making the difference in their careers. We’ve recently heard great talks from the likes of Barry O’Reilly, Marty Cagan, and Gibson Biddle where they talk about having a ‘personal Board of Directors’. But how do you go about getting a mentor and getting the most out of the relationship? We asked Devaris Brown to join us on the podcast to mentor us in the art of mentoring.

Featured Links: Follow DeVaris on LinkedIn, Twitter and his website | Meroxa | 'Networking for Introverts' feature at People Of Colour In Tech | DeVaris's 'Using Playbooks to Drive Innovation' talk at Shift Dev 2019 Conference | 'Do You Need a Coach, a Mentor, or a Therapist?' piece at The Institute of You

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With 2023 just around the corner, product managers have been spending the last few weeks looking at their OKRs and thinking about the direction of their product. To help us better comprehend product strategy and direction, we spoke with Product Leader, Chiedza Muguti to discuss making your product strategy come alive. Let's jump right in!

Featured Links: Follow Chiedza on LinkedIn and Twitter | Alteos | 'Giving direction in product with Janna Bastow, Chiedza Muguti, and Nacho Bassino' feature at Mind The Product

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New products get tested and brought to market every day across different scales and sectors. What are the most essential go-to-market keys to make a product launch successful?

There was no one better to discuss this with than Lea Hickman, now Partner at Silicon Valley Product Group—who played a crucial part in introducing Adobe's subscription model for the creative cloud—joins us on the podcast to discuss bringing products to market.

Featured Links: Follow Lea on LinkedIn and Twitter | Silicon Valley Product Group | Marketecture definition | Martina Lauchengco's book 'Loved: How to Rethink Marketing for Tech Products'

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Featured Links: Follow Marty on LinkedIn and Twitter | Silicon Valley Product Group | Coaching - Managing Time article at SVPG | Two in a Box PM article at SVPG | Shreyas Doshi on Twitter | How to run a Project Premortem Exercise with your Team feature at Atlassian

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Product innovation can get more challenging with the multiple layers of management you have to deal with in larger organisations. How can product managers channel their inner creative thoughts while collaborating effectively in large organisations? There was no one better to ask than Daniel Elizalde, Author of B2B Innovator’s Map, who had all of the answers about B2B product management, innovation in enterprises, and much, much, more.

Featured Links: Follow Daniel on LinkedIn and Twitter | Daniel's website | Daniel's B2B Innovator's Map | Daniel's previous episode on The Product Experience 'The Internet of Things'

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Featured Links: Follow Esha on LinkedIn and Twitter | Meta | WhatsApp

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On this weeks' podcast episode, we welcomed the man who needs no introduction...Marty Cagan, Founder and Party of SVPG , and Author of ”Inspired” and “Empowered” delved into a plethora of topics including strategy, vision, ethics, and ways of working. We struggled to fit so much product wisdom into one episode, so we decided to split it into two parts! Sit back, grab a drink, and listen to some of the wisest words of wisdom in product.

Featured Links: Follow Marty on LinkedIn and Twitter | Silicon Valley Product Group | Coaching - Managing Time article at SVPG | Two in a Box PM article at SVPG | Shreyas Doshi on Twitter | How to run a Project Premortem Exercise with your Team feature at Atlassian

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Rerun: We learn something from every guest that joins us on the podcast, but it’s not that often that something they say makes it onto our wall. Dave Martin (co-founder of Right to Left) chatted with us about building great habits for product people, and how to make sure they stick. He also tells us about his simple question to ask at the end of every week – something that’s already made a difference to the way we work!

Featured Links: Follow Dave on LinkedIn and Twitter | RightToLeft | Marty Cagan's books 'Inspired: How To Create Tech Products Customers Love' and 'Empowered: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Products' | Professor Alison Wolf on 'Not Accepting Good Enough' video | Gallup's book 'First, Break All The Rules: What The World's Greatest Managers Do Differently'

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Lily and Randy in this special episode, take a trip down memory lane to have a chat about the best Roadmap insights they've heard from a range of product episodes on the podcast over the past year. Tune in to listen to actionable insights from Philips Nwachukwu, Janice Fraser, Maahir Shah, and more!

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Roadmaps features atMind The Product | Guests included in this episode: Maggie Crowley, Philips Nwachukwu, Alexander Hipp, Kausambi Manjita, Storm Fagan, Roisi Proven, Ha Phan, Anthony Marter, Christian Crumlish, Maahir Shah, Cassidy Fein, Janice Fraser, and Petra Wille

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What is the art and science behind a global music platform like Spotify nailing its algorithms to ensure that all users get the exact results that users want when using the search bar? On this week's podcast, Lily and Randy sat down with Jonny Brooks-Bartlett, Senior Machine Learning Engineer at Spotify, to discuss this process, and much, much more!

Featured Links: Follow Jonny on LinkedIn and Twitter | Jonny on Medium | Seth Stephens-Davidowitz's book 'Everybody Lies: Big Data, New data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are' | Reinforcement Learning at GeeksforGeeks

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This week on the podcast experience, we're talking all about churn. How do you reduce customer churn. What are the biggest obstacles? What are the biggest challenges? And are there any misconceptions behind the perfect churn strategy? Churn expert, Andrew Michael, CEO of Avrio, was able to answer all of our questions with ease and more.

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What makes a great manager and what are the most important factors in making the leap to leading a team? In this weeks' podcast episode, Lily and Randy were joined by the amazing Melike Hope, Product Director at Twitter, to talk all about managing product managers and scaling up your career ladder.

Featured Links: Follow Melika on LinkedIn and Twitter | Melika's IC to Manager video | 'How to be a great manager' - Claire Lew on The Product Experience

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This week's episode on The Product Experience is going to sound a little different...

Lily and Randy in this special episode, take a trip down memory lane to have a chat about the best OKRs insights they've heard from a range of product episodes on the podcast over the past year. Tune in to listen to actionable insights from Storm Fagan, Todd Olsen, Petra Wille, and more!

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | OKRs features at Mind The Product | Listen to this podcast on Youtube! | Guests included in this episode: Storm Fagan, Todd Olson, Petra Wille, Nicholas Jemetta, Kausambi Manjita, Roisi Proven, Janice Fraser, and Jason Knight.

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What is The Metaverse and how can it helps product managers in their daily craft? To help us make sense of the movement, Lily and Randy talked with Mitchell Bayer-Goldman to help us unpack all of the buzzwords and complexities about The Metaverse, and why us as product managers should note of where the concept is going. Bonus points for how many times we mention the word "Metaverse"!

Featured Links: Follow Mitchell on LinkedIn and Twitter | Volta | Matthew Ball on The Metaverse |

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What are the most important factors when a organisation decides to adopt a product-led growth approach? On this weeks' podcast episode, we spoke with Executive Product Coach, Noa Ganot all about how to do this the right way and pitfalls to avoid.

Featured Links: Follow Noa on LinkedIn and her website | Noa's Infinity Product Leadership Academy on LinkedIn | Noa's 'Deep Product' blog | Product-led Certification Course by Pendo and Mind the Product

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It can be tough, even at the best of times, to remain engaged at work – to find a community of people to share with and learn from. Emily Webber’s seen this in action and has started (and nurtured) successful communities both at work and at home. In this rerun podcast episode, she joined Lily and Randy to go deeper into how to build great communities with remote teams.

Featured Links: Follow Emily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Emily's Blog | Tacit | Read Emily's book 'Building Successful Communities of Practise: Discover How Connecting People Makes Better Organisations' | In The Ether has all the details on how to run a great virtual lean coffee | The Diversity Charter | Sharon Bowman's book 'Training From The Back Of The Room!' | Robin Dunbar's Social Circles feature in The Guardian | Emily and Robin's joint research paper 'The Fractal Study of Communities of Practise: Implications for Business Organisation'

Training From the Back of the Room!: 65 Ways to Step Aside and Let Them Learn

Building Successful Communities of Practice

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It's a common saying that 'ego is the biggest product killer'. In this weeks' podcast episode, CPO at R-Zero, Tony Poon, delves into a discussion with Lily and Randy about how to ensure that your ego doesn't get in the way of discovering and managing the best products.

Featured Links: Follow Tony on LinkedIn and Twitter | R-Zero | Understanding the Id, Ego, and Superego in Psychology

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This week on The Product Experience the topic of choice was product discovery. However, with both of our hosts having worked extensively in this subject area before, they decided to hijack this episode and take on the topic all to themselves...

For this special episode, Randy Silver and Lily Smith share their best tips on customer interaction and product discovery from their combined product knowledge, years of working in discovery, and being involved in over 170 episodes interviewing product experts around the globe.

Featured Links: Follow Randy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Out of Owls | Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Bower Collective | Product Discovery page at Mind The Product

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We all know what OKRs are. Most of us use them or have tried to at some point. But it’s a much smaller group that have used OKRs well, and for their intended purpose. Natalija Hellesoe, co-author of OKRs at the Center, joins us on the podcast to chat about taking your practice to the [...] Read more »

Follow Natalija on LinkedIn and Twitter | OKRs at the Centre website | Natalija's virtual meet up group for OKR practitioners | 'What is an OKR? Definition and examples' What Matters feature

The post Putting OKRs at the Centre – Natalija Hellesoe on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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It seems like everyone on the product scene is about launching brand new products in large organisations, however, we speak with Ben Sehl, Senior Product Lead from Shopify to find out key things to do this in the most effective way.

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We jump right back into where we left on in part two of this series with experience product coach Itamar Gilad. We carry on discussing evidence-based decisions, and how this approach can enable teams to achieve key product goals.

Featured Links: Follow Itamar on LinkedIn and Twitter | Itamar's website | 'Idea Prioritization with ICE and the Confidence Meter' piece | Sign up for Itamar's newsletter

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In part one of two of this podcast series, we spoke with experienced product expert Itamar Gilad to find out more about evidence-based decisions, ideas, and key product goals.

Featured Links: Follow Itamar on LinkedIn and Twitter | Itamar's website | 'Idea Prioritization with ICE and the Confidence Meter' piece | Sign up for Itamar's newsletter

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We all know what product design is but what does inclusive design, and why does it need to be a priority for product managers? On this week's podcast, we were joined by Saielle DaSilver, Director of User Experience at Cazoo to talk all about designing products for people who might face limitations when using your product.

Featured Links: Follow Saielle on LinkedIn and Twitter | Saielle's website Blossom | Kat Holmes' talk 'Design for 7 Billion. Design for One' | Kat Holmes' Inclusive Toolkit | Kat
Holmes' book 'Mismatch' | 'What is Inclusive Design? Principles and Examples' by Justin Morales | Help Saielle with Gender Transition

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We all know what product design is but what does inclusive design, and why does it need to be a priority for product managers? On this week's podcast, we were joined by Saielle DaSilver, Director of User Experience at Cazoo to talk all about designing products for people who might face limitations when using your product.

Featured Links: Follow Saielle on LinkedIn and Twitter | Saielle's website Blossom | Kat Holmes' talk 'Design for 7 Billion. Design for One' | Kat Holmes' Inclusive Toolkit | Kat
Holmes' book 'Mismatch' | 'What is Inclusive Design? Principles and Examples' by Justin Morales | Help Saielle with Gender Transition

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What's it like launching new products within a big organisation like Ocado? In this weeks' podcast Lily and Randy sat down with Hannah Gibson, Chief Product Officer at Ocado Technology to discuss her experiences in product management over the past 10 years at her organisation, and the key lessons learned from launching a new product inside a much bigger establishment.

Featured Links: Follow Hannah on LinkedIn and Twitter | Work with Hannah! | Ocado

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How can product managers get more work done by doing less? On this weeks’ podcast, we spoke with Jim Morris, Founder of The Product Discovery Team about the benefits of having a team-led approach to research, and how that can be an effective way to collaborate effectively and improve your product over time.

Featured Links: Follow Jim on LinkedIn and Twitter | Product Discovery Group | Watch 'The Trident Principle' advert | 'Discovery Team models' feature at Mind The Product

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What is the secret to succeeding in the product management craft? In this podcast episode, we were joined by Enterprising Senior Product Manager, Ronke Majekodunmi to discuss how building relationships are a key asset to developing your product career, and how to master the art of developing alliances.

Featured Links: Follow Ronke on LinkedIn and Twitter | Ronke's website | Ronke's podcast Product Magic | Emily Webber's free eBook 'The Team Onion'

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In this weeks' podcast, we jump straight back into our chat with Daniel Harris about customer-centricity and developing that mindset in product management. Let's get straight back to the chat! Go check out part one of this conversation if you missed it.

Featured Links: Follow Daniel on LinkedIn and Twitter | 'The State of Customer Centricty' model at CX Partners | 'Developing a Customer Centric Mindset' talk by Amon Kiplagat at Mind The Product ProductTank Birmingham

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Customer centricity is about bringing the human dimension to everything that you do with your product. To create that process, you need to create an environment where product managers can innovate and thrive. Daniel Harris, Experience Strategy Director at cxpartners joins us on the podcast to talk all about how to deliver that great customer experience to all who invest if your product.

Featured Links: Follow Daniel on LinkedIn and Twitter | 'The State of Customer Centricty' model at CX Partners | 'Developing a Customer Centric Mindset' talk by Amon Kiplagat at Mind The Product ProductTank Birmingham

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Matt Walton was one of the founders of FutureLearn, where he scaled the product team and organisation from nothing to the significant player in online education that it is today. Along the way, he learned a lot about continuous improvement of both the product and the processes for building it – including the use of four different types of retrospectives. He joins us on the podcast to level up our retro game.

Featured Links: Follow Matt on LinkedIn and Twitter | Matt's website | Matt's Mind The Product talk 'Be in a Band, not an Orchestra: how to grow an Agile Product Team' | Funretrospective's 'The Retrospective Prime Directive' | Management tools at 15Five and Trello

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What does a good Hypothesis look like in product and what does it include? In this weeks' podcast episode, Lily and Randy say down with Mark Tsirekas, VP of Product at ZOE to discuss both the scientific and the non-scientific methods behind hypothesis and testing.

Featured Links: Follow Mark on LinkedIn and Twitter | Zoe are hiring - work with Mark! | Mark's website MTsireud

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Experienced product manager and technology expert Rick Klau, currently California's Chief Technology Innovation Officer sat down with Lily and Randy on the podcast this week to discuss innovation in government throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. They also had time to share insights on OKRs and frameworks in product management.

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On this week's podcast, we speak to Lily Smith, Head of Product and Gro....wait...that name sounds familiar?

For this special episode on the podcast experience, we decided to turn the tables and interview our very own podcast host, Lily Smith, Head of Product Growth at Bower Collective.

With her many years of experience working in product management as well as listening to key insights from product experts over the last 2 years on the Product Experience, she discusses what it takes to be a great Product Manager along with Product Leader and fellow Podcaster, Jason Knight.

Featured Links: Follow Lily on LinkedIn and Twitter | Join the refill revolution at Bower Collective | Follow Jason on LinkedIn and Twitter | Jason's podcast 'One Knight in Product'

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What it's like to join a new company and set up a new product from the start. On this weeks' podcast, we spoke to Maggie Crowley all about her experiences during this process. We also had some time to discuss hypotheses and testing in product.

Featured Links: Follow Maggie on LinkedIn and Twitter | Work with Maggie at Charlie Health | 'Build With Maggie Crowley' podcast

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In recent years the Fintech industry has exploded with many product managers delving into this fast-growing sector. However, what would it be like to pack up all of your things and land a Fintech job in a completely new continent? On this week's podcast, we spoke with. Makera Kigarada, Principal Product Manager at Fintech start-up M-KOPA to hear about how he got started in the new market as a product manager, and his key lessons learned so far.

Featured Links: Follow Makera on LinkedIn and Twitter | M-KOPA | TechCrunch piece on African Fintech growth | Economist feature on mobile phone boom in Africa

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What is an OODA loop and how can it be used in product management? OODA stands for observe, orient, decide, and act. In this week's podcast, Kausambi Manjita, Co-Founder and CEO of Mason joins us to talk all about this military concept and how it has been a useful asset in building products and scaling a SaaS business.

Featured Links: Follow Kausambi on LinkedIn and Twitter | Mason - the content platform for eCommerce teams | The Ultimate Guide to the OODA Loop | Canva

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In this episode of The Product Experience, Todd Olson, co-founder and CEO of Pendo, reveals how he climbed the leadership ladder and shares his advice for anyone keen to do the same.

Featured Links: Follow Todd on LinkedIn and Twitter | Pendo - The Product-Led Organization Digital Workshop | Todd's book 'The Product-Led Organization' | Patrick Thean's book 'Rhythm - How to Achieve Breakthrough Execution and Accelerate Growth' |'Inside the Tornado' book by Geoffrey A. Moore | Jobs at Pendo

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If a product manager is doing their job really well, they will be invisible and the results will speak for themselves. In this rebroadcasted podcast episode, product coach, consultant, and author speaks with Lily and Randy about the product management craft and how the best product managers do their job really well.

Listener of The Product Experience? We need your help! Fill out this short survey to help us improve the overall experience of our community-led podcast.

Featured Links: Follow Matt on LinkedIn and Twitter | Matt's Website | One Page / One Hour | Sudden Compass | Matt's book 'Product Management in Practise'

Product Management in Practice: A Real-World Guide to the Key Connective Role of the 21st Century

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What is the secret to exponential product growth? Daphne Tideman, growth coach joins us on the podcast this week to talk all about how Product/market fit, the importance of business/channel models, and where companies go wrong when looking to grow their products.

Listener of The Product Experience? We need your help! Fill out this short survey to help us improve the overall experience of our community-led podcast.

Featured Links: Follow Daphne on LinkedIn and Twitter | Daphne's book 'Growing Happy Clients' | Read Daphne's articles on Medium | Reid Hoffman 'Blitzscaling' book | 'Thriving In Hypergrowth' - Cassidy Fein on The Product Experience

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If used well, machine learning (ML) can be a key tool to gain the most effective data about your users. However, how do you conclude if it's the right approach for your product and teams? We spoke with Ha Phan, Director of Discovery Products at Pluralsight, to develop a stronger understanding of how we can best use ML in product management.

Featured Links: Follow Ha on LinkedIn and Twitter | Not Hotdog on the App Store | 'A thank you letter to my team' article by Ha Phan

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Releasing new products and features are a routine part of a product manager's craft. But what are the keys to a successful product launch, and how do you make sure you have all the right components upon release? We spoke to launch expert, Derek Osgood, to gain all of the key insights.

Featured Links: Follow Derek on LinkedIn and Twitter | Derek's website | Ignition - The first dedicated GTM platform for PMMs | 'Critical Customer Touchpoints for a Successful Product Launch' feature at Mind The Product

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Since January 2020, Fintech growth has been off the charts. The industry has seen a 337% increase in active users and is only predicted to grow further. We spoke with Deepika Adusumilli, Product Manager at HSBC Retail Banking and Wealth Management to hear more about what it's like to have a product role in this fast-growing sector.

Featured Links: Follow Deepika on LinkedIn and Twitter | King Games | The Definitive Guide to Fintech Ecosystems | Forbes '10 Ways Fintechs are Using Experience Design to Outcompete Banking'

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Product people wear lots of hats - but sometimes we want to swap from one role to another. Author, Consultant, Product lead and recovering-UXer Christian Crumlish joined us on the podcast to talk about why someone might want to move from UX to Product Management, what superpowers they bring to the role, and the biggest surprises they might have.

Featured Links: Follow Christian on LinkedIn and Twitter | Christian's website | Buy Christian's book 'Product Management for UX People' | Design in Product | CA Gov Covid project

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Roisi Proven's last episode was one of our most popular, so we had to have her back for a return chat! She updates us on what she's learned about data ethics and unbiased data sets as Director of Product for Altmetric, and on the horrible story she made up that came true.

Featured Links: Follow Roisi on LinkedIn and Twitter | Altmetric | Roisi's previous episode 'The Black Mirror Test' on The Product Experience | The 6 most common types of bias when working with data

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Figuring out what to prioritise is one of a product team's biggest challenges. Using a North Star metric to orient around can make it easier - but, as Maahir Shah (Product Manager at Facebook) tells us, it can also lead you in the wrong direction. He joined us on the podcast to talk about how to take your use of metrics to the next level.

Featured Links: Follow Maahir on LinkedIn and Twitter | Maahir's blog | Definition of Exit Criteria | 'How I got my job in Product' piece by Maahir at Mind The Product

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Most of our time as product people is spent trying to figure out how to improve things. Every once in a while, we find ourselves where everything seems to work and we're growing like crazy. Congratulations: you're in Hypergrowth. And while it sounds amazing (and can be), it comes with a separate and unque set of challenges. We talked with Casssidy Fein, Vimeo Director of Product Management, about how to navigate this evironment.

Featured Links: Follow Cassidy on LinkedIn and Twitter | Cassidy's website | Harvard Business Review article on Blitzscaling | Work with Cassidy! She's hiring at Vimeo

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Product people are charged with representing the needs of the customer as well as the needs of the business—but what happens when these are in conflict? We asked ethics consultant Cennydd Bowles to chat with us about how to handle some tricky situations in product.

Featured Links: Follow Cennydd on LinkedIn and Twitter | Cennydd's website | NowNext Studio | 'What is the Gini Coefficient?' piece at CFI | Cennydd's book 'Future Ethics: the must read guide to the ethics of emerging technology'

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Making your roadmap work hard for you is one of the critical skills of a Product Manager. Find out how Jeremy Levy, CEO of Indicative, leverages customer data to inform his product roadmap. In this episode we also discuss who should be responsible for the data strategy in the business and why it's so much easier to get it right these days.

Featured Links: Follow Jeremy on LinkedIn and Twitter | mParticle | INDOCHINO case study at Indicative | Jeremy's 'Analytics are the key to optimising the product roadmap' feature at Mind The Product

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After over three years on The Product Experience, we have reached our 150th episode! With so many amazing guests and countless memorable moments, we reckon it's a landmark worth celebrating!

In this compilation episode on the podcast, we look back at the highlights from some of our favourite shows. Tune in to listen to the best moments from our conversations with guests like Melissa Perri, Josh Seiden, Gabrielle Bufrem, and more!

Episodes included in the compilation: Outcomes Over Outputs – Josh Seiden | The Black Mirror Test – Roisi Proven | Roadmaps Are Dead. Long Live Roadmaps! – Janna Bastow| How To Say No – Gabrielle Bufrem | The ABCs of Product - Melissa Perri

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We've run a number of podcast episodes about product discovery because it's one of the hardest things to get right. Even the most experienced product people find it hard to avoid common mistakes. This week, product coach and consultant Anthony Marter joins us on the podcast to chat about the tricky balance between strategy, business case, and discovery.

Featured Links: Follow Anthony on LinkedIn and Twitter | Product Aotearoa | Teresa Torres on 'What Roles are Represented in a Product Trio?'| Marty Cagan on 'The Four Big Risks' | John Cutler on 'The (Messy) Shift to Starting Together'

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There's a huge shift that takes place when you move from managing a product (with a team) to leading a Product Team. It's not just a change in how you spend your day - it's a whole new outlook, with a focus on different skills and competencies. Jason Knight joined us on the podcast to talk about some of the lessons he's learned along his journey.

Featured Links: Follow Jason on LinkedIn and Twitter | Jason's podcast One Knight in Product | Jason's 'Moving from Individual Contributor to Product Leader' article

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Philips Nwachukwu, a Senior Product Manager at The Bulb Africa, joins us on the podcast this week to talk about how he transitioned from a jack-of-all-trades to starting a Product Operations function, as well as the unique challenges he sees for Product people working in Africa.

Featured Links: Follow Philips on LinkedIn and Twitter | Practical Product's 'State of Product Management in Africa' report | Punch article on the trust deficit in Nigeria

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If the last coupleof years has taught us anything, it’s that predicting the future is hard. In this podcast episode, sponsored by Amplitude, we turn to Margaret Heffernan to learn how to do it better. She’s a captivating speaker with more than 12 million views of her TED talks and a prolific writer who recently published Uncharted: How To Map The Future – if she can’t help, there’s no hope!

Featured Links: Follow Margaret on LinkedIn and Twitter | Margaret's Website | Margaret's page at TED | Margaret's latest book 'Uncharted: How to Map the Future'

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If you're the kind of person that listens to the Product Experience and reads articles on MTP, then you're already familiar with any number of frameworks, methodologies and principles to make you a better product manager. But knowing them isn't enough to do the job — or, at least, not to do it well. Figuring out what works for you is way more important. That's something we discussed with Esha Shukla, Product Manager at WhatsApp, for this week's podcast - she's spent the last few years refining her approach to 5 solid principles that really work.

Featured Links: Follow Esha on LinkedIn and Twitter | Meta | WhatsApp

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Ashley Smith has a long career of helping early-stage startups scale into successful organisations. In this episode, Ashley talks to our hosts about product-led growth, and how everyone can and should do it.

Featured Links: Follow Ashley on LinkedIn and Twitter | OpenView Partners Product-Led Growth Index

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One great product person can do some amazing things. An entire team of great product people is a force multiplier, creating an environment that is far more than the sum of its parts. We talked with Petra Wille - Coach, Author & co-creator of MTP Engage/Hamburg - about what it takes to 10x your team.

Featured Links: Follow Petra on LinkedIn and Twitter | Petra's website: Strong Product People | The PM wheel Framework | Buy Petra's book 'Strong Product People' |'A Better Shipyard' - Joff Redfern on The Product Experience

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Product people have a tendency to solutions—we're enlightened enough to know better, but we always need to resist the urge to try and fix every problem we come across. That's an especially hard challenge when the problems are internal. Keeping on top of your mental wellbeing is critical, so we talked with Nicholas Jemetta about how to take of yourself (as well as the rest of your team).

Featured Links: Follow Nick on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram | 'Fancy Dress Dad' - Nick's lockdown story on the BBC | Donate to Nick's 'Fancy Dress Dad' Mental Health UK JustGiving page | Joe Wicks' The Body Coach

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Guido Lonetti’s career started out at age 14 in his bedroom – he built an MP3 search engine website that immediately started making money until his parents quashed that idea! In this episode, he shines a light on the diverse product culture in South and Latin America, where he’s spent time as a Head of Product and the co-organiser of ProductTank Buenos Aires.

Featured Links: Follow Guido on LinkedIn and Medium | Biggest Product Management cultures in South and Latin America: Marketplace and Travel | Startups: Mural and Tiendanube | New companies: Nubank and Rappi

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At some point, virtually every product person has had a run in with their CEO and thought to themselves, "Hey, I could do a better job than they do. Maybe I should start my own thing." Most of us then think about all the things we'd have to take on (or about the lack of a steady paycheck) and decide to keep working for others.

But some of us don't - we hand in our notice and follow the dream of starting something new. This week, we talked to Alexander Hipp - co-founder of Beyond, formerly of Xing and N26 - about why he made the decision, what it's been like so far, and what he'd advise anyone making a similar decision.

Featured Links: Follow Alexander on LinkedIn and Twitter | Beyond - a community platform for Creators | The PM Library - be part of the first social book library for the Tech and Startup industry | Eco-friendly products at Riptide

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One of the biggest challenges of working in product is figuring out what story we're trying to tell, and bringing everyone on board with that story. On this week's podcast, we talked with Janice Fraser about ensuring that the story you're telling is rooted in truth—and all of the things that can get in the way.

Featured Links: Follow Janice on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram | Janice's Website | Janice's piece and talk on 'Uncovering the Truth' at Mind The Product

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OKRs are a simple concept — but deceptively hard to get right. There's an awful lot of horror stories about implementations gone wrong, along with any number of gurus and guides on how to get it right. Storm Fagan — now the Chief Product Officer at the BBC, formerly at JustEat — joined us on the podcast to break down how she made OKRs scale at a big company by keeping them simple. (Hint: that wasn't her first approach.)

Featured Links: Follow Storm on LinkedIn and Twitter | Just Eat | Work with Storm at the BBC | 'How to Write OKRs That Don't Suck' MTP piece by Adrian Howard

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Just when you've finally convinced everyone to work mobile-first, the world goes multimodal. If you're not already working on how you might need to plan for voice interaction and conversation design, physical interaction, and even augmented reality, don't worry - you'renot alone. We sat down with Cheryl Platz (author, and now Director of UX, Player Platform for Riot Games) to learn how to adapt our products.

Featured Links: Follow Cheryl on LinkedIn and Twitter | Cheryl's Website | Cheryl's book 'Design Beyond Devices: Creating Multimodal, Cross-Device Experiences' | Capturing Customer Context - free downloadable worksheets | 'How Calm Technology Can Help Us Be More Human' talk by Amber Case

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We initially ran this episode back in May, but that was before Frances Haugen came forward as the Facebook whistleblower. Our guest, Columbia University sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh, worked in the same area of Facebook as Haugen (civic integrity), albeit years earlier; he also held a similar role at Twitter. We asked him to join us on the podcast to help understand how product people can do great things without fundamentally breaking the internet.

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We've talked about avoiding and escaping feature factories a number of times—but how do you take the next step, to become an outcome-driven product organisation? Becky Flint, CEO at Dragonboat, was able to provide all of the answers — after all, she built the product portfolio organisations at Paypal, Shutterfly, and others.

Featured Links: Follow Becky on LinkedIn and Twitter | Dragonboat | 'Outcomes Over Outputs' - Josh Seiden on The Product Experience | 'Another Side of the Rocks, Pebbles and Sand Story' piece by Aditya Kothadiya | Dragonboat is hiring - work with Becky

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Evolving your organisation from a feature factory to becoming outcome-focused is a challenge many of us have faced - but how do you actually do it? Impact Mapping is a great way to help take stakeholders and teams from focusing on the how-to the what and why. We asked consultant, trainer and author Tim Herbig to give us the crash course on the topic, including how to get people to understand the difference between an Impact, an Output, and an Outcome.

Featured Links: Follow Tim on LinkedIn and Twitter | Tim's Website | Read Tim's 'Using Impact Mapping to Navigate Product Discovery' piece | 'Idea Prioritization with ICE and the Confidence Meter' by Itamar Gilad | Gojko Adzic's book 'Impact Mapping: Making a Big Impact with Software Products and Projects'

Impact Mapping: Making a Big Impact with Software Products and Projects

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Why do good people make bad products? You know the feeling: you're trying to complete a transaction on someone else's site or app,and it Just. Does. Not. Work. You wonder who the poor product manager is for it - or if there even is one. And then you remember the last time you sat in on customer support calls, and how hard your own product can be to use.

How does this happen? We chatted with Rachel Obstler, Heap's VP of Product, to understand how we can use metrics to suck less.

Featured Links: Follow Rachel on LinkedIn and Twitter | Heap | 'Why Every UX Designer Should Be a Data Analyst' Modus article

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Back in the dark ages of web design — back when the job title Webmaster was a thing — every team included someone who specialised in Information Architecture (IA). These days, that work is often considered to be part of UX, but that can mean that we're not doing the job well enough. Abby Covert joins us on the podcast to chat about why IA is important, how and when we should work with Information Architects, and how you can incorporate the principles and lessons from the discipline into your work.

Featured Links: Follow Abby on LinkedIn and Twitter | Abby's Website | Abby's first book 'How To Make Sense Of Any Mess: Information Architecture For Everybody' | Pre-order Abby's forthcoming book 'Stuck: The Purpose, Process And Craft Of Diagramming' | Max Cohn's 'Karl Marx Visits The Cheesecake Factory'| IHOP's omelette pancake batter secret feature at Huffington Post

How to Make Sense of Any Mess: Information Architecture for Everybody

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We always encourage people to experiment with their product development techniques - but experimenting with your team can be a step too far. We talked with Monzo Chief Product Officer Mike Hudack (ex-Facebook, Deliveroo) about how he approaches this: what's worked and what hasn't, avoiding cross-team dependencies, communication & collaboration, and much more.

Featured Links: Follow Mike on LinkedIn and Twitter | Molly Graham's 'Give Away Your Legos' and Other Commandments for Scaling Startups Blog | Work with Mike at Monzo - he's hiring!

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We've all had the experience of presenting to the leadership team - but what do they say about you when you leave the room? What's it like to work at that level? And how do you get promoted to the C-suite?

We talked with experienced product & boardroom vet Tanya Cordrey about all of this - and much more - for this week's podcast.

Featured Links: Follow Tanya on LinkedIn and Twitter | Jörg Malang Five Ways of Becoming a Respected Product Leader in the C-Suite | The Guardian

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When we sat down with Roll20.net Product Director Kenton Hanson for this week's podcast, we were hoping to hear tales of how he and his product team (or band of adventurers!) went on quests to conduct user research. We wanted to hear about dodging orcs and dragons (stakeholders) while collecting treasure (insights).

Instead, we learned that it's only Roll20's marketing team that cast spells. But we also learned a lot about conducting research for such a large, passionate community, qualifying candidates, sharing learnings, and much more.

Featured Links: Follow Kenton on LinkedIn and Twitter | Kenton's Website | Roll20 | Patrick Lencioni's teamwork system The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team | Erika Hall's book Just Enough Research

Give Sprig a try for free by visiting Sprig.com to build better products.

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We all want more customers - but being able to understand who your best customer segments are, prioritise for them, and then land more of them? That's a game-changer. We talked with Tamara Grominsky (Unbounce's VP of Strategy) about some easy-to-implement techniques that will help you do just that.

Featured Links: Follow Tamara on LinkedIn and Twitter | Tamara's Website | Unbounce Segmentation Presentation | Strategyzer's canvas: How to Capture Customer Jobs, Pains, & Gains that aren't Subjective | Forbes' Guide to the Van Westendorp Pricing Model | Profitwell's Patrick Campbell wrote about Pricing for Bottom Line Growth

Give Sprig a try for free by visiting Sprig.com to build better products.

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There's nothing more useless to a Product team than a big backlog. Bringing backlogs to life - making them usable, relevant, and getting value from them - is something that transforms ordinary teams into extraordinary ones. To guide us on how to do that, we asked Jeff Patton - creator of User Story Mapping - to join us on the podcast.

Featured Links: Follow Jeff on LinkedIn and Twitter | Jeff's upcoming Training Sessions | Buy Jeff's book 'User Story Mapping' | Alistair Cockburn's book 'Writing Effective Use Cases'

Give UserLeap a try for free by visiting UserLeap.com to build better products.

User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product

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There's no better training ground than working in Emergency Services for learning how to deal with stress, uncertainty, prioritisaton with imperfect information, and challenging stakeholders - all skills that are key to working in Product. Nathan Henry joins on the podcast this week to chat about how he levereges the skills he developed as a 911 Operator.

Featured Links: Follow Nathan on LinkedIn and Twitter | Brené Brown's 'Rising Strong' book | Work with Nathan at Postlight | A day in the life of a 911 Dispatcher video

Give UserLeap a try for free by visiting UserLeap.com to build better products.

Rising Strong: The Reckoning. The Rumble. The Revolution.

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As product people, it's important for us to love our products, our customers, and the problems we're trying to solve. (though not in that order!). A lot of the time, though, we're not really working on something truly important.

That's not the case for Randeep Sidhu—he got a call to help rescue the UK's Covid-19 app, dropped everything, and dove in. In this episode sponsored by UserLeap, he joined us on the podcast to talk about what that was like, what he learned, and how he built a team and re-launched the product in just 6 weeks.

Featured Links: Follow Randeep on LinkedIn and Twitter｜NHS Covid-19 App | Gov.UK NHS Covid-19 App Privacy Notice | Understanding the Impact of Covid-19 on BAME Groups NHS Data Report

Give UserLeap a try for free by visiting UserLeap.com to build better products.

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Over the last 15 years, Merissa has gone from New York media to Australian finance to German fintechs - with a number of stops in between. She joins us on the podcast to talk about what she's learned along the way, including:

from working in different cultures & industries,
influencing executives,
knowing if you want to be a people manager, and more!

Featured Links: Follow Merissa on LinkedIn and Twitter｜Merissa's article 'Bringing product thinking to any team' | Merissa's article 'How to win at remote product management - Covid 19 edition' | Merissa's article 'Experiment like a boss' | Merissa's New Feature Template form | Roman Pichler's Decision Making Chart | Ken Norton's blog post, 'It's time to fight for a dual product management career path'

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What holds most Product people back? Hint: it's not ability. For this week's podcast, we talked with Martina Hodges-Schell and Teresa Leighty about how to make changes in your company's environment that actually work, for you, and your teams.

Featured Links: Follow Martina on LinkedIn, Twitter & her Website｜Follow Teresa on LinkedIn and Twitter | Heath & Sea | John Chambers article 'The key to business transformation? Empowering your people'

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Understanding your company's business model is a key skill for all product people - but understanding how that affects your company's valuation is what takes things to the next level. What are you maximizing for - and how does your pricing model impact that? We talked with Giff Constable (ex-Chief Product Officer, Meetup) about all this - and much more - for this week's podcast episode.

Featured Links: Follow Giff on Twitter and LinkedIn｜Giff's Website | Buy Giff's book Talking to Humans | Buy Giff's book Testing with Humans | Giff's Sci-Fi novel Becoming Monday | 7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy book by Hamilton Helmer

Testing with Humans: How to use experiments to drive faster, more informed decision making.

7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy

Talking to Humans: Success starts with understanding your customers

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We all know that solving your customer's problem - in a way that's feasible, viable and usable - is the key to a product's success. (Or one of them, anyway!) Inherent in that is clearly understanding your users, and their peoblems. We talked with Peter Yang (Product Lead @ Reddit) about understanding the needs and mindsets of creators, and how to build products for them.

Featured Links: Follow Peter on LinkedIn and Twitter｜Creator Economy｜Build for Creators Course | Buy Peter's book 'Principles of Product Management' | Rob Fitzpatrick's book 'The Mom Test'

The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you

Principles of Product Management: How to Land a PM Job and Launch Your Product Career

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Want to make a veteran product person sad? Just ask them how they've used MVPs in the past. Once you get past the sobbing, you're likely to get stories of the myriad ways that a perfectly good experiment got turned into a v1 release.

It doesn't have to be like that! Dan Olsen joins us on the podcast to teach Lily & Randy how to actually control the scope of an MVP, guide us through some of his favourites, and why MVP failure can be considered a success.

Featured Links: Follow Dan on LinkedIn, Twitter and his Website｜Read Dan's The Lean Product Playbook｜Types of MVPs | Lean Product Meetup | The original MVP article How to successfully validate your idea with a Landing Page MVP - and the follow-up,four days later,|A Landing Page is NOT an MVP | Aaron Walter's book Designing for Emotion

The Lean Product Playbook: How to Innovate with Minimum Viable Products and Rapid Customer Feedback

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You've optimised your product to solve a problem for your users. You've refined the sales funnel, built for scale, and made sure that accessability is baked in from the start. Great job!

But what about ensuring that your customers can trust it? We talked with Nathan Kinch, an Entrepreneur & Digital Trust Expert, about the big picture - and how you can get started on it, today.

Featured Links: Follow Nathan on LinkedIn and Twitter｜Greater Than Learning｜Greater Than Experience | Data Trust by Design best practices feature at Medium | Open Data Institute Data Ethics Canvas | The Dunning-Kruger Effect explained | Hemingway App | Donella H. Meadows' book Thinking In Systems

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You may have heard about Project Aristotle — an effort by Google that revealed Psychological Safety as the common element in their highest-performing teams. Understanding what that is — and how we can create a culture of safety in our teams — isn’t quite as easy. We spoke with Alla Weinberg, author of A Culture of Safety, about the elements of safety, how to recognise teams that have it, and how to support the teams that don’t.

Featured Links: Follow Alla on LinkedIn and Twitter｜Spoke & Wheel｜Read Alla’s book, A Culture of Safety｜David Marquet’s book ‘Turn the Ship Around!’: A True Story of Building Leaders by Breaking the Rules

Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders

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We all know that discovery is important — but how it’s done is just as critical. Randy had the chance to collaborate with service design consultant Simon Wilson on a project recently, where mapping formed the basis for much of the discovery work. We invited Simon onto the podcast to talk about this approach. Featured [...] Read more »

The post Using maps as part of discovery – Simon Wilson appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Debbie Madden wants you to make better teams because she knows what she’s doing. The founder and CEO of NYC-based Stride Consulting, Debbie offers practical advice for hiring managers, anyone looking for a new job, or who wants to change the culture in their current organisation. And it’s not just that hiring for diversity is a lofty [...] Read more »

The post Hire Women! – Debbie Madden [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Egyptian-born Abdelrahman (Abdo) Wahba co-founded popular Arabic audiobook site Iqraaly—but it wouldn’t have seen its current success unless Abdo had taken the time to analyse deeply what made customers stay loyal. To do that, he had to get to his “Aha moment”. Now based in Berlin as the Chief Product Officer for the Offerista Group, [...] Read more »

The post The “Aha moment” – Abdelrahman Wahba [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The job of a Product person is hard to define. We’re a little of everything, depending on the day and what’s needed. The one thing we can all agree on is that it’s never really done. Christian Idiodi—partner at Silicon Valley Product Group—joins us on the podcast to break down what’s expected of us, what [...] Read more »

The post Product Management: What is the job, really? – Christian Idiodi appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In 2008, Columbia University sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh published his first book, Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes To The Streets. A few years later, that got the attention of Mark Zuckerberg, which led to a role working in Integrity for Facebook, and later, as Director of Social Science Research and Health Research [...] Read more »

The post Breaking the internet – Sudhir Venkatesh appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In his new book, Product Direction: How to Build Successful Products at Scale with Strategy, Roadmaps, and Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), Xing Product Director Nacho Bassino details the parts of the job that any senior product person needs to master – but which are really difficult to learn before you’re responsible for them. We chatted [...] Read more »

The post How to create a product strategy – Nacho Bassino appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Building and managing products is hard. Building an organisation that manages existing products, and is optimised to build new ones is exponentially harder — which is why we spoke with Cait O’Riordan, Chief Product and Information Officer at the Financial Times, for this week’s podcast. A veteran of the BBC and Shazam, she’s now working [...] Read more »

The post Building for success at every stage of product development – Cait O’Riordan appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Monika Turska defines the job of a Product Manager as someone who helps make better decisions, faster. But making the right decisions—whether it’s the ones that we’re actively making, or the ones we’re empowering our algorithms to make—requires a real understanding of the environment they’re being made in. We asked Design for Cognitive Bias author, [...] Read more »

The post Designing for Cognitive Bias – David Dylan Thomas appeared first on Mind the Product.

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For many product people, it’s a dream to get in early at a startup — or to start their own. Unless you have the ability to bootstrap, that means you’ll need access to money, which often means working with venture capital. That can be a mysterious and scary world, so we asked Dharmesh Raithatha, CPO [...] Read more »

The post Product and VC: What You Need to Know – Dharmesh Raithatha appeared first on Mind the Product.

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When we talk about product strategy, we often go back to the double diamond approach: identify the problem that you need to solve, then work on creating & optimising a solution for it. There’s a similar approach to Product careers — first, we need to get the job, then we need to excel in it. [...] Read more »

The post Cracking the PM Career – Jackie Bavaro on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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For most of us, the way that we conduct user research has been different during a year of lockdowns. Not so much for Anna Lee Anda, UX Research Manager at Zendesk — as someone with a global customer base, she’s been working with these techniques for ages. She joined us on the podcast to talk [...] Read more »

The post Remote Research – Anna Lee Anda on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We all know that we need to measure what matters; that if it’s not measured, then it’s not managed. We know that we need to have a North Star; that we need to run A/B tests; and that A/B tests are awful. We also know there’s a massive difference between what we read in the [...] Read more »

The post Metrics of Success – Rik Higham on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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How much should you be charging? Are you leaving money on the table, or are you scaring away potential customers? Pricing strategy can be one of the biggest challenges for product people, so we asked Founders Factory coach Fanni Fejes to share some of the lessons she teaches founders. In this episode, sponsored by Hotjar, listen [...] Read more »

The post Pricing Strategy for Product Dummies – Fanni Fejes on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Estimation is a dark art — get it wrong, and your stakeholders will never forget (or forgive). We talked with agile consultant Liz Keogh about how to get this right, who estimates are for, her invaluable scale for estimating complexity, and how to pronounce the word Cynefin. In this episode, sponsored by Hotjar, listen to learn [...] Read more »

The post Estimating Complexity – Liz Keogh on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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There’s no glory in working on internal tools – no one ever gives you credit for success, it’s almost impossible to recruit for, and there’s never enough time to fix all of the things that are needed. It’s no wonder that we don’t talk about it very often. But they’re the key to making lots [...] Read more »

The post Managing Internal Tools – Emily Patterson on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the key things to do in any product lifecycle is to review if it’s meeting your user’s needs. The last time we sat down to do this for the podcast, we decided to use the Jobs To Be Done approach, which led to a key question: how might we power up our JTBD [...] Read more »

The post Getting Started with JTBD – Mike Belsito on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We all know what OKRs are. Most of us use them or have tried to at some point. But it’s a much smaller group that have used OKRs well, and for their intended purpose. Natalija Hellesoe, co-author of OKRs at the Center, joins us on the podcast to chat about taking your practice to the [...] Read more »

The post Putting OKRs at the Centre – Natalija Hellesoe on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Accessibility is one of those things that we all know we should do, but are rarely confident that we’ve done it well. To get over that hump, we talked with Prof Jonathan Hassell about how and when to embed and test for accessibility (or a11y!), when you can skip it, and how to convince stakeholders [...] Read more »

The post Building Accessible Products – Jonathan Hassell on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Over the last decade in the public sector, there’s been a global explosion in citizen and resident-centered design and development, with movements in the UK, Estonia, Australia, Canada, USA, and many more strengthening their approaches. Where it’s been done well, it’s made a huge difference. At the same time, civil services are always facing budget [...] Read more »

The post Public Service Product Management – Tom Loosemore on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Startups, scale-ups, and unicorns get all the press – but there are an awful lot more product people working at large organisations. Katie Saindon, Senior Manager of Product Management at GE Healthcare, is one of them. Working on their digital products and platforms, she’s learned a lot about how to survive and thrive in a [...] Read more »

The post Lifting the Feature Factory Boulder – Katie Saindon on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Everyone – or so we’re told – has the dream of joining or founding a hot startup and making their fortune, all while really proving their product chops. Though he’s now a Product Manager at Facebook, Karthik Suresh co-founded Altrest and grew Craft.io from an early stage. He joins us on the podcast to share [...] Read more »

The post Managing Your Startup Options – Karthik Suresh on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Startups are often talked about as if they’re all the same, as if experience in one is directly transferable to another. Georgie Smallwood, Chief Product Officer at Tier Mobility, joined us on the podcast to chat about the differences in working for earlier stage companies and those that are scaling up. She covers why she [...] Read more »

The post The Stages of Startups – Georgie Smallwood on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Some of the most successful people we know credit their mentors for making the difference in their careers. We’ve recently heard great talks from the likes of Barry O’Reilly, Marty Cagan, and Gibson Biddle where they talk about having a ‘personal Board of Directors’. But how do you go about getting a mentor and getting [...] Read more »

The post The Power of Mentoring – DeVaris Brown on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We learn something from every guest that joins us on the podcast, but it’s not that often that something they say makes it onto our wall. Dave Martin (co-founder of Right to Left) chatted with us about building great habits for product people, and how to make sure they stick. He also tells us about [...] Read more »

The post The Habits of Successful Product Managers – Dave Martin on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the things we’ve learned in 2020 is just how important it is to have great facilitation skills as product people. That’s why we’re revisiting our chat with Elena Astilleros from earlier in the year – she’s the author of Invisible Leader: Facilitation secrets for catalyzing change, cultivating, innovation, and commanding results, a topic [...] Read more »

The post The Invisible Leader: Facilitation Secrets – Elena Astilleros on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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As product people, we work extensively with images. While our designers may be doing the heavy lifting, who hasn’t spent an extra 30 minutes trying to find the perfect image to help get a point across for an executive presentation? (It can’t just be us who does that…) That’s why we invited Grant Farhall, Chief [...] Read more »

The post A Picture is Worth A Thousand Stories – Grant Farhall on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In 2020, we had to brush up on our skills. Building quickly and testing with users is key to many product people, but this year demanded a new approach when we couldn’t do our work in person. With that in mind, we’re revisiting our chat with Cookpad’s Head of Product for Premium Services, Philip Pantelides, [...] Read more »

The post Rapid Prototyping – Philip Pantelides on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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As we start to wrap up the year and panic shop for gifts, our thoughts naturally drift to everyone’s favourite part of the holiday season: playing with toys! Our go-to person to learn more about creating a great play experience is Melissa Pickering, Strategic Product Director at The LEGO Group. Melissa joined us on the [...] Read more »

The post Designing for Play – Melissa Pickering on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Being on the inside of a company as it takes off is a special kind of experience – and being in a product leadership position while that’s going on gives a unique viewpoint. Gibson Biddle has been lucky enough to have gone on that ride at Netflix, and he’s generous in sharing the lessons he [...] Read more »

The post Building Defensible Advantages – Gibson Biddle on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Matt Walton was one of the founders of FutureLearn, where he scaled the product team and organisation from nothing to the significant player in online education that it is today. Along the way, he learned a lot about continuous improvement of both the product and the processes for building it – including the use of [...] Read more »

The post Using Retros to Create Continuous Improvement – Matt Walton on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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It’s been drilled into our heads time and time again – as product people, we know that we are not the customer. What follows is that we need to get to know our customers, to figure out what their problems are, how they perceive and prioritise them, and how they react to the solutions we [...] Read more »

The post Product Research Rules – C. Todd Lombardo & Aras Bilgen on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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A quick update to this episode: Since we recorded this episode, one of our guests has made a change. Eli Montgomery is now known as Saielle Montgomery and goes by the pronouns she/her. We’ve worked with her to updated the links below, but we wanted to make sure that there wasn’t any confusion about the name for people just listening to it for the first time now.

Diversity at work comes in many forms, but neurodiversity is one that we don’t discuss as much in the workplace. This week, we’re joined on the podcast by Marton Gaspar and Eli Montgomery, to give us two different points of view on the topic. Marton’s recently been talking publicly about his experiences as an autistic [...] Read more »

The post Not Your Typical Product People – Marton Gaspar & Eli Montgomery on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We first saw Onfido’s Susana Lopes talk about how she used the State of the Product presentation to manage stakeholders and drive alignment at London’s Product Camp. She’s since written two great articles on the subject (Tools to Help Product Managers Think Strategically and Commercially Part 1 and Part 2), and she joins us on [...] Read more »

The post The State of the Product – Susana Lopes on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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When you have questions about roadmaps, it pays to talk to someone who has spent way too much of her life thinking about them. Janna Bastow – co-founder of both Mind the Product and ProdPad—has been trying to fix the problems of roadmaps for most of her professional life. She hacked together the first version [...] Read more »

The post Roadmaps Are Dead. Long Live Roadmaps! – Janna Bastow on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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“People are hard.” That’s what Mind the Product co-founder Janna Bastow said in her keynote speech at #mtpcon in 2017. As product managers, we have to deal with demanding, unreasonable people who hold us to unrealistic standards and want everything delivered yesterday – and as a parent, you have to deal with stakeholders and team members [...] Read more »

The post Balancing Family Life with a Career in Product Management – Shelly Kalish & Karen Hershenson on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Talking to users is easy. Talking to them in a way that gets you useful information is hard. Using that information in a way that helps align stakeholders and teams on the path to building great products? That’s the hardest of all. Lucky for us, our guest on the podcast this week is Robert Chokr, [...] Read more »

The post User Research Interviews – Robert Chokr on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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As we’ve got an Ask Me Anything session with Colin Pal coming up soon (October 14th), we’re re-broadcasting this episode from earlier in the year so that you can get to know Colin and prep some questions for him! The AMA is for Prioritised and MTP Leader members so if you’re not a member yet, [...] Read more »

The post Building Products in AsiaPac – Colin Pal and Adrienne Tan on The Product Experience [rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In our previous episode, Adam Thomas introduced how he uses a military technique (BLUF) for prioritisation. This week, former US Marine William Treseder – now co-founder and SVP of Product at innovation consultancy BMNT – joins us to talk about how he works with Government, Defense, Academic and Corporate clients to transform their innovation culture. [...] Read more »

The post Accelerate Your Product Development – William Treseder on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The one thing every product person needs is a new acronym that comes from the military, and Adam Thomas is here to help. Sarcasm aside, Adam’s made good use of the BLUF technique: Bottom Line Up Front, a short template, clearly laying out what the team is working on and how they plan to do [...] Read more »

The post BLUF Your Way to Success – Adam Thomas on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Matt LeMay has a problem. He’s a content machine. He’s written 3 books (two books on product and one on the musician Elliot Smith), plenty of music, and much more – which means that he’s prone to going down a rabbit hole before sharing his work with a team. To combat that, he now employs [...] Read more »

The post Perfection is the Enemy of Progress – Matt LeMay on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Product people love to study frameworks, techniques, and approaches that have worked at other companies. In Kate Leto’s new book, Hiring Product Managers: Using Product EQ to go Beyond Culture and Skills, she gives an overview of how to actually use those tools – both in building a team and day-to-day, as a product professional. [...] Read more »

The post Using Product EQ to Hire the Best Product Managers – Kate Leto on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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April Dunford’s mtpcon Digital 2020 keynote on positioning was so good that we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to dig deeper into the topic with her. This is one of the dark arts for many product people, and it has such a deep effect on everything else you do – take a listen to upgrade [...] Read more »

The post Obviously Awesome: Positioning Your Product – April Dunford on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Bugs are the bane of existence for product teams. They frustrate our users, ruin the best-laid plans, and screw up our sprints. Figuring out how to deal with them is a problem for many teams: do we have good acceptance criteria? How do we test? What’s better, unit tests or user acceptance testing? Who has [...] Read more »

The post Building Quality Products – Stacy Kirk on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Is product management an art or a science? Holly Hester-Reilly, the founder of H2R Product Science and a former Chemical Engineer, uses her background to apply scientific principles and techniques to product development. She joins us to chat about evidence-based product strategy, continuous discovery & delivery, and empowered teams. In this episode, sponsored by Amplitude, [...] Read more »

The post The Science of Product – Holly Hester-Reilly on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Just call him Mr Joe. A UK-based consultant, Joe Leech has built a reputation for managing change (for both users and stakeholders) and as the guy to call when a product launch has gone wrong. Joe gave one of the most entertaining and engaging talks at Mind the Product in London 2018, so we followed [...] Read more »

The post Managing Change – Joe Leech on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of our favourite pub discussions after a ProductTank is to try and define the difference between a product and a service. (We’re fun like that.) These days, we’re doing all of our meetups and events remotely, so Andy Budd joined us on the podcast to talk about the difference between product managers and service [...] Read more »

The post Service Design and Product – Andy Budd on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Teaching something is hard – to do it well, you need both an incredible command of the subject and great communication skills. Teaching in the form of a narrative story? That’s another level of difficulty and in her new book, The Team That Managed Itself: A Story Of Leadership, Christina Wodtke does just that. Drawing [...] Read more »

The post Leading Teams to Success – Christina Wodtke on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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All the sexy stories around product management come from startups, or revolve around working like a startup. Working in an enterprise gets much less respect – but being successful in a large firm is no picnic. It takes a very particular set of skills to be able to communicate, influence, prioritise and execute at scale [...] Read more »

The post Product In The Enterprise – Alicia Dixon on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Nandini Jammi started out in product marketing and growth, but after the US elections in 2016, her career took an unexpected turn when she joined Sleeping Giants, an organisation that aims to make bigotry and sexism less profitable. In this episode of The Product Experience, sponsored by Amplitude, learn how to apply this ethos to [...] Read more »

The post Sleeping Giants – Nandini Jammi on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Product people have a lot of things in common: we’re curious, we like connecting the dots, we try to solve more problems than we create, we get bored easily, we’re pretty social (even if we also identify as introverts), and we enjoy looking at things at both a tactical and strategic level. Unfortunately, we’re also [...] Read more »

The post You Are the Product – Kristina Walcker-Mayer on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Working in product is a dream job for lots of people but sustaining a dream career certainly isn’t without challenges. There are problems around burnout, advancement, the challenges of specialisation, and in being a generalist. Jeff Gothelf has been there. He woke up one day and realised that his path forward as a design leader [...] Read more »

The post Forever Employable – Jeff Gothelf on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Over the course of lockdown, how we maintain relationships with our nearest and dearest has been tested. But Fabrice des Mazery, CPO at Thiga, suggests the skills we’ve honed during this time can actually be useful in building relationships with our customers. In this episode, sponsored by Amplitude, he draws on his experience at Deezer, [...] Read more »

The post Build Relationships With Your Customers – Fabrice des Mazery on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Berlin-based Product Coach Shaun Russell was always destined to work in Product. He co-founded Audiobubble while still in school and gave himself all the responsibilities of a Product Manager years before ever hearing of the title. In the years since he’s put a lot of thought into the development of his practice and has spoken [...] Read more »

The post Breaking Into Product – Shaun Russell on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that predicting the future is hard and in this episode, sponsored by Amplitude, we turn to Margaret Heffernan to learn how to do it better. She’s a captivating speaker with more than 12 million views of her TED talks and a prolific writer who recently published Uncharted: How To [...] Read more »

The post Making Better Predictions – Margaret Heffernan on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the critical skills never mentioned in the job description is being a great meeting facilitator. We’ve all been thrust into the situation of trying to wrangle a room full of people into working together to create a strategy, generate a plan, or get past a roadblock. Elena Astilleros has been there, too – [...] Read more »

The post The Invisible Leader: Facilitation Secrets – Elena Astilleros on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The story of the first ProductTank – held in the back room of a London pub, arranged by Martin Eriksson, attended by a handful of people – has been told many times. And so, to celebrate the 10th anniversary, we wanted to hear from someone else who was there, in the room, when it all [...] Read more »

The post World Product Day Special – 10 Years of ProductTank, Arne Kittler & Selena Hadzibabic on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In previous roles, Julia Whitney led teams at WGBH and the BBC, so she’s familiar with rooms full of people in meetings where decisions not only don’t get made, they’re sometimes actively avoided. Now an executive and leadership coach, she’s devoted a lot of time over the last few years to working with teams on [...] Read more »

The post Making Decisions That Scale – Julia Whitney on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the tropes we’ve heard again and again is that product people don’t actually build anything. We’re not designers (except when we are) or engineers (unless we can code) or anything actually, y’know, useful. What that viewpoint misses is that we build understanding, alignment, and purpose – and that our best tool is conversations. [...] Read more »

The post Troubleshooting Agile – Jeffrey Fredrick & Douglas Squirrel on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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At ProductCamp Southwest UK earlier this year, Adrian Howard ran a session that focused on something he termed ‘Sturgeon’s biases‘ – where he talked about how the experience of being in a community was not evenly distributed, about the fact that like-minded people tend to group together, and that 90% of everything is crap. We [...] Read more »

The post 90% of Everything is Crap – Adrian Howard on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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It can be tough, even at the best of times, to remain engaged at work – to find a community of people to share with and learn from. Emily Webber’s seen this in action and has started (and nurtured) successful communities both at work and at home. She joined us to continue where her 2018 [...] Read more »

The post Building Communities That Work – Emily Webber on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’ve heard it again and again – these are odd times; we’re not working remotely, we’re working during a crisis; this is not the new normal. You’re not working the same way, and your customers have different needs than they did a month ago. We turned to Teresa Torres – our first repeat guest! – [...] Read more »

The post Remote Discovery – Teresa Torres on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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For obvious reasons, most of us are currently working from home, along with teams that are also all remote. Even if you’ve worked from home before, even if you’ve done it under tough conditions, this is different. Amir Salihefendić should know. As the founder and CEO of Doist (makers of Todoist and Twist), his company [...] Read more »

The post Remote Working For Product Organisations – Amir Salihefendić on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Throughout their careers, whatever question either Lily or Randy has had, Roman Pichler’s probably had some great advice on the topic! A longtime consultant, author and teacher, we grabbed him for a chat focusing on some of the lessons contained in his fourth book, How to Lead in Product Management. Quote of the Episode A [...] Read more »

The post Conversations, Conflict and Leadership – Roman Pichler on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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When you want to learn about the state of product management across Asia, there are two people who come to mind: Adrienne Tan (CEO and co-founder of Brianmates in Sydney) and Colin Pal (Chief Product Officer, Caterspot in Kuala Lumpur). With more than 25 years of experience between them, they’ve been there since the beginning, [...] Read more »

The post Building Products in AsiaPac – Colin Pal and Adrienne Tan on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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A couple of things we’re hearing people talk about a lot this week are how they’re adjusting to working in a different way, and how they are adjusting their strategies to deal with the current situation. These are situations that are fraught with the possibility for unintended consequences – something Roisi Proven covered in her [...] Read more »

The post The Black Mirror Test – Roisi Proven on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Nobody rants quite like Laura Klein. Others have tried, but we’ve yet to find anyone else with her depth of experience (spanning stints as a developer, designer, researcher and product manager), her empathy for both users and stakeholders, her experience as a teacher, and her sense of humour. She’s author of Build Better Products: a [...] Read more »

The post Build Better Products – Laura Klein on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the things we’ve learned from doing this podcast is that it’s important to schedule in time to reflect and to revisit some of the lessons you’ve learned along the way. It’s been a recurring theme, actually – something that’s been mentioned by Barry O’Reilly, Rian van der Merwe, and John Cutler – and [...] Read more »

The post Outcomes Over Outputs – Josh Seiden on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The best product people are the ones that are insatiably curious, who want to learn more, who want to get better at all aspects of the job. In many businesses this can be hard – there’s not always an established culture, or people around who have done the job before and can help upskill the [...] Read more »

The post Building Better Product People – Sebastian Sabouné on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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At MTP Engage Manchester (February 2020), Rakhi Rajani (Associate Partner at QuantumBlack) joined us for our first-ever live podcast recording. Talking to Rakhi we learned why Engage organiser Adam Warburton called her the smartest person he’s ever worked with as we discussed building teams, hiring at scale, when you need troublemakers, and why she had [...] Read more »

The post Cognitively Diverse Teams – Live from MTP Engage Manchester – Rakhi Rajani on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If you listen to the end credits of the podcast every week, then you already know Marc Abraham’s voice – he’s ProductTank’s Global Coordinator, a co-curator of the Mind the Product conference, an author (of My Product Management Toolkit), and he’s got a day job as a Head of Product at ASOS. What you might [...] Read more »

The post I Got 99 Problems – Learning From Jay-Z – Marc Abraham on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’ve all had that one manager that we’ll do anything to avoid for the rest of our careers – but have you ever stopped to think if you’re that person for someone else? That’s the question that prompted Claire Lew to start Know Your Team and here she joins us on the podcast to give [...] Read more »

The post How To Be A Great Manager – Claire Lew on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If you’ve ever had to fill a role in your team, then you already know how broken most hiring processes are. It’s even harder if you’re competing for top talent but are only able to pay at NGO/charity scales. That’s the situation that Simprints found itself in when they decided to treat their hiring process [...] Read more »

The post Hacking The Hiring Process – Alex Yang & Max Bevan on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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W. Edwards Deming wrote, “In God we trust, all others must bring data.” Product people hold on to this as a mantra – how else can we defend ourselves from random requests? – but we’re not always taught how best to use data. In this week’s episode, Lens.ai founder Mike Bugembe joins us on the [...] Read more »

The post Cracking The Data Code – Mike Bugembe on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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For the 50th episode of The Product Experience, we’re proud to have Chris Adams join us to talk about making your products more sustainable. One of the rare people who’s seen our world from all sides – Chris has been a developer, designer, researcher and product manager – he came on the show to share [...] Read more »

The post Carbon Neutral Roadmaps – Chris Adams on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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There’s a lot of debate in the product and research communities about quantitative vs qualitative approaches to metrics, so we sat down with Tomer Sharon (MD/Head of User Research and Metrics at Goldman Sachs) to talk about how he uses Google’s HEART approach to track what matters. Formerly of Google and WeWork, Tomer talks about [...] Read more »

The post Keeping Track Of Your HEART – Tomer Sharon on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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One of the hardest skills for product people to acquire is that of saying no. After all, when everyone comes at you with ideas, prioritisation can be a massive challenge. So it’s refreshing when we get a chance to come at it from the opposite direction in order to generate good ideas. Gal Josefsberg, VP [...] Read more »

The post Where Do Good Ideas Come From? – Gal Josefsberg on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes over the holidays. We’ll be back with new interviews in early January. But don’t despair! In the meantime, we’re re-running two episodes that fit the theme of the season: reflection and planning for 2020. Randy’s Pick ‘Tis the season to make a list of resolutions for [...] Read more »

The post Crazy Busy Product People – Rian van der Merwe on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes over the holidays. We’ll be back with fresh interviews in early January. But don’t despair! In the meantime, we’re re-running two episodes that fit the theme of the season: reflection and planning for 2020. Lily’s Pick I think, by now, we all know that product management [...] Read more »

The post Moving Up the Career Ladder with Thor Mitchell [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Taking a break from the always entertaining/sometimes informative podcast Jake & Jonathan (formerly known as The Product Breakfast club, which he co-hosts with Jake Knapp), AJ&Smart CEO Jonathan Courtney joined us to chat about Design Sprints, workshops, and how to get groups of people collaborating. Quote of the Episode One of the best things about [...] Read more »

The post How To Rock Your Workshops – Jonathan Courtney on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Todd Green knows a few things about creating and managing things that attract a lot of attention – before he joined King (makers of Candy Crush etc), he helped to define the digital experience for The X Factor, and the [Your Country] Idol and [Your Country]’s Got Talent franchises. We talked to him about how [...] Read more »

The post Let’s Play a Game – Todd Green on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Jimena Almendares has held senior product roles and leadership positions at Zynga and Meetup, and now runs the Global Expansion efforts for Intuit. She has plenty of great stories to tell from those roles, but it’s her time as Chief Product Officer at OKCupid that we wanted to talk about. Jimena’s team completely revamped the [...] Read more »

The post The Truth Behind the Data – Jimena Almendares on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If you’ve got a background in waterfall processes, it can seem as if agile techniques are just about making it up as you go along. (MTP’s own James Mayes once commented that waterfall, on the other hand, “is making it up before you even begin”.) What happens if we embrace this, and bring improv techniques [...] Read more »

The post Don’t Call it Improv – David Farkas on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Mixcloud CTO and co-founder Mat Clayton helped bootstrap his company from humble beginnings in an empty warehouse with no internet connection to more than 15 million active users over a 10-year period, all before they took their first round of funding. He joined us to talk about startup life, scaling, making hard decisions, and more. [...] Read more »

The post Beats, Bootstrapping and Life – Mat Clayton on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Author, advisor, professor, and podcaster Barry O’Reilly joined us on The Product Experience where we learned that he has a lot of sympathy for senior executives. These are people, he points out, whose entire career has led them to a position of responsibility and reward – so it naturally follows that the behaviours that got [...] Read more »

The post Learning to Unlearn – Barry O’Reilly on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If you – or your kids – have ever controlled a Lego creation from an app, then you’re familiar with Melissa Pickering’s work. Now Lego’s Head of Interactive Play, blending digital and physical play, she got her start as an Imagineer at Disney (designing rollercoasters!) before founding a STEM startup. She joined us on the [...] Read more »

The post Designing for Play – Melissa Pickering on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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David Bland is the CEO and Founder of Precoil, an author, and a long-time practitioner of agile and lean startup. He joined us on the podcast to talk about how to create focus around what matters to your users by using different testing methodologies – a topic he and Alex Osterwalder cover in their book, [...] Read more »

The post Testing Business Ideas – David Bland on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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With over 20 years of experience in industries ranging from manufacturing to aerospace, to energy, and more, Daniel Elizalde has seen it all. Currently VP, Head of IoT at Ericsson North America and also an IoT instructor at Stanford University, Daniel talks to Randy and Lily about how to gain the skills needed to confidently [...] Read more »

The post The Internet of Things – Daniel Elizalde on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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A manager of product management at Pivotal Software, Brazilian native Gabrielle Bufrem has worked on three continents (North America, Europe and Asia) and hails from a fourth. She’s delivered great talks at our #MTPEngage conferences in Hamburg and Manchester, but we caught up with her after a talk about “saying no” at Edinburgh’s Turing Festival. [...] Read more »

The post How To Say No – Gabrielle Bufrem on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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After starting out as an agency (37 Signals), those at Basecamp realised that the tools it used to manage its own projects would have value for others. What followed was a bootstrapped journey to creating an entire suite of products, using Basecamp’s own approach on how to work well together. Over the years, the company [...] Read more »

The post Shape Up – Ryan Singer on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Guido Lonetti’s career started out at age 14 in his bedroom – he built an MP3 search engine website that immediately started making money until his parents quashed that idea! In this episode, he shines a light on the diverse product culture in South and Latin America, where he’s spent time as a Head of [...] Read more »

The post South and Latin America – Guido Lonetti on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Nandini Jammi started out in product marketing and growth, but after the US elections in 2016 her career took an unexpected turn when she joined Sleeping Giants, an organisation that aims to make bigotry and sexism less profitable. In this episode of The Product Experience, learn how to apply this ethos to your products, where [...] Read more »

The post Sleeping Giants – Nandini Jammi on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Presently a partner at expansion stage venture capital firm OpenView, Ashley Smith has a long career of helping early-stage startups scale into successful organisations. In this episode, Ashley talks to our hosts about product-led growth, and how everyone can and should do it. Quote of the Episode It really comes down to: listen to your [...] Read more »

The post Product-Led Growth – Ashley Smith on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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After starting his career on the road with a circus (yes, really), no business setting should ever be a challenge for Jeff Gothelf – after all, he’s worked with real clowns. Jeff sat down with our hosts for a rare in-person conversation during Scotland’s Turing Festival to chat about effecting change, focusing on outcomes, using [...] Read more »

The post Sense and Respond – Jeff Gothelf on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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For our first episode back after a summer break, we chat with Philip Pantelides, who takes us on a journey through Japan, Indonesia and beyond. (er, Bristol.) As the Head of Product for Premium Services at Cookpad, Philip has become known for his unstinting attention to detail, and taking rapid prototyping to a whole new [...] Read more »

The post Rapid Prototyping – Philip Pantelides on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes for the month of August. We’ll be back with new interviews in September. But don’t despair! We’ve asked a few friends to pick some of their favorite episodes to re-broadcast in the meantime. This week’s pick comes from Mind the Product co-founder, Martin Eriksson. Martin Eriksson’s [...] Read more »

The post Don’t Worry About Being Cool with Petra Wille [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes for the month of August. We’ll be back with new interviews in September. But don’t despair! We’ve asked a few friends to pick some of their favorite episodes to re-broadcast in the meantime. This week’s pick comes from our co-host, Randy Silver. Randy Silver’s Pick Of [...] Read more »

The post Marketplace Thinking – Christopher Nheu on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes for the month of August. We’ll be back with new interviews in September. But don’t despair! We’ve asked a few friends to pick some of their favorite episodes to re-broadcast in the meantime. This week’s pick comes from our Executive Producer, Emily Tate. Emily Tate’s Pick [...] Read more »

The post Killing Zombies – Lisa Long on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Roisi Proven is a true product person: she has a penchant for imagining the worst, which she’s turned into a superpower to put all of her product decisions through a rigorous ethics test. That’s useful – but she’s also found a way for you to engage your team in a creative way, using the model [...] Read more »

The post The Black Mirror Test – Roisi Proven on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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A nice bit of serendipity this week: this week’s guest, Josh Seiden, had his new book (Outcomes Over Output) recommended in last week’s episode by guest Rich Mironov. While we didn’t plan this, it’s no surprise – Josh is a respected author, speaker, trainer, and consultant, and the book is a fantastic read. As a [...] Read more »

The post Outcomes Over Outputs – Josh Seiden on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Rich Mironov got his start in product with a a single, very demanding customer: Apple. Realising it would be safer to diversify, he’s gone on to spend the last 30-plus years working with more than 90 organisations across the world in interim leadership roles and consulting. He’s seen it all, and he shares his experience [...] Read more »

The post The Product Mensch – Rich Mironov on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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After leaving the Navy and working on nuclear submarines, Dan Olsen embarked on a career that has spanned enterprises and start-ups, consulting, speaking, writing, and running the Lean Product & Lean UX meetup. He joined us to talk about product/market fit: what it is, how to know when you have it, and how to achieve [...] Read more »

The post Lean Mean Product Machine – Dan Olsen on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Lucie McLean started on mobile products before the launch of the iPhone – she once held a phone for an illustration in a BBC article, and as a result, has some of the most famous hands on the internet. She joined us to talk about some of the things she’s learned from her long career at [...] Read more »

The post Hedging Your Bets – Lucie McLean on the Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Egyptian-born Abdelrahman (Abdo) Wahba co-founded popular Arabic audiobook site Iqraaly – but it wouldn’t have seen its current success unless Abdo had taken the time to analyse deeply what made customers stay loyal. To do that, he had to get to his “Aha moment”. Now based in Berlin as the Head of Product for the [...] Read more »

The post The Aha Moment – Abdelrahman Wahba on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The Head of Product at Wildbit, Rian van der Merwe has spent his career being crazy busy – and he’s had enough of it. He joined us to talk about slowing down to speed up, making sure your team(s) are productive, and managing yourself to provide the most value to everyone around you. Quote of the [...] Read more »

The post Crazy Busy Product People – Rian van der Merwe on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Ashwini Asokan, CEO and co-founder of intelligent retail automation platform VUE.ai, is working to evolve the world of retail, making shopping more of an entertainment experience. She’s spent a lot of time thinking about artificial intelligence and she sat down with us to go beyond the hype – and give us some practical advice about [...] Read more »

The post Beyond the Hype on AI – Ashwini Asokan on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Ash Williams (Evil Dead); Columbus, Tallahassee, Wichita and Little Rock (Zombieland); Shaun (Shaun of the Dead); Alice (Resident Evil); Lisa Long (ProductTank). All have killed zombies, and entertained us as they did so… but only Lisa did so on stage at London’s ProductTank, giving us practical advice on how to kill off zombie features and [...] Read more »

The post Killing Zombies – Lisa Long on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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In 2017, Teresa Torres gave one of our favourite talks on the Mind the Product stage, introducing the concept of Opportunity Solution Trees. Simple, powerful, and immediately useful, it’s been a critical part of our toolkits ever since. When we started this podcast, Teresa was one of the people we simply had to talk to [...] Read more »

The post Discover Everything – Teresa Torres on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Ryan Jacoby is an expert on innovation, but not, perhaps, on optimising book titles for SEO – his book, Making Progress, is a guide on how to ensure that your team is open to and successful at innovation. Ryan has been working in the field since his undergraduate days, when he became the first person [...] Read more »

The post How to Innovate – Ryan Jacoby on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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From humble beginnings with 25 people in the back room of a pub in London in May 2010 looking for a group therapy session, the ProductTank meetups have grown to over 180 cities with hundreds of thousands of people signed up. We grabbed co-founder Martin Eriksson and Dallas organiser Emily Tate (now also US General [...] Read more »

The post World Product Day special – Martin Eriksson & Emily Tate on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Melissa Perri is the product manager’s product manager—she’s able to do the job, explain it, and teach you how to do it better. So when we got her on this week’s podcast, we covered everything…including Japanese deployment strategies, Marmite and peanut butter, product leadership and team organisation, how companies scale, how to pick the right [...] Read more »

The post The ABCs of Product – Melissa Perri on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Over the course of her career, Donna Lichaw has moved from Design and UX to Product – consulting with teams, giving keynotes and working with leadership groups – but what she’s always focused on is storytelling. Now an executive coach – “I just won’t help people build products, I help them build themselves,” she says [...] Read more »

The post Tell Better Stories – Donna Lichaw on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Debbie Madden wants you to make better teams – but because she knows what she’s doing, she gave her book the attention-grabbing title Hire Women. The founder and CEO of NYC-based Stride Consulting, Debbie offers practical advice for hiring managers, anyone looking for a new job, or who wants to change the culture in their current [...] Read more »

The post Hire Women! – Debbie Madden on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Few people have more experience in leading product teams than Joff Redfern. Now the VP of Product at Atlassian, he’s held similar roles at LinkedIn, Yahoo!, and Fidelity Investments. Joff’s team at Atlassian creates the products that many of us use to manage our own product and development processes; he’s got a unique viewpoint on the [...] Read more »

The post A Better Shipyard – Joff Redfern on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Just call him Mr Joe. A UK-based consultant, Joe Leech has built a reputation for managing change (for both users and stakeholders) and as the guy to call when a product launch has gone wrong. Joe gave one of the most entertaining and engaging talks at Mind the Product in London 2018, so we followed up [...] Read more »

The post Managing Change – Joe Leech on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Kai Haley is Google’s Lead of Design Relations, but in her spare time she also looks after the company’s internal Design Sprint Academy. Jake Knapp (late of Google Ventures/GV) may have written the book, but Kai has run the sprints, trained the trainers, and has spent the last few years in the trenches. We had a [...] Read more »

The post Mastering Design Sprints – Kai Haley on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Prior to taking on the role of COO and CPO at Singapore-based financial portal MoneySmart, Nick Ramsay was a strategy consultant and product manager. In the last year, he’s grown the product team there from one to 10 product managers, and has been working on changing the culture and attracting the right kind of talent to [...] Read more »

The post Creating a Product Culture – Nick Ramsay on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Before financial software provider Aquila Heywood transformed how it approaches prioritisation, it had a backlog that was more than 20 years long and its projects took about seven years to release. Product Director Holly Donohue was part of the team that changed how the business approaches its work, so that it now sees value being [...] Read more »

The post Take Control of Prioritisation – Holly Donohue on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Tim Herbig has made many mistakes (who hasn’t?). Fortunately for us, Tim not only owns up to his mistakes, he’s written a book to help the rest of us avoid making the same ones. We’ve all had issues with how to work best – not only within our individual teams, but with the rest of [...] Read more »

The post How to Influence Without Power – Tim Herbig on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.

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If you’re active on Product Twitter, then you already know John Cutler. It’s not just that he’s extremely prolific – it’s the quality and depth of his tweets (and his longer essays) that reach deep into the heart of what we’re struggling with on a daily basis – especially his post 12 Signs You’re working in [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: How to get Your Team to do Their Best Work with John Cutler appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Bruce McCarthy was the president of the Boston Product Management Association, is the founder of consultancy Product Culture and co-wrote the book on roadmapping, Product Roadmaps Relaunched. He joined us live at the Mind the Product Leadership Forum to chat about how he builds his own roadmaps, prioritisation, product vision, OKRs and quite a bit more. Quote [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Roadmaps, OKRs, Vision and Prioritisation with Bruce McCarthy appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Marty Cagan recently called her an “exceptional discovery coach”, but we’ve known that Petra Wille is special for a long time. One of the co-organisers of the MtP Engage conference in Hamburg (and a featured speaker at the Leadership Forum this year), she gave a talk a while back on Egoless Product Development. We wanted to [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Don’t Worry About Being Cool with Petra Wille appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Ken Norton needs no introduction. Now Senior Operating Partner at GV (we still slip up and call it Google Ventures), Ken was a CTO and CEO/founder before he joined Yahoo! to run its Product organisation. He then joined Google, where he worked on Maps, Calendar and Docs. Ken has also been a keynote speaker, giving [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Too Many Product Managers with Ken Norton appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Christopher Nheu (Head of Product at Australia-based Mad Paws) came to our attention after speaking at ProductTank Sydney. His presentation, Product Thinking for Marketplace Startups, does an amazing job of documenting the differences between pipes and platforms, the three fundamental forces of marketplaces, and the specific challenges of catering to customers concerned with the well-being of [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Marketplace Thinking and Fur Babies with Christopher Nheu appeared first on Mind the Product.

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The founder and CEO of NYC-based Motivate Design, Mona Patel, first came to our attention after appearing on another great podcast, Jonathan Courtney and Jake Knapp’s Product Breakfast Club. She spoke about running and scaling an agency, which was interesting – but what really got us was her unique take on the Discovery process. Her [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Breaking the Rules and Generating Insights with Mona Patel appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Ben Newell was the first guest we got by recommendation. After giving a talk on persuasion techniques at ProductTank Dallas-Fort Worth, it was a no-brainer for us: this is a key skill for anyone whose job includes wrangling tricky stakeholders, herding teams or presenting to senior management – an area where in which we’d all like [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: How to Persuade People with Ben Newell appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Thor Mitchell knows his bones – he’s an ex-Google product manager (Maps and Google+ APIs) and was most recently the Chief Product Officer at Crowdcube. Following a talk at ProductTank Bristol, he joined us to chat about the advice he gives both to aspiring product managers and to those angling for leadership positions. Quote of [...] Read more »

The post Podcast: Moving Up the Career Ladder with Thor Mitchell appeared first on Mind the Product.

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Earlier this year, I had the chance to speak at Mind the Product/Engage in Hamburg. It was a fantastic experience, and an opportunity I didn’t want to waste. In preparation, I took the chance to give the talk a few dry-runs at ProductTanks across the UK – and I learned something that was obvious, but [...] Read more »

The post Ear Worm: the Product Experience Podcast is here appeared first on Mind the Product.

The Product Experience: Recent Episodes

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