Project Management

The Lifecycle of Goals: Research, Discover, Deliver, Monitor

Goals and OKRs, Product Discovery, Roadmaps and Planning

Product companies tend to manage the lifecycle of projects (AKA ideas) — from the moment the project/initiative is approved until it is shipped. But in a reality where most ideas fail to create value, it is far more important to manage the lifecycle of goals (what we’re attempting to achieve)— from the moment the goal […]

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Escaping the Vicious Cycle of Plan & Execute

Anti-Patterns, Frameworks and Tools, Product Operating Model, Roadmaps and Planning

Tell me if this sounds familiar: Well-thought-out strategies change seemingly every other quarter. 9-month projects that take two years to complete. Disgruntled managers talking about “low velocity”, “lack of ‘can do’ culture”. Skeptical employees talking about lack of vision, bad planning, politics. Spending lots of time on planning, replanning, scope-downs Disappointing launches that customers generally

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Building your project for learning AND execution

Frameworks and Tools, Product Discovery

In tech we have huge bias for execution – building things and launching them fast and with the right quality. A million underwhelming launches later, we now know we should focus on something else: Learning — systematically discovering the right product, market and business model. All execution and no learning exposes you to launching a great product

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Are You Building a Cathedral?

Product Discovery

There’s something inherently problematic about the way we plan our products and services. An uncomfortable truth that’s rarely stated. David M. Upton and Bradley R. Staats wrote the following on IT projects: “The fundamental problem with these systems is that for the most part, they’re constructed using what programmer and open source champion Eric Raymond

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