## Metadata - Author: [[John cutler|John Cutler]] - Full Title:: TBM 317: Yes, Or... - Category:: #🗞️Articles - Document Tags:: [[Product management|Product Management]], - URL:: https://cutlefish.substack.com/p/tbm-317-yes-or - Finished date:: [[2024-10-26]] ## Highlights > **"Be customer-obsessed."** > Obsession leads to distortion. > **"Teams need clear objectives!"** > Having overly clear objectives can lead to tunnel vision and close doors prematurely. > **"Think big. Start small."** > There’s a lot of money in making a better mousetrap. > **"You can’t improve what you don’t measure."** > Not everything measurable matters, and not everything that matters is measurable. > **"Focus on outcomes, not outputs."** > You can’t make shots you don’t take. > **"Lead by example!"** > Don't encourage anyone to blindly copy you. > **"Hire for culture fit!"** > Over-emphasizing culture fit leads to homogeneity and stifles diversity. > **"Be proactive!"** > Avoid solving problems that don’t exist yet. Acting too early creates new problems. > **"Always seek feedback!"** > Too much feedback can spin you in circles. > **"Be transparent!"** > Radical transparency can overwhelm or demoralize teams, especially with incomplete information. > **"Continuous improvement!"** > Sometimes, it's better to start over. Don’t polish a fundamentally flawed system. > **"Never give up!"** > Avoid the [[Sunk cost fallacy|Sunk cost fallacy]]. > **"Build, measure, learn."** > Building is often the most expensive way to learn what you need to learn. > **"Focus on keeping your most valuable team members!"** > If the only reason they stay is your constant effort to keep them, you've likely already lost their best work and motivation. > **"Think in first principles."** > Don’t alienate team members who excel at pattern recognition and have domain experience. First principles aren’t the best way to solve all problems. > **"Always validate with data."** > Waiting for perfect evidence may cause you to miss the market window. > **"Don’t let stakeholders push features onto the roadmap."** > Sometimes, the stakeholder relationship is more valuable (to customers) than a dud feature. > **"Continuously measure outcomes."** > A watched pot never boils. > **"Be an authentic leader!"** > Trying to be authentic often makes you inauthentic. Some situations require you to act the part. > **"Always be available for the team."** > Boundaries are important. > **"Be perpetually optimistic!"** > Unwavering optimism glosses over real risks and setbacks. > **"Always be learning!"** > Don’t let curiosity always distract you from mundane but important tasks at hand. > **"It's all about the product."** > Good, not great, products paired with excellent marketing and operations often win. > **"Hire A-players only."** > Competency comes in various flavors, many of which you may miss or overlook. > **"Good product managers share context; bad product managers share ideas."** > Sometimes people will welcome your ideas. > **"The product manager must deeply understand all aspects of the business."** > Partner with specialists and synthesize their insights instead of trying to master every domain. > **"Balance is important!"** > Imbalance can free us from stagnation. > **"It depends!”** > Except when it doesn’t—some truths are immune to context. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01jb4mpz8eryhear96amz21a6m))