This is the second to-last newsletter before my annual writing break for the holidays. After next week's issue, I will return to your inboxes on January 31, 2025. Product Practice #346 My Most Popular Ideas of 2024 READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Dec 13, 2024 READING TIME 3 min & 25 sec Dear Reader, These five ideas had the biggest impact on my own thinking or my readers and consulting clients throughout 2024: Treating Ways of Working Like Products The core message of my talk at Product at Heart...
9 days ago • 3 min read
Product Practice #345 Four Decision Tree Frameworks Product Managers Need to Know READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Dec 6, 2024 READING TIME 2 min & 54 sec Dear Reader, As a highly visual thinker, decision trees are one of my favorite ways to support product teams in making real progress and bringing structure to my thinking. Today, I want to share four of my favorite tree structures and use an outside-in view on Eventbrite to illustrate their usage. MECE Trees The MECE tree structure, invented by...
15 days ago • 2 min read
Product Practice #344 Product Strategy Stackvs. Decision Stack (Part 2) READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Nov 29, 2024 READING TIME 4 min & 49 sec Dear Reader, This is part 2 in my mini-series on putting the Product Strategy Stack and Decision Stack side-by-side. You can read part 1 here. Measuring Progress Here's where the frameworks diverge more significantly. The Decision Stack uses "Objectives" as its connecting measuring element between "the work" and Strategy. At the same time, the Product...
23 days ago • 4 min read
Product Practice #343 Product Strategy Stackvs. Decision Stack (Part 1) READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Nov 22, 2024 READING TIME 3 min & 01 sec Dear Reader, Everyone loves a Product Strategy framework. But choosing between the Product Strategy Stack and Decision Stack isn't straightforward. Both put long-term artifacts like a Vision and Mission at the top and link their different elements. But knowing which works best for you requires decoding their layers. Long-term Ambitions Both stacks agree:...
30 days ago • 2 min read
Product Practice #342 The OKR Trap:Reporting vs. Progress READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Nov 12, 2024 READING TIME 3 min & 04 sec Dear Reader, Similar to being focused on Discovery motions, but missing Discovery decisions, simply filling in OKR templates will lead to reporting, but not measuring progress. OKRs that report numbers try to get a template-based Objective right and define a Key Result as something with a number. OKRs that measure progress take care of the hard conversations through...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Product Practice #341 The Context Matrix READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Nov 8, 2024 READING TIME 2 min & 11 sec Dear Reader, Every level of product management involves two areas: creating context and making sense of it. While creating the context partially depends on the environment you work in, making sense of the context mainly depends on the hard skills a product team has. For Product Strategy, the context consists of internal and external data points about the market, your capabilities, how...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Product Practice #340 How to Navigate Product Discovery Like a Map READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Nov 1, 2024 READING TIME 4 min & 51 sec Dear Reader, “We need to complete all six Discovery phases in order." "Let's perfect that JTBD statement before we talk to users." "Our process requires detailed one-pagers before any customer interviews." Does this sound familiar? These are examples of dogmatic defaults: Teams cycling through the same tools in the same order, regardless of context. While...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Product Practice #339 How to predict the future of your OKRs (and why it matters) READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Oct 25, 2024 READING TIME 3 min & 32 sec Dear Reader, Ever sat in an OKR review meeting feeling like you're just going through the motions or reporting without meaning? You're not alone. As a Head of Product, I've been there too. But what if I told you there's a way to make your OKRs truly useful for decision-making? Let's dive in. The power of predicting the future One of my favorite...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Product Practice #338 Product at Heart 2024Keynote Recording and Slides READ ON HERBIG.CO PUBLISHED Oct 18, 2024 READING TIME 2 min & 17 sec Dear Reader, Stepping on stage at Product at Heart 2024 five weeks ago was a definitive highlight of my year so far. I loved bringing a message I deeply care about to an audience I also care about. Without further ado, I'm happy to share the full recording of this keynote with you: Watch the Video You can also get the slides and templates I shared during...
2 months ago • 2 min read