Aye Moah

ENOUGH WITH THE FRAMEWORKS! If you've worked with me, you've probably heard me say that. Product teams should be focused on driving outcome and impact, not falling in love with the process. And that's something Peter Yang from Roblox knows all too well. We had a great conversation on Next Gen Builders about how the PM role is evolving, how to use #AI to focus on more important work (like talking to customers), and more. Tune in to our conversation: https://lnkd.in/dY-AZh2s

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Product Market Fit, a new framework. I've been working on this for a little while now and figured it's time to "eat my own dogfood" and test it out in the market. In this framework I provide a visual outline of the journey from "day zero" to PMF. Along the way founders must iterate on their product as well as their market to close the Product Market Gap in order to get to PMF. More details in the article. Let me know what you think 🙏 https://lnkd.in/gyF8V--x

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A company’s product/technology org being called “EPD”, “PED” or some other acronym standing for "product, engineering, design" is a strong smell that the company is a political mess. If that org is called "R&D," it's a smell that means the company is run by finance/MBA people. Why finance, btw? "R&D" (research & development) is a legacy term — certain payroll/etc costs are tax deductible, based in the old-school manufacturing mindset that "product development" was just an investment or cost center, and not revenue-generating as it is in software.

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You know there's some momentum happening if Marty Cagan decides to write about a product topic you've been at work trying to enable for years. Love to see it, and BIG shout out to Stacey Langer for providing her expertise in this article! 🧘‍♀️ Here are a few other pros that came to mind for the product model: 1. The government product model makes product (public) value and risk management possible. Product risks—such as value, desirability, viability, and feasibility—are not risks that traditional project management models can effectively manage. Government agencies interact with the public through the services they offer, but government digital experiences are not always inherently valuable. It’s what these digital services do for users that create individual and public value. Building tech alone ≠ value. 2. Evidence-driven decision-making uses discovery, iterative delivery, and testing with actual end users, where you continuously learn. This enables many things, mainly building with your users while validating the solution direction. It can also enable an incremental funding option specifically for products/services (traditionally called ‘projects’) that are especially complex, high priority, and/or contain many unknowns. 3. Driving technology from a place of vision and strategy measured in outcomes that can align and even influence policy changes. 🤸‍♀️ Some realities in trying to adopt a product model in gov: 1. The word ‘product’ often can be confusing, especially when it doesn’t fully represent what is being built and managed. A lot, if not most, of the technology work happening in government often involves solving service design challenges. So, in gov products, you focus on solving for the end-to-end experience, which can mean processes and non-tech things. 2. Conway’s Law and government systems replicate the organizational structures in agencies, which are often siloed and isolated. This is often represented as 'legacy tech.' Much of the work in 'product' in government is modernizing legacy systems, which requires the same principles as the product model but often a different emphasis on its varied approaches. Not all products or digital services start from the same place; many are not greenfield. 3. Traditional ATO structures can stop the product operating model in its tracks. To overcome this, it is important to integrate the ATO into the product model, utilizing a ‘continuous ATO’ operating model. But see point 2 above. At the end of the day, the product model isn’t a process you learn to implement and then just implement. It’s not just ‘Agile’ or Scrum or DevOps. Those methods can (or sometimes can’t) enable the product model. It's a mentality and discipline for continuously using new inputs to deliver value throughout a product's LIFE. It's a cultural change as much as an operating change, and there is no 'single way' to do it. However, operating from product thinking principles can help us start from the right place.

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Have you ever thought about how compliance laws are a lot like design systems? I recently spoke with Joe Toscano, founder of DataGrade, and he made a fascinating comparison. Joe explained how Brad Frost's atomic design methodology took an engineering approach to design: → Creating standardized elements → Templatizing them → Scaling them across a system This led to the rise of human interface guidelines (HIGs) from tech giants like Google, Apple, and IBM. But here's where it gets really interesting: Joe argued that privacy laws and regulations are like the ultimate HIG for product design. Just like how HIGs provide rules and constraints for design systems... Compliance laws set guardrails for what we can and can't do with user data. If we design something that isn't compliant, it doesn't matter how sleek the UI is. Legal requirements become the top-level framework we have to design within. That's what got Joe into studying laws - to understand this new "design system" for building products. So next time you're cursing a lengthy legal doc or trying to make sense of GDPR... Remember, it's all just part of the atomic design of compliance. — Do you agree with the analogy of compliance laws as the ultimate design system? Why or why not? Hear more of Joe's unique perspectives on the intersection of product, privacy, and law on the latest episode of The Minimum Viable Podcast.

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Where did all the product engineers go? Is there a new title in town? I'm talking about people who are skilled at traversing the entire stack (frontend/backend/api +) to build incredible product and ux. #engineering #recruiting #product

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🏆 Andre Marquet knows his stuff! What a fun podcast. I had the pleasure of chatting with him about #productstrategy and how #productoperations enables : 1️⃣ A winning product strategy 2️⃣ How you measure the success of a product strategy transformation 3️⃣ Just how do you get Product Operations stood up? ⭐ Building on that theme, join me in Lisbon for my NEW workshop "From 0-1: Standing Up Product Operations (with no new hires)" at the Productized conference Oct 2-4. https://lnkd.in/esiH8hff #productmanagement

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Last week, I sat down with Matt Bernier, a product leader at Temporal Technologies, focused on developer experience to talk about what he's learned about building trust between product & engineering and how to operate on pricing & packaging. Here's ~2 minutes on the challenges product managers have to be aware of when leading pricing & packaging initiatives. I loved this conversation, and we’ll release the entire interview soon on youtube. 3 ideas have stayed with me from this interview. 1. The power of analogy to foster trust and collaboration between teams, especially between product & engineering teams.🤝 2. The criticality of considering the developer experience when architecting SaaS for discoverability.🖥️ 3. The product manager's responsibility to deeply understand how their business grows — from how sales reps are incentivized, to margin objectives, to land & expand opportunities.📈 Matt has had an incredibly textured career as an operator, impacting product at companies across a wide range of industries: Communications (SendGrid, Twilio), Recruiting (Technical Integrity), Martech (mParticle), and application development (SpottedKoi, Delta Systems), and mobile device management (Cloudsync Technology, Good Technology). What always stands out to me about Matt is his ability to methodically improve processes via a commitment to being a great collaborator in technical environments. #pricing #packaging #b2bsaas #monetization

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Take it from me, there’s no better way to learn excellent and practical ways to overhaul your experimentation efficacy! Erin makes critical thinking fun and highly accessible in this workshop, June 11:

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When working on larger projects and / or those with high outcome uncertainty, many org cultures (surprisingly pervasive even in many startups) tend to prioritize tackling low-hanging fruit or default to taking a consensus path ironically termed "the path of least resistance". This approach of solving easy sub-problems ("known unknowns" as Donald Rumsfeld fmr. US Sect of state, would have termed it) builds in sunk costs & illusions of progress, creating inertia to course correct. Most modern project or program operations turn out to be successful if we view them as a portfolio of risks (sorted by highest impact, high uncertainty to lowest impact, high uncertainty). Tackle the ones at the top first. Prove or disprove your hypotheses. Source of image: First round review #product #bets #operating #principles

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I've been thinking a lot about what separates good product from great product. I keep coming back to these 3 principles: 1) Instant. A great product delivers what the user wants, fast. 2) Frictionless. Every click or swipe or tap feels natural. Effortless. No need to stop and think "how do I do this?". Smooth, intuitive experiences win. 3) Personal. It's about making each user feel like the product was built just for them. Any more you'd think to add?

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Thought for the day for Investors and Founders. Every startup needs 3 people on the team; Tech visionary, Sales missionary, Product designer. The CEO should be an expert at one of these roles. You might think that a Founder CEO can fill all three roles, but that is rarely the case. You might think the startup can fill those roles later in the evolution. Maybe, but you lose so much time, and risk getting too far off track if you wait. You might think not having deep domain experience in the market they are targeting, isn't important. Thinking smart thoughts, and having a crisp pitch deck is NOT the same as grinding at the problem for years. If you don't see 3 strong people on the team that totally get those 3 roles, and people who have deep domain experience... don't invest.

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Today's market and expectations are pretty tough. From my conversations, I see that experienced product managers within companies are often under immense pressure, grappling with additional responsibilities, less senior support, and the need to demonstrate clear impact. It's also tough for folks trying to secure their next role, and it's clear that even the most seasoned professionals need robust support, more confidence, and advanced skills to get where they need to be. That's why I'm glad to lead another Advanced Product Management Cohort out of London, starting on June 11th. We have 6 spots left. Here’s what we cover: 1️⃣ Product Discovery & Strategic Thinking 2️⃣ Experimentation & Prioritisation 3️⃣ Product Leadership & Communication 4️⃣ Career Growth Framework - my personal favourite When you join Colab, you not only gain access to one live cohort (such as this one) but also to a comprehensive knowledge base, a library of tools, on-demand recordings and snippets, and bi-weekly career coaching on our platform. If you are interested, check out the full program details. https://lnkd.in/gCXka-D9 💰 Affordable payment plans are also provided. Feel free to DM me if you'd like to chat to see if it's right for you or how else Colab Cohorts can support you.

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Product for Engineers dropped another awesome post recently: How we decide what to build. It’s a beautiful building-in-public look at how PostHog goes about product development. There is so much to learn from this newsletter. I love it. https://lnkd.in/ewNBSpu4

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Starting with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is not just a phase; it's a strategic misstep most make unknowingly. If you're launching straight from MVP to full-scale production without iterative learning, you're doing it wrong. Here's why. MVPs are more than a launchpad. They are a goldmine of insights, a chance to deeply understand user needs and refine your solution. Skipping the iterative development process means missing out on critical feedback that can pivot your product from good to exceptional. The journey from MVP to production isn't linear; it's cyclical. Each iteration is an opportunity to learn, adapt, and enhance. Ignoring this cycle can lead to a product that, while functional, may not fully meet user expectations or exploit the market potential. Moreover, the MVP to production journey is about risk mitigation. Each iteration allows you to address issues on a smaller scale, saving time, resources, and, most importantly, your reputation. So, if your strategy skips these iterative learning cycles, it's time to rethink. Embrace the iterative journey from MVP to production. Leverage each phase as a stepping stone towards creating a product that not only meets but exceeds market expectations. Ready to transform your development strategy? Start by re-evaluating your approach to MVPs and embrace the power of iterative learning. Your future self (and product) will thank you.

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a note on intuition and building products (via mike knoop, founder - zapier, go follow him on twttr) -- Wisdom for founding teams is "talk to users". Over the last 10 years this has become the playbook for doing 0 to 1 work. As the advice became dogma, some founders forgot why it exists, and a new failure mode emerged: "the blind walk to product-market fit". YC popularized "talk to users" in response to the classic mistake of coming up with some idea in isolation, building in secret for months or years, and launching just to learn no one cares. Talking to users forces faster contact with reality. Your initial idea and and intuition are likely wrong in material ways, so you want to shrink the time to learn this. At Zapier, I tell teams to try and model this behavior: ship in the AM, demo to users in the PM. If you do this, you get 5-7 hits on reality per week compared to a team on a 2-week release process (or worse). This all makes sense and many founders conclude their idea, intuition, or experience don't really matter. They model finding pmf as y=mx+b where cycle time is "m" and the initial idea is "b". In this model, founder intuition gives them an initial head start but impact is quickly overtaken by iteration speed. This leads them to heavily discount or even outright ignore their own experience and intuition -- many get stuck doing a fast cycle, but ultimately directionless, traversal through the pmf maze. The modeling mistake here is the "m" term is decomposed into (iteration speed) * (intuition). Every time you make contact with reality, you learn something new. And you get to decide what to do with that new information. Should you ignore it? Update but carry on? Change directions entirely? This is why intuition is important. Your idea and experience do not just establish initial position on the Y-axis. They are a multiplier on every decision or change you make. The faster your iteration speed, the more overall impact your experience can have. If you're ideas are right, they are right faster. If they are wrong, they are wrong more obviously. All other things equal, founders with experience in a domain outperform blank-slate founders doing the blind walk.

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Chat with Miles Clements about building Linear For me companies are like design problems: you have context, constraints & goals unique to you. Then you look for a solution that has a good fit to your unique problems. The company problem also evolve over times the solution Directly applying what others have done doesn’t work that well, yet there is lot emphasis on playbooks, pattern matching and playing copying what other companies are doing in industry. https://lnkd.in/ghxjJwYU

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John Mark Nickels is a Senior Director of Product Management at Uber. Previously, he was Head of Product for Commercialization at Waymo and led product teams at DoorDash. JM is also a coach and advisor focused on conscious leadership. In our conversation, JM shares: 🔸 What is “conscious leadership” and how to practice it 🔸 Practical techniques for managing stress 🔸 How to sharpen your vision and strategy skills 🔸 The power of emotional intelligence in leadership 🔸 Lessons from working at Uber, Waymo, and DoorDash 🔸 Keys to living a successful and fulfilling life 🔸 Much more Listen now 👇 - YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gWwcewch - Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gABwfUbM - Apple: https://lnkd.in/g2q_yVuw Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for supporting the podcast: 🏆 Pendo.io — The only all-in-one product experience platform for any type of application: https://www.pendo.io/lenny 🏆 WorkOS — Modern identity platform for B2B SaaS, free up to 1 million MAUs: https://workos.com/ 🏆 Vanta — Automate compliance. Simplify security: https://vanta.com/lenny Some key takeaways: 1. Take the time to define what truly matters to you—your personal “objective function.” Reflect on your values and long-term goals. Ask yourself, “What will matter most to me in five years?” Use this clarity to guide your daily decisions, prioritizing relationships and experiences over temporary achievements. 2. Conscious leadership involves becoming more aware of your interior world—your thoughts, emotions, and biases. Recognize that everyone has influence, regardless of their formal role or title. Take responsibility for how you impact those around you by asking yourself daily, “How am I influencing others?” Cultivating this awareness is the first step toward being a more effective leader. 3. While optics matter (how you present your work is important), don’t let them overshadow the work itself. Focus on delivering value and making an impact. The best presentations are grounded in genuine passion for the work, not just flashy slides. 4. To improve your vision and strategy skills: a. Immerse yourself deeply in your domain for an extended period. Depth of knowledge allows you to understand nuances that surface-level knowledge won’t. b. Challenge the status quo by asking, “Why are things the way they are?” Break down existing assumptions and explore the underlying reasons behind them. c. Set aside quiet time to think about what the world will look like in 5 or 10 years. Use this reflection to create a vivid picture of your ideal future in your field. d. Once you have a solid vision, share it with your team. Engage in collaborative brainstorming sessions where everyone can contribute ideas and insights. Create a safe space for discussion where no idea is too outlandish.

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