Culture of urgency—people feel like they are in wartime, and that if they don't find a way to move fast, then bad things could happen.
Culture of high‐integrity commitments—teams understand the need for (and power of) commitments, but they also insist on high‐integrity commitments.
Culture of empowerment—teams feel as though they have the tools, resources, and permission to do whatever is necessary to meet their commitments.
Culture of accountability—people and teams feel a deep responsibility to meet their commitments. Accountability also implies consequences—not necessarily being terminated, except in extreme and repeated situations, but more likely consequences to their reputations among their peers.
Culture of collaboration—while team autonomy and empowerment is important, teams understand their even higher need to work together to accomplish many of the biggest and most meaningful objectives.
Culture of results—is the focus on output or is the focus on results?
Culture of recognition—teams often take their cues from what is rewarded and what is accepted. Is it just the team that comes up with the great new idea that gets rewarded, or the team that delivered on a brutally tough commitment? And what is the message if missing a commitment is seen as easily excusable?
So, if these characteristics help define each culture, this begs some pretty tough questions:
Is an innovation culture in any way inherently at odds with an execution culture?
Does a strong execution culture lead to a stressful (or worse) work environment?
What types of people, including leaders, are attracted to, and needed, for each type of culture?
I can tell you that there do exist companies that are very strong at both consistent innovation and execution. Amazon is one of the best examples. However, it's also well known that the Amazon work environment is not for the faint of heart. I've found that most companies that are exceptionally strong at execution are pretty tough places to work.
In my experience working with companies, only a few companies are strong at both innovation and execution. Many are good at execution but weak at innovation; some are strong at innovation and just okay at execution; and a depressing number of companies are poor at both innovation and execution (usually older companies that lost their product mojo a long time ago, but still have a strong brand and customer base to lean on).
In any case, what I hope you and your team will consider doing is assess yourself along these dimensions of innovation and execution, and then ask yourselves where you would like to be, or think you need to be, as a team or company.
Acknowledgments
The very nature of putting together this book on sharing best practices from the industry's best product companies means that I have learned from a great many exceptional people. I have been especially fortunate to have had the chance to work with and for some of our industry's best product minds and companies. I have learned from each one of these people, but some of them have made such a deep impression on me that I must thank them here.
First and foremost, my partners at the Silicon Valley Product Group. They are my colleagues now precisely because I have been so impressed with their talents and have learned so much from each of them over the years: Lea Hickman, Martina Lauchengco, and Chris Jones.
I must also thank Peter Economy, Jeff Patton, and Richard Narramore for their help reviewing and improving this book.
The genesis of this book was material developed at Netscape Communications. Netscape provided an unparalleled learning opportunity, and I gained much insight about product and leadership by working for and with truly brilliant minds, including Marc Andreessen, Barry Appelman, Jennifer Bailey, Jim Barksdale, Peter Currie, Eric Hahn, Basil Hashem, Mike Homer, Ben Horowitz, Omid Kordestani, Keng Lim, Bob Lisbonne, Debby Meredith, Mike McCue, Danny Shader, Sharmila Shahani, Ram Shriram, Bill Turpin, and David Weiden.
At eBay, I have to especially credit Marty Abbott, Mike Fisher, Chuck Geiger, Jeff Jordan, Josh Kopelman, Shri Mahesh, Pierre Omidyar, Lynn Reedy, Stephanie Tilenius, and Maynard Webb.
Each one of these people has directly influenced me and informed specific topics in this book, either by their explicit help and coaching or simply by way of their leadership and actions that I was fortunate enough to witness first hand.
While my time working for these exceptional companies was an invaluable learning experience, I found that as I began working with tech teams in my advisory and coaching work as part of SVPG, I benefited greatly by getting a chance to meet and work with the product leaders at many of the very best companies in our industry. There are simply too many people to list, but they know who they are, and I am grateful to every one of them.
This book is based on material produced for a blog and newsletter that I have published for many years, and each and every topic was improved thanks to feedback and comments from literally thousands of product managers and product leaders from every corner of the globe. I thank everyone who has read, shared, and commented on these articles.
Finally, those people who know the culture of the companies I've worked at understand that many very long hours were involved, and I could not have contributed to these companies without the support of my wife and children.
About the Author
Before founding the Silicon Valley Product Group to pursue his interests in helping others create successful products through his writing, speaking, advising, and coaching, Marty Cagan served as an executive responsible for defining and building products for some of the most successful companies in the world, including Hewlett‐Packard, Netscape Communications, and eBay.
Marty began his career with a decade as a software engineer at Hewlett‐Packard Laboratories, conducting research on software technology and building several software products for other software developers.
After HP, Marty joined a then‐young Netscape Communications Corporation, where he had the opportunity to participate in the birth of the Internet industry. Marty worked directly for co‐founder Marc Andreessen, where he was vice president for Netscape's platform and tools, and later e‐commerce applications, and worked to help Internet startups and Fortune 500 companies alike understand and use the newly emerging technology.
Marty was most recently senior vice president of product and design for eBay, where he was responsible for defining products and services for the company's global e‐commerce trading site.
During his career, Marty has personally performed and managed most of the roles of a modern software product organization, including engineering, product management, product marketing, user experience design, software testing, engineering management, and general management.
As part of his work with SVPG, Marty is an invited speaker at major conferences and top companies across the globe.
Marty is a graduate of the University of California at Santa Cruz with bachelor of arts degrees in computer science and applied economics (1981) and of the Stanford University Executive Institute (1994).
Learning More
The Silicon Valley Product Group website (www.svpg.com) is designed as a free and open resource where we share our latest thoughts and learnings from the world of technology‐powered products.
You will also find examples of the techniques described in the book (see www.svpg.com/examples) as well as a current recommended reading list (see www.svpg.com/recommended‐reading).
For aspiring product managers, we hold occasional intense training sessions, usually in San Francisco, New York City, and London. Our goal is to share the most recent learnings and to provide a career‐defining experience for aspiring tech product managers (see www.svpg.com/public‐workshops/).
For companies that believe they need dramatic and meaningful change across their technology and product organization to competitively produce technology‐powered products, we also offer custom, on‐site engagements.
You can find more information on these various options and learn more about the SVPG partn
ers that provide these services, at www.svpg.com.
Index
A
A/B testing
Adobe consistent product innovation by
Creative Suite and Creative Cloud of
Lea Hickman of
AdWords (Google)
Agile at Scale
Agile methods as conducive to consistent innovation
inadequate application of
leveraging the core principles of
product owner role in the
in support of
waterfall process versus
Airbnb
Amazon consistent product innovation by
customer-centric culture of
customer letter technique used by
product leadership of
Analytics for quantitative value testing
Andreessen, Marc
API platforms customer discovery through
developer misbehavior on public
Apple Camille Hearst of
consistent product innovation by
consumer device products by
Architecture alignment of product team with
CTO responsibility to build strong
technical debt
Arnold, Kate
Audible
Autonomy accountability tied to
company culture emphasis on leverage versus
as principle of product team
product team structured for
relationship between successful scaling and product team
B
BBC Alex Pressland of the
“BBC Out of Home” product of
Bezos, Jeff
Blockbuster
Business accounting/finance skills
Business cases fatal flaw
Business objectives CEO's responsibility for
for each product team
OKR (objectives and key results) of products for
See also Product Team objectives
Business results/outcomes execution culture with focus on
focusing on outputs instead of
leveraging technology for
OKR (objectives and key results) of products
outcome-based roadmaps
product manager's deep knowledge of your
Business strategy aligning product strategy with
focusing on outputs versus outcomes
Business viability risk
Business viability testing business development
challenges related to
customer success
description of
finance
legal
marketing
sales
security
C
CEO of the Product
Certified Scrum Product Owner class
Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) being CEO of the product
interest in business viability testing by
responsibility for organization's objectives and key results
VP product position interview with
who drives the product vision
Chief Information Officers (CIOs)
Chief Technology Officers (CTOs) comparing CIOs and
six major responsibilities of a
leading the technology organization
VP product position interview with
See also VP engineering
Collaboration company culture of
Lean and Agile principles
product team
Communication of product learnings
of product strategy across the organization
story map as technique for
Company culture customer-centric
emphasis on autonomy versus leverage in
loss of velocity due to consensus
See also Product culture
Computer programming skills
Concierge testing technique
Consistent innovation Agile methods as conducive to
challenge of maintaining
definition of
ideas leading to
top reasons for loss of
Consumer device products
Consumer products discovery program
Consumer-service products
Contextual inquiry
Continuous discovery and delivery concept
Corporate courage
Creative Suite and Creative Cloud (Adobe)
Cue, Eddy
Culture. See Company culture; Product culture
Customer-centric culture
Customer discovery program techniques applied to consumer products
applied to customer-enabling tools
applied to platform/API products
power of reference customers
for qualitative value testing
recruiting the prospective reference customers
single target market
when to use the
Customer-enabling tools
Customer interviews different forms of the
return on your time
as important skill to have
tips on getting the most out of
Customer letter technique Amazon's applications of the
description of the
Nordstrom's application of the
Customer misbehavior technique
Customer problems problems versus solutions
opportunity assessment technique to identify the
Customers alignment of product team with users or
as always dissatisfied and wanting more
building relationship with prospective
concierge test technique used with
obsessing over competitors rather than your
opportunity assessment technique to identify target market
problem of too late product validation by
product evangelism by giving great demos to
product evangelism by sharing the pain of
product manager's deep knowledge of the
reference
unaware of what is possible with technology products
Customer success strategy
D
Data analysts
Data knowledge
Dedicated product teams
Delivery managers description of and need for
loss of velocity tied to lack of
Scrum Master role of
See also Product delivery
Demand testing techniques landing page demand test
reasons for using
Demos product evangelism by giving great
user test versus walkthrough versus product
Design. See Product design
Design sprint technique, See Discovery Sprint technique.
Developer misbehavior technique
Discovery coaches
description of the
to ensure team is on the same page
to identify all the big risks
mistake to focus on solutions instead of problems
opportunity assessment
startup canvas
story map used for
See also Risks
Discovery ideation techniques concierge test
customer interviews
customer misbehavior
description of the
developer misbehavior
hacks days
story map used for
when to use the
See also Ideas
Discovery pivot
Discovery planning techniques customer discovery program
overview of the
story map
Discovery prototyping techniques description of the
feasibility prototype
hybrid prototype
live-data prototype
types of prototypes for
user prototype
See also Prototypes
Discovery Sprint technique
&nbs
p; Discovery testing techniques overview of the
in risk-averse companies
testing business viability
testing demand
testing feasibility
testing usability
testing value
See also Risks
Doerr, John
Durable product teams
E
eBay e-commerce of
“Everything Else” category of
Empowerment accountability tied to
company culture of
innovation tied to product teams with
product team accountability and
Engineers being brought in too late to product development process
innovation tied to discovery participation by
loss of velocity tied to not including them in discovery
making them feel like missionaries not mercenaries
relationship between product managers and
tech lead role of
test automation
Enterprise companies consistent product innovation challenge of
Ethical risk
Etsy
Evangelizing by CTOs for technology organization
by product management
the product vision
Execution product culture assessing your company's
characteristics of