Kassen Qian

2. Put Everything in Writing — Then Tier It : Executive summaries, wiki pages, PRDs, and launch plans are four types of documents that can aid in operational excellency.

You’re a super user: Eat your own dog food and talk to people who do too.

There are idiosyncrasies of software development that are invariant even as technique and technology improves, and so you are bound to recapitulate these patterns eventually.

You’re an engineer: companies want PMs who can roll with engineers, speak the same language, grasp the technical concepts (and problems and opportunities) quickly, and by so doing gain the respect and trust of the people actually moving bits around. The best PMs are culturally engineers

6. Always Be Grooming New Leaders: Articulate the mission early in candidate interviews. Hire listeners that display intellectual curiosity. Offer high-performing PMs opportunities to onboard others.

In particular, not all software is a Web app ... We discount the volume of, for instance, embedded systems and one-off infrastructure.

2. Strong Product Leadership: in strong product companies, the product leaders are among the most impactful leaders in the company.

Side benefit of this method: by forcing multiple iterations on a PR/FAQ, you implicitly gain the approval of everyone who reviews it, demands iterations on it, and subsequently approves it. This then means that when a product passes the PR/FAQ process but subsequently fails in the market, people are more likely to take collective responsibility.

Good product managers think in terms of delivering superior value to the market place during inbound planning and achieving market share and revenue goals during outbound. Bad product managers get very confused about the differences amongst delivering value, matching competitive features, pricing, and ubiquity.