A Random Jog - Latest Comments

Re: How to Create an Awesome Product Introduction Video

Laura — Tue, 02 Feb 2016 14:06:41 -0000

I have an idea for you. You should charge people to look at their introduction video ideas and to make suggestions on how to improve them, if needed.

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Joshua Duncan — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 21:03:59 -0000

Thanks Brian!

Agree, Jason Cohen and Mark Suster are no-brainers. I have not been following Practical eCommerce but will check it out.

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Nobody — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 12:24:15 -0000

Of these 4, Stratechery is my favorite. Here's a few from my Feedly list.

http://blog.asmartbear.com/ (Jason Cohen)

http://www.bothsidesoftheta... (Mark Suster. No-brainer.)

http://www.practicalecommer...

-Brian

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Joshua Duncan — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 12:15:42 -0000

Thanks for sharing Jim. I got several similar responses on Twitter, mostly around free subscriptions. I had a couple friends see value in the Stratechery newsletter and sign up for that as well.

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Jim Holland — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 11:18:55 -0000

Josh - This is a great list and I also subscribe to Flipbord focusing post and articles on Product Strategy, Startups, Innovation and all things product.

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Joshua Duncan — Wed, 13 Jan 2016 07:25:00 -0000

Thanks Ron. That's a good one. Just signed-up.

Re: Product Management Resources Worth Paying For

Ron Dovich — Mon, 11 Jan 2016 08:37:38 -0000

The daily newsletter Versioning. Great curated list of tech topics. https://www.sitepoint.com/v...

Re: Curiosity and Product

Joshua Duncan — Mon, 08 Jun 2015 17:17:51 -0000

Thanks Roger. Missed that one!

Re: Curiosity and Product

Roger L. Cauvin — Sun, 07 Jun 2015 02:00:54 -0000

You haven't been reading my blog :-) Self-driven learning is the primary talent that most great product managers possess. I break it down to two of the four learning types that researcher Martin Rayala enumerates: http://blog.cauvin.org/2013....

Re: Don’t Worry About Failing Fast, Worry About Learning Fast

David Telleen-Lawton — Mon, 23 Mar 2015 12:00:30 -0000

Nate,
I disagree about your characterizing the stories as "about failing repeatedly". I read nothing about failure in either one of those. For the Second City group, it sounds like you assumed failure, but the story was about getting feedback on the product during product development.

Granted, the potter story was not about getting feedback from the "customer", but it still provided a strong point that by engaging with the product (and the implied self feedback) was better than just thinking about the product with no engagement...okay, kind of a stretch, but a great story anyway.

I heartily agree that the focus on failure is misplaced..."fail fast" is trying to be cute about not worrying about failing as long as you are getting feedback...unfortunately the feedback (learning) part does get overlooked too often.

Re: Don’t Worry About Failing Fast, Worry About Learning Fast

Joshua Duncan — Tue, 17 Mar 2015 11:48:17 -0000

Nate,

Thanks for the great comment.

You are spot on that in both cases the learning was implied and did not go into specifics. I think in the case of the pottery parable, you could speculate that the act of learning is part of the class along with the teacher and other students, Being able to see your end result and those of of your peers would give you the real time feedback necessary to improve.

The BuzzFeed example is a bit more tangible. Their ability to A/B test content, titles, etc. allows them to quickly learn what works and what doesn't. They key being that their organization is aligned to support experiments and willing to fail in the short term to reap the rewards of this learning and improvements.

A lot of companies are not built this way and do not build practices that support.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

Josh

Re: Don’t Worry About Failing Fast, Worry About Learning Fast

Nate Allen — Tue, 17 Mar 2015 09:02:51 -0000

Joshua,

Love the message. I think that failure without learning is just hardship. However, both examples you give are stories about failing repeatedly. The learning is simply implied. In fact, in the pottery parable, the students who are encouraged to iterate are told nothing about learning.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on ways to internalize failure and determine what to do next to improve.

Re: You are Blind to Change

Adriana Beal — Sat, 07 Mar 2015 10:31:48 -0000

Joshua, I haven't read Bozeman's book, so I don't know if he addresses the "how" of not becoming blind to change, but Liz Wiseman has a book that offers good answers: Rookie Smarts: Why Learning Beats Knowing in the New Game of Work. In it, Wiseman explains how, in times of uncertainty and in situations that demand innovation, a "rookie mindset" can be the secret to avoiding blind spots, and shares valuable tactics to get there (turning to others, as Roger suggested, is a critical one, but there are other things that can be very useful too, which she details in the book).

Re: You are Blind to Change

Joshua Duncan — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 14:03:53 -0000

Roger,

Thanks for the comment and really good point!

Things are often moving fast and too complex to be aware of everything that is going on. Being able to trust others to keep you informed of what is really happening is huge. The opposite is a culture that hides information and only presents a positive picture no matter what is really happening.

Re: You are Blind to Change

Roger L. Cauvin — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 10:28:46 -0000

No doubt. Great leaders have are aware - particularly of how they and their work products are perceived. This awareness is not always innate; great leaders turn to others to help them "see" past blind spots.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

PBZ — Wed, 14 Jan 2015 13:58:54 -0000

I see how this is funny to many people, but it actually made me sad! I'm a fairly emotional person, and it hurt to see someone "punished." And "Derrick" looked so sad to begin with. I have family members who suffer from depression and it just struck a bad chord with me. But, that's just me. Not saying it shouldn't have been made.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

jwog — Sat, 30 Aug 2014 17:12:47 -0000

Don't you know sarcasm when you see it?

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

Nowhere — Wed, 30 Jul 2014 19:31:27 -0000

Actually I had to search to find out if it was a damn phishing scheme that somehow I clicked into. If you hover over Punish Derrick nothing shows up in the link so I think, roh oh. Groupon are morons, maybe boring proper programming isn't such a bad Idea hmm? Maybe why you stuck going nowhere.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 17:39:01 -0000

And again the irony is lost on you.... Tom, you have nothing to fear from me. The only thing mighty about me is my mouth, And who are you calling anonymous. I'm using my picture and full name.

I am open to having a civil discourse as long as you are willing to open your mind a bit to the reality of human nature. I'm not shutting down communication here. I'm just trying to illustrate much larger points.

First, I disagree that words, cartoons, video games, movies, etc. create a culture of violence. The social science literature on this common thesis promulgated in the media is very suspect. There is hardly any correlation yet you see no problem presenting this view as fact while advocating to curtail behavior. I'm as offended by your manipulation as you are offended by my rhetorical style. My position is let people live their lives without some blowhard who chooses to believe in false dogmas telling them they are wrong.

The other point is guys like you don't know how to deal with belligerent jerks like me, a point our interactions makes very clear. The best you can do is moral posturing and threats of legal action. Your message implies you are going to call the cops on me! Really??? Why? For being honest about what I felt about your opinion? I made no threat, yet you feel threatened to "note" my "personal attack"? See how quickly two guys talking turned bad. Now imagine this happening on a much larger scale.

I find it very interesting that a guy promoting peace chooses such violent metaphors to curtail speech they disagree with. Words like " vituperative", "assail", "aggression", "bullying" and "personal attack" are rooted in actual violence and seem to advocate suppressing me with force of law if necessary. Nothing in my post asserts that I would every harm a body, or use force to impose my will, but yours sure did.

Are you capable of laughing at the absurdity of the situation? A guy called you jerk and you sound like you would throw him in the gulag if you could.

Let's assume for a minute we are both reasonable men. Let me share my experience with you.

I was in Serbencia shortly after the war in Bosnia. I saw the results of a culture that bused Muslims men and young boys out to a field, riddled them with bullets, and bulldozed their crumpled bodies into graves. Now that's a culture of violence. That isn't the result of slapstick entertainment media "desensitizing" people into a "culture" of violence. It happens because some people will do anything to enforce their will on others in the name of god, justice, or some other higher purpose.

What happened there was pure, unopposed evil rooted in intolerance. How do you deal with that? Once you experience that kind of horror it makes your think, wow... what's real? Let's focus on that instead of focusing on trivial things that really have no consequence.

What I am advocating for is tolerance so we don't become a society that prohibits free speech. Do you really want to become a police state that criminalizes being honest about how you feel and choose to express yourself? I hope to avoid that, and I think you do to. We just have to be honest with ourselves first and get to the root of the issue.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

Tom K — Thu, 15 May 2014 17:20:15 -0000

Mr. O'Grady

It's ironic that my benign and polite post about the normalization of violence elicits your vituperative retort that assails my character and impugns my dignity. You've made erroneous judgments about me without even knowing me.

Your post exemplifies how trivializing violence impacts society in a most disturbing fashion. It promotes anonymous aggression, intimidation and bullying in a forum that COULD aide discourse, understanding and accord.

Your personal attack is well noted, Mr. O'Grady.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 02:38:36 -0000

Very perceptive of you Giles, or can I call you Spock?

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 02:37:35 -0000

Because I signed you back up, Tom.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 02:36:33 -0000

Finally, a true enlightened individual on this thread.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 02:35:10 -0000

So bold of you to say so noname.

Re: Groupon Wants You To Punish Derrick

John W. O'Grady — Thu, 15 May 2014 02:34:49 -0000

rtfm, I wouldn't use my real name either if I made comments like this. Don't you know it's the CEO in the skit having a little fun with their employees?