Product Talk · Teresa TorresDec 13, 2023
Dec 13, 2023 · 12 min
Teresa Torres profiles Thomas Groendal, a senior PM at Bluestone Analytics, whose intelligence-analysis products (DarkBlue and DarkPursuit) operate on the dark web with few users, privacy restrictions, and very long…
SVPG · Marty CaganDec 12, 2023
Dec 12, 2023 · 3 min
Marty Cagan clarifies a terminology problem in the product community: many people use "product leader" interchangeably with "product manager" or "product owner," which causes unnecessary confusion. He argues the two…
Lenny’s Newsletter · Free post♥ 231
Dec 12, 2023 · 11 min
Lenny Rachitsky's annual year-end roundup revisits his past newsletter posts and podcast episodes and reorganizes the best of them by reader job-to-be-done, such as sharpening product skills, growing a product, scaling…
Lenny’s Podcast108 min
Kim Scott · Dec 10, 2023
Key learnings- Radical candor means caring personally while challenging directly; missing the first yields obnoxious aggression, missing the…
- Don't ask 'Do you have any feedback for me?'; instead ask a specific question like 'What could I do or stop doing that would make…
- Give feedback immediately, in person or by phone rather than text or Slack, and use context, observation, result, next step…
Lenny’s Podcast89 min
Anuj Rathi · Dec 7, 2023
Key learnings- Design onboarding for the next-state user, treating new users as lazy, vain, and selfish, and carry the same value proposition…
- Pick one clear value proposition and follow it through the full journey instead of presenting everything the product does at once…
- Use working backwards PR FAQs not just for customer value but to align GTM, pricing, legal, and engineering timelines, and to…
Product Talk · Teresa TorresDec 6, 2023
Dec 6, 2023 · 25 min
Teresa Torres introduces opportunity solution trees as a visual tool that lets product trios map the paths from a desired outcome to customer opportunities, candidate solutions, and assumption tests. The article argues…
SVPG · Marty CaganDec 5, 2023
Dec 5, 2023 · 5 min
Marty Cagan argues that for product companies at scale, he knows of no reliable alternative to strong product leadership. He explains that founders who act as head of product eventually stop scaling, and that the common…
Lenny’s Newsletter♥ 121
Dec 5, 2023 · 18 min
Subscriber post — summary onlyLenny Rachitsky profiles Saturn, a calendar-centered social app for high school students that became a top App Store performer. The post draws five lessons from its founders on building viral consumer social products…
Lenny’s Podcast125 min
Ebi Atawodi · Dec 3, 2023
Key learnings- A vision should describe a picture of the future state, be lofty yet attainable, be free of today's technical limits, and be…
- Distinguish vision from mission: the vision is what the destination looks like, while the mission is the purpose and guiding…
- Write the vision as a 'once upon a time' story (current problem, a turning point, and the resulting changed world), or write the…
Lenny’s Podcast67 min
Inbal S · Dec 1, 2023
Key learnings- Engineers using AI tools need to shift from writing code to systems and architecture thinking, which lets junior developers spend…
- Don't adopt AI for its own sake; start from the customer problem and ask how AI can best solve it, rather than asking what to do…
- AI tools must fade into the background: any extra setup, asking, or waiting adds friction and developers will abandon the tool.
Lenny’s Podcast26 min
Interview Q Compilation · Nov 29, 2023
Key learnings- Ask 'To what do you attribute your success?' and watch for self-awareness and curiosity rather than an answer like 'luck' (Eeke…
- Ask 'What's the hardest thing you've ever done?' to learn how a candidate defines difficulty, how they overcame it, and how much…
- Use the teleportation-device 'Eigenquestion' exercise: candidates may ask only two questions, then must plan, revealing how they…
SVPG · Marty CaganNov 28, 2023
Nov 28, 2023 · 8 min
This FAQ, published by Marty Cagan after his book TRANSFORMED, answers recurring reader objections about moving from feature teams to empowered product teams. It argues that the product manager role changes rather than…
SVPG · Marty CaganNov 28, 2023
Nov 28, 2023 · 6 min
Marty Cagan responds to a public interview with Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky by examining alternatives to product managers. He defines product management as owning the value and viability of what gets built, and argues that…
Lenny’s Newsletter♥ 213
Nov 28, 2023 · 15 min
Subscriber post — summary onlyBobby Pinero, CEO of Equals, recounts how adding a freemium plan and removing onboarding friction initially spiked user counts but then stalled engagement, retention, and revenue. The team reversed course by…
Lenny’s Podcast115 min
Tom Conrad · Nov 26, 2023
Key learnings- Choose where to work by the people you'd collaborate with, not just the product; your satisfaction tracks team relationships more…
- Trust your gut about a team's values and working style early; Conrad says he has consistently sensed mismatches before joining…
- Build a model of the whole business equation (investment in, returns out, over a time horizon) so you can see which levers have…
Product Talk · Teresa TorresNov 22, 2023
Nov 22, 2023 · 10 min
Teresa Torres argues that opportunity solution trees, a simple visual map linking a desired business outcome to customer opportunities, solutions, and assumption tests, help product trios make better product decisions…
Lenny’s Podcast74 min
Paul Millerd · Nov 19, 2023
Key learnings- Notice whether you're consciously choosing your default path or simply inheriting it, including implicit contracts like working…
- Take a three-hour block during a workday, go for an aimless walk or revisit a childhood activity, and notice what emerges and…
- Ask yourself why you work beyond money, and examine the cultural scripts behind your answer about being a good person.
Product Talk · Teresa TorresNov 15, 2023
Nov 15, 2023 · 21 min
Teresa Torres and Hope Gurion walk through the seven most common reasons product teams say they have no time for discovery, and offer practical fixes for each. The core argument is that discovery should run in tandem…
Lenny’s Newsletter♥ 97
Nov 14, 2023 · 16 min
Subscriber post — summary onlyLenny Rachitsky surveys about 30 companies on when they hired their first product manager, finding the typical wait was two to three years, often before product-market fit. The post shows that someone always does PM…
Lenny’s Podcast108 min
Ramesh Johari · Nov 9, 2023
Key learnings- Marketplaces sell the removal of friction (transaction costs) rather than the underlying goods, and both sides are customers who…
- Don't build a marketplace before you have one: early on, find a bespoke value proposition that solves a real problem (e.g…
- Apply a scaled-liquidity smell test: if you don't have a lot of buyers and sellers, you're not yet a marketplace; if one side is…
Product Talk · Teresa TorresNov 8, 2023
Nov 8, 2023 · 12 min
Teresa Torres describes her Continuous Discovery Habits (CDH) community, built on the idea that people learn best in community rather than from reading alone. She explains why she shifted from being the expert to…
Lenny’s Newsletter♥ 225
Nov 7, 2023 · 13 min
Subscriber post — summary onlyThe post introduces DRICE, a two-stage prioritization method for product and growth teams. It starts with RICE scoring (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) to build a shortlist, then applies a deeper 30-minute DRICE…
Lenny’s Podcast113 min
Maggie Crowley · Nov 5, 2023
Key learnings- Great PMs simplify relentlessly: find the one thing to do and stick with it long enough to actually finish it.
- Read your documents out loud and cut anything complicated; if you can say it in conversation, write it that way.
- Follow up on results after launches by setting calendar reminders to check metrics weeks and months later, and share what you…
Lenny’s Podcast109 min
Bill Carr · Nov 2, 2023
Key learnings- Start product decisions from the customer's real problem and work backwards to the required solution, rather than starting from…
- Avoid compound metrics that blend several numbers into one index; track each important metric individually so you can see which…
- Organize teams around a single-threaded leader who owns the people, resources and roadmap for a durable area, rather than…
Lenny’s Newsletter · Free post♥ 204
Oct 31, 2023 · 11 min
Jake Fuentes, co-founder of Cascade, reflects on the lessons from shutting down his B2B data-visualization startup after four years. He argues that failure rarely gets studied carefully, and that several decisions which…
Lenny’s Podcast193 min
Eric Ries · Oct 29, 2023
Key learnings- Treat a startup as an experiment: state the hypothesis, identify the leap-of-faith assumptions, and design the cheapest test that…
- An MVP is defined by the hypothesis being tested, not by a fixed level of stripped-down quality; it can be a brochure, a…
- Quality is defined by the customer, so teams that don't know their customer can't really know what a quality bar means; get early…
Lenny’s Podcast102 min
Paul Adams · Oct 26, 2023
Key learnings- Before redesigning a product for AI, start from the core premise: why people use it and what problem it solves, then map what AI…
- Treat AI as a strategic shift rather than a feature; Intercom ripped up its strategy and rebuilt from first principles after the…
- Build real machine learning depth on the team, but spread AI skills across product teams instead of isolating AI work in a…
Product Talk · Teresa TorresOct 25, 2023
Oct 25, 2023 · 12 min
New product leaders often struggle with the shift from doing discovery and delivery themselves to leading teams and stakeholders. Two leaders from the Continuous Discovery Habits community share how they handled this…
Lenny’s Newsletter♥ 197
Oct 24, 2023 · 31 min
Subscriber post — summary onlyLenny Rachitsky closes his seven-part B2B series by answering how long reaching $1M ARR typically takes, which growth channels scale B2B companies, and when and how much to charge. He draws on interviews with founders…
Lenny’s Podcast132 min
Gina Gotthilf · Oct 19, 2023
Key learnings- Anchor the company in a mission people can rally behind; it helps with organic growth, hiring, and resisting short-term…
- Keep growth lean and avoid paid acquisition early, since rising CAC and dependence on paid users can become an addiction that is…
- Focus relentlessly on retention by asking whether the product delivers real value; users who find real value stick around.