022: How To Build Better Products Using Continuous Discovery

Welcome to episode #22 of IoT Product Leadership, a podcast featuring in-depth conversations with product leaders on what it takes to build great IoT products. I’m your host, Daniel Elizalde.     I’m very excited about this episode. My guest today is Teresa Torres. Teresa is a Product Discovery Coach helping companies establish proficient discovery practices.     I’ve known Teresa for many years and I consider her one of the top thought leaders in the Product space. In this episode, we talk about the importance of adopting a continuing discovery practice when building your IoT products.    This is an episode that no IoT Product Leader should miss.      About Teresa Torres:    Teresa Torres is a product discovery coach who helps product teams develop strong continuous discovery habits (a regular cadence of customer interviews, rapid prototyping, and assumption tests) and develop the critical thinking required to justify product decisions with these research activities.    Her work with clients is designed to improve the quality and speed of product decisions to ensure that companies are getting the most out of their product development efforts.   As a coach, Teresa helps  • Team leaders identify and remove organizational barriers to adopting continuous discovery practices • Product teams work collaboratively to make better product decisions • Individuals develop the skills necessary to implement a modern product discovery approach   Prior to working as a coach, Teresa was Vice President of Products at AfterCollege, an Internet startup that helps college students find their first job. She was CEO of Affinity Circles, an online community provider for university alumni associations and a social recruiting service used by Fortune 500 companies. She also held product and design roles at Become.com and HighWire Press.   Teresa has spoken at industry conferences including the Lean Startup Conference (San Francisco, CA), the Product Management Festival (Zurich, Switzerland), the Startup Product Summit (San Francisco, CA), Front (Salt Lake City, UT), Productized (Lisbon, Portugal), and SXSW (Austin, TX) on product management best practices. She was a workshop instructor at Mind the Product (San Francisco) and will be speaking at Mind the Product London this fall. She is the author of the product management blog www.ProductTalk.org and writes a column for Inc.com.    Teresa has a BS in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University and an MS in Learning and Organizational Change from Northwestern University.      Topics we discuss in this episode:   Teresa shares her background and about Product Talk. What Continuous Product Discovery is. How Product Leaders get buy-in from their company to invest in discovery. Incorporating rapid prototyping in discovery, considering the complexity of IoT solutions. Teresa’s 6 principles for effective product discovery: Start with empathy for your audience  Explore the problem space indefinitely  Map your way to clarity  Use theory as inspiration  Co-create solutions that meet the unique needs of your audience  Surface and test underlying assumptions  Advice for Product Leaders who are new at developing IoT solutions.   To learn more about Teresa and Product Talk: Product Talk Product Talk Academy Teresa on LinkedIn On Twitter @ttorres