119: John Fontenot and The Urgency of “Never Assume”

Never Assume

You can’t trust anyone. Even yourself. Product managers have to keep an open mind, be empathetic, and work in a world of uncertainty. That uncertainty extends especially to ourselves and our own assumptions. So my guest John Fontenot has a warning – Never Assume!

John’s new book Never Assume: 10 Fatal Assumptions Great Product Managers Never Make is about the most common – and dangerous – assumptions product managers can make. How they lead to problems. And of course, to how we can overcome these assumptions.

In this episode, we go into depth on Never Assume, but we also cover other awesome topics:

* How John get into product in the first place.

* The lessons John got from studying agribiz as an undergraduate.

* The best way to get into that first product management job.

* His new offering for aspiring product managers at Path 2 Product.

Books John mentioned

John had a lot of books to recommend – many of them are mentioned in his book as well:

* Teresa Torres’ Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value

* David Bland’s Testing Business Ideas: A Field Guide for Rapid Experimentation

* Etiene Garbugli’s Solving Product: Reveal Gaps, Ignite Growth, and Accelerate Any Tech Product with Customer Research. John says this book is an undiscovered gem.

* Andy Grove’s Only The Paranoid Survive

* Richard Rumelt’s Good Strategy Bad Strategy

Connecting with John

* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnrfontenot/

* Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductFont

* Email:  [email protected].

Never Assume

You can’t trust anyone. Even yourself. Product managers have to keep an open mind, be empathetic, and work in a world of uncertainty. That uncertainty extends especially to ourselves and our own assumptions. So my guest John Fontenot has a warning – Never Assume!

John’s new book Never Assume: 10 Fatal Assumptions Great Product Managers Never Make is about the most common – and dangerous – assumptions product managers can make. How they lead to problems. And of course, to how we can overcome these assumptions.

In this episode, we go into depth on Never Assume, but we also cover other awesome topics:

* How John get into product in the first place.

* The lessons John got from studying agribiz as an undergraduate.

* The best way to get into that first product management job.

* His new offering for aspiring product managers at Path 2 Product.

Books John mentioned

John had a lot of books to recommend – many of them are mentioned in his book as well:

* Teresa Torres’ Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value

* David Bland’s <a href="https://amzn.