Product Thinking

Another month, another host of great articles, listens, books and other finds from Product Thinking and around the internet. Here’s what you may have missed.

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Weekly newsletter: Lumber Prices, Second Jobs, Floppy Disks and Pax Romana: September Monthly Wrap
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

Bringing ideas from abstract concepts to reality is a critical part of product and design thinking. The better we understand how to do it, the better we can create the best experiences for our users.

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Weekly newsletter: Being Overconfident, Getting Stupider, and Banning NFTs: Monthly Wrap from July
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

It is easy to complicate our work. Many of the tools we use these days make it incredibly easy to add more and more with less and less effort. Steve Jobs knew that keeping things simple was the key to a good user experience. We can add two keyboards to an iPad, but users don’t need two keyboards to type on. We need to keep our work simple too. And we explore that in this episode.

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Weekly newsletter: The Importance of Simplicity: Keeping It Simple Early
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

This month we're reviewing Loved: How to Rethink Marketing for Tech Products by Martina Lauchengco. It is the latest book from SVPG and focuses on product marketing. So how does it stack up?

Overall, I was disappointed by Loved. I had hoped for a solid book on product marketing with insights or tidbits I could use as a product manager or product leader. I didn’t feel like I got that. It felt more like a heavily corporatized book, focused on the boardroom or consultant.

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Weekly newsletter: Loved: How to Rethink Marketing for Tech Products - A Book Review
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

Another month, another host of great articles, listens, books and other finds from Product Thinking and around the internet. Here’s what you may have missed.

Don't forget to subscribe at productthinking.cc
Weekly newsletter: Systems, Three-Body Problems, Resurrectionists and Yellowstone: August Monthly Wrap
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

It’s interesting to think about how much our pets influence us vs. how much they are a reflection of our existing preferences. I suspect it is both, though how much is an open question. We certainly can’t escape how our decisions shape our environment, which in turn shapes our decisions.

It seems like a stretch to say that dog owners take more risks and conform to their pets’ stereotypical traits without adjusting for many of the other factors at play. Which is why it is so important to look at all of these types of articles and research studies with a critical eye. And ask questions and examine sources. Which also goes for our own research for our products and our companies. It’s easy to confirm our own biases and assumptions, but we have to dig deeper and question our hypotheses rather than confirm our stereotypes. 

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Weekly newsletter: Dogs and Data and Assumptions: Bonus Week and Off Topic
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

The system we work in is critical for our success. We can make improvements within the system, and those are important incremental changes. A new rule or a new process can improve the system. But we need to assess the system holistically. Is it the right system? In our work and our lives, this means critically thinking about everything around us.

In this episode, we explore some classic examples of systems, as well as broken systems such as:

• Our car dependence
• Our current education system
• Government crisis management
• Religion and hierarchy
• Software development 

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Weekly newsletter: When the System is the Problem
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

When we zoom out and consider the entire system, we’re able to see that the problem may not be optimizing the existing system, but rather changing it entirely. Because we get so caught up in the water we’re swimming in that we don’t see the problems all around us. And that is at the heart of product thinking.

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Weekly newsletter: The Forest for the Trees: Zooming out to see the real problems
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As people, we gather frequently. For meetings at work, for dinner as friends, for holidays as families. Yet so frequently, our gatherings disappoint us. But we still continue to do the same things, expecting different results (insanity, right?).

Book: The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker
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Weekly newsletter: The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker: Book Review
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Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking

Another month, another host of great articles, listens, books and other finds from Product Thinking and around the internet. Here’s what you may have missed.

Don't forget to subscribe at productthinking.cc
Weekly newsletter: Being Overconfident, Getting Stupider, and Banning NFTs: Monthly Wrap from July
Or just want to leave a tip: buy me a coffee?
Twitter: @kylelarryevans and @producthinking