Roman's Product Management Podcast

Change seems to be the only constant when it comes to software technology. Over the last ten years, microservices, cloud-based computing, augmented reality, blockchain, the Internet of Things, machine learning, and artificial intelligence have emerged—to name just a few new technologies. But as product people, we are often so busy with getting new and enhanced features delivered that we risk overlooking new tech trends and being overtaken by competitors. In this episode, I share three tips that help you spot new and potentially disruptive technologies early on so you can take full advantage of those that will benefit your product.

The head of product role and the product strategy are often linked. But should a head of product make strategic decisions for individual products? Or would it be better to empower the product people to own the product strategy? These are the question I discuss in this podcast episode.

The product strategy is possibly the most important product management plan. But what exactly is it? Which information should it contain? Do you need a strategy for your product? How can you ensure that it is likely to result in a successful product and how do you keep it up to date? Listen to this podcast episode to hear my answers.

Scrum is not a product management framework. But it can be tremendously valuable for product people: It can help you make the right product decisions and deliver great products if it’s correctly applied. In this podcast episode, I share ten tips to help you maximise value delivery with Scrum.

If you want to advance your career or if you want help others develop professionally, then you need a career path. But I find that not all companies have such a path in place for their product people; and if it exists, it's not always effective, especially when agile product roles are used. This podcast episode introduces a career path for product owners. It connects different product roles, and it explains how people can start and progress their careers, from owning part of a product to leading a group of product people.

As the person in charge of the product, you have a rewarding but challenging job. A key challenge is leading the stakeholders and development teams without being their boss, without being able to tell people what to do. In this podcast episode, I offer my advice on how to overcome this challenge, guide the individuals, and create value together.

The product roadmap is a great product management tool. But it can cause significant issues when it is not used appropriately. In this podcast episode, I discuss ten product roadmapping mistakes you should avoid to fully leverage your roadmap.

The product backlog is a simple yet powerful tool to capture tactical product decisions and direct the work of the development team. To take full advantage of it, it’s important to set up the initial backlog in the right way. This episode offers five practical tips to successfully stock the product backlog and lay the foundation for a successful development effort.

Making the right strategic decisions is crucial to achieve product success. If it’s not clear, for example, what a product’s value proposition is and what its stand-out features are, then it will be difficult to create the desired business value. But I find that many product teams do not use a systematic approach to create and evolve a product strategy. To put it differently, they lack a product strategy model. In this podcast episode, I describe the model that I have developed.

I was recently asked at a product management conference what superpower product people should have. I didn’t have to think twice and replied, “empathy.” This podcast episode explains why empathy is particularly important in product management and how you can strengthen your ability to empathise even with seemingly difficult stakeholders, customers, and team members.