Creating great products is about the systems, processes and culture in place that help companies deliver value to their customers. On the Product Thinking Podcast, host Melissa Perri interviews the thought leaders in product development and answers your pressing questions to help you think like a great product leader.

This episode is all about strategy: what it is vs what it isn’t, and how to create a good one. The expert Melissa turns to for strategy advice is Barry O’Reilly, entrepreneur and business strategist who has “pioneered the intersection of business model innovation, product development, organizational design and culture transformation.” Barry is also the author of two seminal books on product strategy and development - Unlearned: Let Go of Past Success to Achieve Extraordinary Results, and The Lean Enterprise: How High Performance Organizations Innovate at Scale.

These are some highlights from Melissa and Barry’s conversation:

Learn about the pitfalls that growing companies often experience when they lack clear strategy. [5:15]

Strategy is making choices. Barry and Melissa talk about defining your expectations for the outcome, and how to measure the effectiveness of your decisions. [14:40]

Bad strategy sounds like fluff, so Barry shares what makes a strategy great. [23:15]

Strategy evolves over time - you make choices, execute, evaluate and iterate based on what you learn. [33:10] 

Barry explains why cross-functional teams are the best way to approach creating strategy. [38:50]

Product management is a creative skill. Melissa and Barry discuss why making space for thinking is important for product leaders. [45:20]

Resources

BarryOReilly.com

Barry O’Reilly on LinkedIn | Twitter | YouTube

Unlearn: Let Go of Past Success to Achieve Extraordinary Results 

The Lean Enterprise: How High Performance Organizations Innovate at Scale