The best resources on product wisdom
The best resources on product wisdom
Let me learn you something...
Whether you are a junior or senior product manager access to books and wisdom is usually not the problem. But deciding what to spend your time on seems to be an incredibly difficult endeavor.
People recommend books over books, methodologies, courses, and blogs easily but which ones are the right ones?
Let’s look at a few examples:
Product-Led Growth
Beyond basic “product” and “growth” knowledge
Leadership & Communication
Time Management
Org and Product Scaling
Jobs to be Done / Engagement - Understanding Why
You can either dig in my curated knowledge database or keep reading for a smaller, more focussed list:
The problem is that most recommendations are what's important to whoever is recommending them, every product manager has different challenges, aspirations to grow, and life circumstances so a well-meant recommendation can easily turn out into a perceived waste of time as it doesn't line up.
Let’s go:
Beyond basic “product” and “growth” knowledge
I’m starting with this because it’s the most custom advice here aside from books. Don’t sleep on any of these.
Reforge.com
Reforge is an incredible resource for any product manager in tech, it's more geared for associate / senior product managers I would say and the admission price is quite hefty (ask your company to finance it), but if you get a chance and want to work on your skills in a more course based structure this is the motherload. I went through about 5 of their programs and I can't say anything bad about any of them. They also feature free articles all over and I highly recommend checking those out as well.
and her
Elena is a powerhouse when it comes to operative product-led and growth topics. She is on point and the presented frameworks are built on actual experience.
She finally started her own substack and you would be a fool to not go there RIGHT now.
Stage 2 Capital Blog
Stage 2 Capital is a fantastic source of really advanced sales, CRO, CMO, and scaling topics. It’s absolutely astounding how much I learned from them over the years. If you look at who’s behind it you also understand why.
I’m a passionate learner and proponent of anything Hubspot did in the past 5 years and their former CRO, Mark Roberge is part of it. An absolute must-read if you want to do deep dives on Sales in a PLG environment
Time Management
4000 Weeks - Oliver Burkeman
If you feel overwhelmed by the 20 things that you didn't get done because your superiors and everyone around you just want too much and you feel constantly that your days are too short and you struggle to make compromises at the cost of your work-life balance - this is the book for you.
It's one of my absolute favorites and I recommend it to literally everyone. A more tongue-in-cheek description I usually employ is "How to fail at the right things." Incredibly insightful.
Learning how to strategically disappoint people.
Team of Teams - General Stanley McCrystal
One of the clearest and most compelling books on organizations.
McChrystal clearly explains why our organizations based on hierarchy and directive control are failing and how to do it right.
An absolute necessity for anyone interested in org design and org efficiency. Personal Favourite of mine.
Understanding "Why" - Jobs to be done
There is a surprising amount of product managers I know who focus on solutions rather than understanding the problems behind their users. Understanding the Jobs-to-be-done is a very approachable framework that helps you achieve just that. Moving away from the "how do I build this" to understanding "why do I build this" is an important first step to excellence.
When Coffee & Kale Compete - Alan Klement
You can download this one for free as a PDF, it's one of the best introductions to the JTBD framework making you understand what motivates people to do what they do. It essentially helps you to create products that fit your customer’s problems much better.
The Jobs To Be Done Playbook - Jim Kalbach
I would recommend this book as a follow-up as it's more practical rather than just explaining what JTBD is and it shows practical methods to put into action what you learned before
Game Thinking - Amy Jo Kim
This is another angle to understand why people do what they do. The book tries to answer the question of how market-leading products are born. Why do people stick with things that help them get better at the stuff they care about? It's very easy to read and quite insightful as Amy draws from her experience when creating "The Sims" "Rock Band" and "Ultima Online"
Leadership & Communication
Radical Candor - Kim Scott
How to keep an open culture of discussion that fosters and encourages honest and direct feedback while also showing care. If you don't manage to lead by example and enable people to criticize you they won't return the favor. This book to me should be standard literature for anyone that aspires to or is in a leadership position. Must read for any level of product manager.
Scaling your product/organization
Crossing the Chasm by Geffrey A. Moore
If you want to conquer large markets you better understand the dynamics between early adopters to the early majority. A classic and in my opinion a table stake to understanding what landing and expanding into a major market really means.
Team Topologies by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais
I’m not aware of a better book to actually explain how teams should be structured within each other and what the foundation is of a successful team pattern. If you ever want to scale and build organizations this is a must-read.
Their follow-up work addresses the changes in a remote team environment.
Product-led Growth
I wrote my own guide on Product-led Growth because I wasn’t satisfied with the ones that are out there. It contains a complete and actionable explanation on what this important market trend is about. Check it out here:
General Business Knowledge
Valuation - McKinsey
If I had one insecurity then it was about how companies work on the financial side. It’s a big brick but definitely worth it if you feel like completely overdoing it.
Highly recommended.
7 Powers - Hamilton Helmer
While this book is a bit more high-level and looks at how to make a company more valuable there are important insights for product managers as well that would like to understand more about the business world and what makes a company successful. I would recommend this to more senior product managers though as it requires some experience on the topic. It offers a good framework in which to understand the dynamics of business/products and how they influence each other.
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