September Roundup: Leadership mistakes, stakeholder management, discovery and more

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Before we move into the final quarter of the year (yes, that’s right, the first three happened) we recap on the membership content released this September. In it, we covered leadership mistakes, strategic thinking, discovery, stakeholder management, burnout and more.

If you’re not yet a Mind the product member but want to access the content in this roundup and everything coming soon, you absolutely can. Sign up for access to our membership dashboard, extras and upcoming events.

Leadership Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Available to: MTP Leaders

Any good Product leader will admit that they’ve made a few mistakes along the way and in the first of our AMA sessions, exclusively for MTP Leaders, Tanya Cordrey, the former Chief Digital Officer at Guardian News and Media shares her top 7. From losing sight of strategy and forgetting to focus on what’s actionable to neglecting financials and communicating poorly, she explains what she now knows to do differently.
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Strategic Thinking for Product Managers

Available to: MTP Leaders and Prioritised members

It becomes a habit when you’re solving day-to-day problems to check with yourself if we’re doing the right thing from a bigger perspective. Peter Kruty

In a survey run by Mind te Product, you told us which skills you’ve found to be most helpful in advancing your careers. Strategic thinking came out on top and, because it’s such a difficult skill to master, we decided to gather together some advice from different members of the community. With their help, we answered questions such as why it’s so hard, how to move between tactical and strategic thinking, and shared tips on making time for strategic thinking.
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man brainstorming alone
Strategic thinking is an important skill for product managers to master

Teresa Torres on Discovery

Available to: MTP Leaders and Prioritised members

As you’re doing discovery you want to be as inclusive as you can, but inclusion slows you down, so that’s the trade-off you’re trying to balance – how do I make sure I’m leveraging all the expertise in the building, but not making decisions that take forever. Teresa Torres

In this AMA session, we were joined by Teresa Torres who took questions from the audience covering a long list of juicy discovery topics. From how to keep track of your team’s discovery efforts and why the process of discovery is just so damn hard, to effective ways to share discovery results and tips on taking your stakeholders along on the discovery journey with you.
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Manage Your Stakeholders

Available to: MTP Leaders
In this episode of Mindset, Rosemary King speaks with Papa Akuffo on the subject of stakeholders. Papa and Rosemary, share their advice on stakeholder interviews, how to get stakeholders to give solutions and not problems, and more. Settle in for their in-depth discussion.
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Burnout: the Signs, Symptoms, and Strategies

Available to: MTP Leaders

As a professional, I feel that the shock COVID has had on the world, society, businesses and individuals, is an important opportunity to challenge out-dated ways of working – to shift towards more human workplaces. Lucia Adams

It would be an understatement to say that 2020 has been a challenging year and while burnout can strike at any time, it’s a problem many people are experiencing right now – for many the pressure is well and truly on. In this post, Lucia Adams, a consultant and executive coach, shares her own, honest experience of burnout and offers some advice, tips for recovery, and useful resources.
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Common Product Development Mistakes and How To Avoid Them All

Available to: MTP Leaders and Prioritised members

Product Managers face a number of challenges during the product development cycle and for Ashley Fidler, this led to a number of errors when launching a cybersecurity software product. Now a CPO, Ashley has the experience to provide an honest analysis of the errors she and her team made. She does just that in this exclusive case study.
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Transforming Toxic Teams

Available to: MTP Leaders

If you’ve ever experienced working in a toxic team you’ll know exactly how difficult it can be. Constant tension, bubbling frustrations, and an environment where everything is a battle. Toxic teams are not a fun place to work and in this post, we speak to different experts with an interest in team dysfunction and behavioural science to better understand how it happens, why it happens, and what you can do to prevent and resolve it.
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illustration of a weak team member
If you’ve ever experienced working in a toxic team you’ll know exactly how difficult it can be

Build What Matters – Free Book Chapters!

Available to: MTP Leaders and Prioritised members

In their new book, Build What Matters, Rajesh Nerlikar and Ben Foster introduce you to their methodology for becoming a product-driven company and in this post, they give you a sneak peek. As a Mind the Product member you can take the book for a little test drive as Rajesh and Ben are giving you chapters 1 and 2 for free.
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Coming up in October

There’s plenty going on in October and we don’t want you to miss a thing. For upcoming events visit your dashboard:

Already a member? Subscribe to our Google calendar to ensure never miss an event (you’ll find the link beneath each event on your dashboard).

For a look at everything coming up in September see below!

Week Commencing 28 September

  • Quiz Marty Cagan: A product pro who needs no introduction, we’re delighted to welcome Marty Cagan, the author of Inspired, to this AMA. Join us to be one click away from the man himself! Date: 30 September: 8am PDT / 11am EDT / 4pm BST / 5pm CEST

Week Commencing 5 October

  • Predictive tech deep-dive: More and more of today’s digital products are using predictive models to examine data in order to better understand customers, products and to spot opportunities and risk. But are we crystal clear on the whole story? In this deep-dive, we explore the pros and cons of predictive tech.

Week Commencing 16 October

  • Put your questions to Colin Pal: Join us and the former Chief Product Officer at Caterspot for this AMA session. Date: 14 October
  • Prioritisation Report: We’ve been quizzing members of the community on all things prioritisation and have already spotted some interesting trends. With our experts, we’re scouring the results to share the advice you need to prioritise for success.

Week Commencing 19 October

  • Deep Dive: For many businesses, COVID has accelerated digital transformation and been the catalyst for new and exciting products. For some, it’s simply helped to fast-track interesting ideas that were previously buried deep in the backlog. So how have companies been leveraging digital in COVID so far? We take a look.

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