Part of the Process

One of the interesting things running a "state of practice" survey is finding out (or being reminded!) of organisations. In my previous round-up of professional bodies , I had missed out two in particular - Mind the Product and Women in Product. Women in Product From the Women in Product website : Women In Product connects women in the product management field through our online platforms and live events. Our robust global community empowers women with opportunities to collaborate and resources for advancement. We align with organizations driving innovation through inclusive policies and practices that encourage mobility for women in product.  so, it's more the community angle than a professional body per se. From the website it still seems to be heavily weighted towards North American chapters. That and not reallt being the target demographic and it's not surprising that I hadn't thought of them when providing professional bodies that survey respondents might be...

Doing background desk research for my final MSc project and I fell down a bit of a rabbit hole. It started with looking at the different industry bodies that look after computing fields. I have been a member of the  British Computer Society (BCS) for a number of years, mainly because of their Project Management group and local branch meetings. But they are lagging a bit on modern development practices and roles, such as Product Management. Although they do have a Digital Product Management book coming out later this year! This got me to looking at associations that specifically support product roles, and building a " body of knowledge " like the project management world has. I found quite a few out there, and some names I had seen in academic research started popping up. I also fell down a rabbit hole in terms of the difference between a certificate and certification ! I have joined a couple, and ordered copies of all of the "bodies of knowledge" books I can since ...

The past couple of weeks have given me opportunities to reflect on what I like about my job and previous experience. Partly because we are expanding the team at 15below , partly from doing a bit of coding. I have written a bit about becoming "post-technical"  in the past, but now is the first time I have done much code in years. The thing that I enjoy most is solving problems and helping people. Throughout my career solving business problems to help create positive outcomes has always been fulfilling. Now I get to help do that, then go back and refine the solutions. You don't always get to do that as a developer or in a project focused role. Side project Code wot I wrote The first bit of coding is on my side project . Martyn has created a great architecture and I contributed the project import from LinkedIn ( almost) all by myself. It feels to brilliant to code on a side project - you get a sense of achievement from seeing an idea come to life. It also provides...

Great look here at Product Analytics . Think I use about 5 tools altogether, and even with Google Analytics, I layer other tools on top to help make the data usable  Life Beyond Google Analytics: Pick the Best Tools for the Job Thinking about product culture started with the start of a new series on Medium from FutureLearn -  Using agile principles to develop company culture Part 1: Introduction  and it promises to be a great look at how a successful organisation in delivery can live the values of the agile manifesto. It was then a short step to  Stop Blaming, Start Innovating  a great article that teaches us that Innovation , like charity, begins at home. Thoughtworks have a similar take and say that  "Innovation is the key to unlocking a best practice culture" Thoughtworks, 2017 Next up were two posts that cover more of the nuts and bolts of Product Management work . The first was a round of top tips on  How to become a great Product Man...

Photo by  Matthew Spiteri  on  Unsplash Inspired by this tweet I have decided to do a follow up to what I have learned in 2017 , with what I have "unlearned" Try it the other way around…. What have you unlearned / let go of this year? https://t.co/uzbsumUzh7 — Dan Creswell (@dancres) December 30, 2017 I really like this idea, as looking back I suspect most of the time I’ve truly learned something I’ve been able to let go. In 2018 I am going to be much more mindful about whether fear or learning drives adding new ideas/skills/practices this year. I feel that it is much easier to layer on new skills while you learn them, without thinking about what in your tool kit is no longer useful ... or at least if the effort outweighs  the benefit/impact  of not doing it. The main thing I have let go of this year has been no longer worrying about agile/scrum ceremonies and artifacts. Along with the main team I work with, I have moved to a much mor...

I've had this book on preview as each chapter came out and I've finally had a chance to read the full release version. So before it gets officially launch at MTPCon on June 13th here is my round-up... Formats : Paperback, DAISY, ePub, Mobi, PDF Where can I get it?  From  O'Reilly , Amazon or .... any good bookshop, although I think there are currently only 500 physical copies left world wide!     Who is it for?  Anyone involved in a software product development team or a startup founder thinking about which roles to hire next.  What's it about?  Product management, product leadership, not just the overlap but also the differences. How to grow your career as you grow into product leadership and how to hire the role for senior management. What's the book like?  The book is divided into three sections: The Product Leader The Right Leader for the Right Time Working with Customers, Agencies, Partners, and External Stakeholders The ...

Photo of Bellagio by me Bit of a parable about chasing silver bullets ... I have been a keen photographer since mid-2008 when I got my first SLR. Since then I have taken tens of thousands of photos, practising my technique and getting used to the tools available - for example natural light, flashes or particular lenses. Most of these photos never see the light of day and get written off as I don't like them for some reason or other, but I can't bring myself to delete them and every now and again go back and look to see what I can salvage. Each time I then fall into the trap of Gear Acquisition Syndrome ! I have been doing that recently and looking at what themes I can find in my photos and how they can be edited to fit in a series - at the same time as pricing up the latest Fuji X-T10. This time there are a couple of photos that have not only gone from the "nah" pile, but are now being shared on the Internet with other people! So, what has changed? ... The...

"How do you learn how to use a code base?" a very simple question from a junior developer that has prompted a lot of thought. To be honest it's been a while since I was last at that point and it's so long ago I can't remember learning a new code base. But my advice was to learn and study the code, run it change it, see where it breaks. Do the same with other open source projects to deliberately learn how to learn code bases. Also do this outside of work, where there isn't the same pressure to deliver or perform.  Apparently that wasn't a great answer as I got the reply, "What if you've got a life?", so a little motivation was in order :-) I've written about this before and point 3 from a W.S. Humphrey quote in my previous blog post on motivation and management was " the training and support to enable the work to be properly done". There are various training courses and sites available for teaching specific skills or technolog...