Product Leadership: How Top Product Managers Launch Awesome Products and Build Successful Teams 1st Edition

There's a lot of quality material floating around these days about Product Management, but this is the first book I've read that specifically focuses on product *leadership*. If you are a CPO, VP of Product, or Director of Product, this is the book you've been waiting for. Hearing the quotes and insights from so many of my peers in companies that I admire is, for me, the best part. So many of us are facing similar struggles, and at last we can see that we're not alone! There's a vast community of product leaders out there, and the authors have done a great job distilling their experience and feedback into a highly readable book. I can't recommend this enough.

I purchased the book because I was eager to learn more from Nate Walkingshaw. Nate has been one of the strongest voices behind some of the explosive growth in the Utah product management scene and his insights have been very helpful to me. I learned a lot from the book and will keep it as a desk reference.Pros:* The book provides an excellent broad overview of a number of product management concepts - a great 30,000 ft view for product leaders* They cover some key principles of product leadership that are rarely covered in other product books and forums like: hiring, team-building, career pathways, and other leadership concepts.* The ideas in the book are well-supported by experienced practitioners and there are a number of references to people worth following and books worth reading.* Because the book ties everything back to being customer-centric, it's a good reminder (even if you're an experienced product builder) to research everything and always let the customer voice win.* The intense focus on tying everything you do in product back to three key variables: usability, feasibility, and sellability (value) was a good reminder for me.* The three chapters on how product management differs within different contexts (startup, growth, and enterprise orgs) were extremely valuable.Cons:* There were so many interviews that went into the book - it would be nice to have a larger view into those conversations. Publishing raw interview transcripts, for example, would be amazing.* Many of the people who were interviewed have amazing stories to tell, and it would be nice to have a more visibility into those stories.* The partner ecology chapter was missing a piece for me - I was hoping that it would dive more into things like business development style partnerships, integrations, and other ways for businesses to work together to go-to-market with experiences they couldn't otherwise deliver alone.Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone in product management or in any type of leadership role in a product-driven organization. While none of the concepts were new to me, it was a healthy reminder of the tools we use to build customer-centric products.

Banfield, Erickson, and Walkingshow do a great job at covering a niche that's not often talked about in product: leadership. Sure there are plenty of books out there on leadership, but leadership in _product_ is a different beast. Many of the similar principles apply, but the command-and-control authoritarian style will not be the model for future success. The book is packed with insights from many interviews with product professionals, While I could have used a little less name-dropping throughout the book, I get that these anecdotes support their thesis with a dose of reality.The book is a relatively fast read (a long plane ride, etc) and they explore the types of leadership needed at different types of organization (start-up, emerging and enterprise according to their segmentation), which implies there's not a one-size-fits all approach. Let's be honest, there's no silver bullet to product success hidden here in these pages, but lots smart thinking and techniques that you can apply to your team(s) immediately.Full disclosure: I co-authored a book with one of the co-authors (Banfield).Design Sprint: A Practical Guidebook for Building Great Digital Products

The book covers a high level overview of PM in an easy to understand layout and description. The book also provides good references for other books to read. Main takeaway for me is you need to live the voice of the customer by constantly engaging with them throughout the lifecycle.

I listened to this book on Audible and immediately followed up by purchasing it to have for a reference whenever I needed it. Such a great guide to elevate into being a product leader rather than a feature factory supporter.

I am a software engineer and lead developer who has very suddenly become the director of software engineering for a growing company. We are experiencing growing pains, trying to figure out what roles developers should play and what a good product organization looks like.It looks like most of the negative reviews of this book are from readers who have a lot of experience in product management. I think those people might gain some insights.But for people like me, for whom product management is not their core skill, this gives the reader a GREAT vision of what an awesome product team looks like. I'm really, really, really glad I spent money on this book. It's already making my job a lot easier as I help my teams work with the product organization and as I set expectations for what we expect the product organization to contribute and deliver.