[[blog/video-the-scaling-dilemma-mary-poppendieck.md|Video_ The Scaling Dilemma - Mary Poppendieck]] Want to Read Rate this book 1 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars INSPIRED: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love by Marty Cagan 4.22 · https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true#https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true# https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true# Rating details · 7,410 ratings · 386 reviews The basic premise of Inspired is that the best tech companies create products in a manner very different from how most companies create products. The goal of the book is to share the techniques of the best companies. This book is aimed primarily at Product Managers working on technology-powered products. That includes the hundreds of “tech companies” like Google, Facebook, Amazon, Twitter and the like, as well as the thousands of companies moving to leverage technology (financial companies, media companies, retailers, manufacturers, nearly every industry). Inspired covers companies from early stage start-ups to large, established companies. The products might be consumer products or devices, business services for small businesses to enterprises, internal tools, and developer platforms. Inspired is secondarily aimed at the designers, engineers, user researchers and data scientists that work closely with the product managers on product teams at these same companies. (less) Get A Copy AmazonOnline Stores ▾Book Links ▾ Hardcover, 349 pages Published December 4th 2017 by Wiley (first published January 1st 2008) Original Title Inspired: How To Create Products Customers Love . ISBN 1119387507 (ISBN13: 9781119387503) . Edition Language English . Other Editions (1) All Editions | Add a New Edition | Combine …Less Detail edit details Friend Reviews (2) Jan 08, 2018 Gien Verschatse marked it as to-read · review of another edition Shelves: audio, non-fiction, social-behavior flag Like · comment Nov 22, 2017 Jo marked it as to-read · review of another edition Shelves: self-learning flag Like · comment Recommend This Book… . Reviews from People You Follow (1) Jun 07, 2019 Rod Hilton is currently reading it Shelves: business, audiobooks flag Like · comment . Reader Q&A Ask the Goodreads community a question about INSPIRED ![[./resources/book-inspired-marty-cagan.resources/30721486.ux100_cr00100100.jpg]] Be the first to ask a question about INSPIRED . Lists with This Book An Elegant Puzzle 33 books — 1 voter More lists with this book… . Community Reviews Showing 1-30 4.22 · https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true# Rating details · 7,411 ratings · 386 reviews ![[./resources/book-inspired-marty-cagan.resources/loading-45f04d682f1e9151cf1e6fb18a1bde21.gif]] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true#More filters | https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35249663-inspired?from_search=true#Sort order . Jan 26, 2012 Adam Wiggins rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: business “Inspired” is a well-written, thorough, and down-to-earth work covering all aspects of product management at software companies. To paraphrase/summarize: the job of the product manager is to discover a product that is useful, feasible, and valuable. They do this through understanding users and potential users in detail and evaluating opportunities to solve problems for those users. Once an opportunity is identified, they create a prototype, validate the prototype with users, then work with engineering to build the product, product marketing to launch the product, and sales and support to follow up on the success (or failure) of the product. The book covers how product management fits in with other functions – engineering, interaction design, visual design, project management, product marketing. The difference between product management and product marketing is often misunderstood, but Inspired explains it simply: product marketing is about understanding the marketplace (in aggregate), how your product fits into that, and how to explain it when it comes time to launch. Product management is about the content of the product – understanding the users/customers (individually), how the product works, what it is for. Creating a product and explaining a product to the world require two very different skillsets that are rarely found in the same person. There’s also a great chapter on how to “manage up,” meaning how to work most effectively with your manager. Some excerpts and points: - “Engineers think in terms of implementation models, but users think in terms of conceptual models.” - You need “one product manager for every 5 - 10 engineers,” one interaction designer for every two product managers, and one visual designer for every four interaction designers. - “As a product manager, you are responsible for defining the right product, and your engineering counterpart is responsible for builidng the product right.” - “Keep the focus on minimal product. Your job as product manager is not to defin the ultimate product, it’s to defint he smallest possible product that will meet your goals.” - While most work the engineering teams do comes from product, engineering teams should reserve some amount of time (the author used 20% when he worked at eBay) for refactorings, rearchitecting, and other internal technical changes that are unrelated to product. - Great product people may already exist in your organization if you look around. The author suggests that they often come from engineering. - Product managers should be passionate and evangelize internally. They “inspire the rest of the product team, and the passion for a product is contagious.” - Empathize with your target market, but don’t slip into the trap of thinking of yourself and your friends as being the target users, even if it’s partially true. Related: “It can be dangerous for a product manager to have too much domain expertise, because they believe they can speak for the target customer, and that they are more like their target customer than they really are.” - Engineering knows what’s possible, so they are an important input to the product discovery process. - Product marketing knows of broad unaddressed needs in the marketplace, making them another important input to product opportunities. - Good revenue vs bad revenue: the former enhances your Net Promoter Score and expands your market, the latter does the opposite – for example, adding customized features for one banner customer, what the author calls “specials.” - Product management should be a top-level organization, not placed as a subset of engineering or marketing (two common org structures). The design team can be part of the product org. - “Conduct the real meetings before your official meeting.” Get buy-in from key stakeholders beforehand. “The formal meeting still has an important purpose, which is for every at the table to see that everyone else is on board.” - “Opportunities for new products exist all around us, in every market – even mature markets. This is because what is possible is always changing.” - Product should always be working well-ahead of engineering, to keep engineering teams fed with new work when they finish their current projects. - “Review the business performance of products that have launched, typically 3 - 6 months post-launch. This sort of accountability will help the council better understand which investments and decisions they made were good ones, and why.” - The author strongly favors high-fidelity prototypes (e.g., they look like the real thing, not a rough paper mockup) as they are cheap to create nowadays and give better results when validating the prototype with users. High-fidelity prototypes are also great for engineering teams, because it’s extremely clear what needs to be implemented. - On the importance of reference customers at launch time: “Potential customers need to know that this product really works for people like them.” - Building a customer advisor board of charter around six customers will help in the feedback process for a new product, and also provides real customer references at launch time. Think of these charter users as development partners, and treat them as colleagues. - “Winning products come from the deep understanding of the user’s needs combined with an equally deep understanding of what’s just now possible.” - Use “personas,” archetypes of an imaginary but plausible user that describes a particular customer segment you’re targeting. - If there are technical feasibility risks (e.g., something that might be hard or impossible for engineerings to implement), get with an engineer to address them early, during the prototype phase. - Do your own user testing, ideally in person. - Take care to avoid accidental “user abuse” – surprising changes in your product, especially ones that create incompatibilities. Even releases too many changes in too short a time period (“change fatigue”) can be a type of user abuse. - “As a general rule, users don’t like change. Sure, they want the software to be great, and they clamor for new functionality, but most people aren’t excited about taking the time to learn a new way to do something they can already do.” - The author describes what he calls “gentle deployment,” which is a way to cautiously and respectfully roll out changes to a large usercase. This includes techniques such as rolling out both the old and new versions alongside each other, with a link somewhere inviting users to try out the new version, long before the new version becomes the default. - Make sure to reserve product, engineering, and design resources to follow up on feedback in the week or so following a big product or feature launch. - Great ideas almost always come from the bottom up, not top-down product strategy. Use techniques like Google’s 20% time or skunkworks teams to encourage this. - “Build relationships before you need them.” - On working in large organizations: “Pick something worth fighting for, where the outcome truly matters. When you do fight, make sure you’re fighting for your product and not against another person.” And: “Triage your meetings ruthlessly.” And: “Evangelize! Explain the vision and strategy, demo the prototype, and share customer feedback. Don’t underestimate the importance of this internal sales function.” - “Knowing how to get feedback on product ideas is probably the single most important skill for product managers.” (less) flag 32 likes · Like · comment · see review Feb 11, 2013 Ellen Chisa rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: 2014, design, pm, nonfiction, male_author, product, business, tech I’m embarrassed to say I hadn’t read this book until today. I’s pretty a concise summary of all the other articles, books, and conversations that I’ve had in the field. You could probably save a lot of time by reading this book when you’re first interested in PM, rather than after doing it for four years. (But re-read it then, too!) I particularly liked that he discussed: - Clear definition of role separation and responsibilities of marketing, PM, interaction design, development. - The emphasis on the “Product Discovery” process. I think people underestimate how much of PM is a researching/incubating ideas role. You spend a lot of time sorting through information and considering what is/isn’t relevant. - The need for high fidelity prototypes. If I had to pick a single skill that would make me a better PM, being able to quickly produce a prototype would be it. - Ways to do small usability tests as a PM. I think there’s a lot of pushback from this in the industry - lots of people worry the PM can’t detach / research will be useless. There’s a lot to be said for small amounts of research. - Discussion of “how to build a PM team” - I think he’s completely right that there are often people throughout companies with the right skills (and attention to detail). - Dealing with special requests from clients (and the hidden costs of those requests). I’d recommend it to anyone who is struggling with a few major customers, and has a CEO that wants to accommodate special requests. I’ve never personally had this challenge, but he seemed to have practical advice. (less) flag 12 likes · Like · comment · see review Feb 23, 2015 Adam Zabell rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: business tl;dr - products need prototypes, are grounded in answering emotions, and can always be improved. Product management starts with this book. If you want be one, start here, then go find something that talks about the products in your field of interest, or describes the process by which you get yourself hired, or the way you raise capital to fund your own product. But, start here to learn what it means to build a product quickly and successfully. Not that you’re guaranteed success. Especially when you’re working for somebody else, your ability to drive a product from an Idea to a Sale is going to require negotiation with every other part of the business. Most people are used to thinking that the idea in their head is the idea that will get delivered, even though there are a dozen people working on the product. And most companies aren’t actually committed to the idea of having a person who owns the Idea of a product, allowing the role to be implied by a project manager or chief architect or lead engineer. It’s clear this is a book that was built from blog posts, because there’s some repetition of phrasing which made me wonder if I’d misplaced my bookmark. Normally that feels like sloppy editing, but here it felt like a successful lecturer who returns to a few key phrases to remind you of the previous point and how it aligns with this next one. I wish I’d read this book a year ago. It answers 90% of the questions I had at the time, long before I acquired the title of “product manager.” (less) flag 7 likes · Like · comment · see review Jun 17, 2013 Chris Kang rated it liked it · review of another edition Inspired is pretty high level and tends to focus more on the organizational challenges related to product development. I feel that there are some better resources out there (especially online blogs) if you as a product manager are looking for strong guidance at a more tactical level. Although, the SVPG website has some useful resources. I kept putting off reading this book, and after having experienced the growing pains as a PM and other major organizational transitions, most of the insights the book had to offer I had already learned the hard way. So if you think you’re like me, I wouldn’t beat yourself up for not having read it. However, the book was still a pleasant read and is filled with healthy reminders on the critical role of a product manager and proper perspectives on developing winning products. (less) flag 5 likes · Like · 1 comment · see review Jan 27, 2019 Maria Lasprilla rated it it was amazing It wouldn’t be so sexy or approved by the marketing department, but a more accurate name for this book would be “Product Management 101”. Recommended. flag 5 likes · Like · comment · see review Feb 26, 2017 Graham rated it really liked it · review of another edition Possibly one of very few books actually written all about Product Management, and it’s a good one. I love how it starts with a bunch of things that people think are Product Management but which aren’t. I also like the simple framework and definition of PM around valuable+useable+feasible, and how he builds up detail on achieving those qualities through the book. Got a bit dry as it came towards the end, but was a good length. Highly recommend for anyone in or thinking of moving into PM. flag 4 likes · Like · 1 comment · see review Dec 10, 2015 Disha rated it it was ok · review of another edition Picked up this book after a great review in Economic Times. The content is very disappointing to say the least. The author has missed on several key responsibilities and challenges of product management and has only penned a theoretical and ideal world description. The book does not talk in examples and almost sounds like a boring lecture. Not for beginners and surely not for veterans either. Disappoint s. flag 4 likes · Like · comment · see review Feb 06, 2019 Goce Cvetanov rated it it was amazing One of the best books I have read in a while. It got me thinking about a lot of stuff that’s going on in our industry and it also helped me bridge the gap in my transition from a company oriented on providing services to clients to a company owning their own product and oriented towards keeping their customers happy and improving their product. Although I am not a Product Manager (which is the main intended audience), I would say that I am at the best point in my career to have read this book and would recommend it to anyone working on a tech product. (less) flag 3 likes · Like · comment · see review Mar 30, 2016 Jenn rated it liked it · review of another edition The information in the book was good and useful to learn how things work or should work on a product team, but the delivery was a little slow and dry. flag 3 likes · Like · comment · see review Mar 17, 2019 Philip Joubert rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: favorites I’m frustrated with myself that I didn’t read this many moons ago. This is the book for you if you are: - An aspiring product manager - Work with product managers (e.g. you’re a software engineer or designer) - You’re building out a product team - You are interested in how modern tech teams structure themselves flag 3 likes · Like · comment · see review May 24, 2018 Dmitry Martsinkevich rated it it was amazing · review of another edition When i started the book it was a bit irritating to read that just every person in a product team is like a totally vital part. But it turned that Inspired is more like a Bible for product managers. It is full of good practices and clear methodologies. Not many i could use in our very small team but still picked some to be used as common practices. You can open almost any page and find a new thing to implement in your team. Most of the simple ideas are written in short without long argumentation and therefore are not over-explained as it often happens. Finally i have to notice it is written by very simple English, was easy to read. Thank you, Marty (less) flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Jan 05, 2018 Arunthep Sangvareethip rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Not just a product book, this is an ultimate book for building great culture that happen to deliver the best possible product I fell in love with the first version. This version is going above and beyond what I had in mind when buying. I just told my team of Product Manager Team that if there is a book for 2018 that worth every second to read, this is the one! flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Sep 12, 2018 Markiyan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition The best book on Product Management I’ve ever read. Not only you get a depth and years of experience and wisdom in your hand, but it’s also so incredibly well structured! Definitely will come back to this book again and again. Must read for a PM. flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Oct 24, 2018 Jeremy Zhang rated it it was amazing · review of another edition The bible. flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Jan 09, 2015 Amr Basha rated it it was amazing · review of another edition A must-read book for every designer out there, and is considered as the holy book for product management as well. flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Mar 23, 2014 Kresimir Mudrovcic rated it really liked it · review of another edition Interesting, insightful, easy to read and digest, useful tips for anyone who is into Product Management or startups. flag 2 likes · Like · comment · see review Apr 19, 2019 Kair Käsper rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: starting-up Doesn’t matter if you’re a billion dollar success story or a future unicorn learning to walk, this book should be on the top of your reading list. Why? - It’s densely packed with good to great advice on how to build a solid product organization, spiced up by examples from well-known companies. - It describes in detail the pitfalls even the most progressive teams fall into. Many of these I have had the privilege of exploring or witnessing myself and I have to say, the experience was not worth much. As Bismarck once wrote: “Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.” Might not apply everywhere, but definitely applies in a startup environment. - Wherever you work, chances are that reading the book will trigger a harsh realization - you, together with your whole product organization, are already standing in one or several of these treacherous holes. Not to worry though - the book gives pretty clear instructions on how to climb out. If your company has the will or the capability is unfortunately another matter. I listened to this book on Audible, but already ordered a physical copy and have my marker pen on stand-by. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Apr 02, 2019 Vasya rated it it was amazing · review of another edition One of the best books I have read in a while. Everything you have to know about a Product manager role based on lessons from top tech companies of getting a product to the market. I read the book from a marketing perspective and my takeaway is “Solve real customer problems in a way that met the needs of the business”. The most important is the first part of the task to determine “real customer problems” instead of listening to yourself or looking for the answer inside your team. The book contains endless examples, case studies, and principles on how to listen to customers like: How to choose a target market. Recruiting the first customer as real testers. Customer behavior discovery. Hot to run an interview with customers. And many many more! It got me thinking about a lot of stuff that’s going on in our industry and it also helped me bridge the gap in my understanding of Product manager role and product team structure. I would say that I am at the best point in my career to have read this book. I would definitely recommend it to anyone working on a tech product. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Mar 13, 2019 Alex Watson rated it really liked it · review of another edition I loved the first edition and read it often during the early phases of my product career. I’m further along in my work now, and so is the field of product management in the UK, and so I felt like I got less from the second edition - there are over sixty chapters and so some end up being short and fairly superficial - the ones on ethics, agile at scale in particular - and it seems the whole idea of encompassing all of product management in one book is too big of an ask. It desperately needs new examples too - the case studies are dated. That said, everything great about Marty is here in spades: super direct, concentrated, crystal clear advice, and rock solid on good foundations for great product work. The core ideas remain strong and his regular writing on the SVPG blog means his writing style is concise and powerful and you often find he puts your own thoughts into a better, more distilled form. Essential if you’re starting out in product, good if you’ve been doing it for a while, but not the silver bullet it once was. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Jan 14, 2019 Maanas S Bukkuri rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: product-management I “read” this via Audible during my commutes. I have read this book in the past and continue to read this during my product management tenure. I find that it is always provides a different set of outcomes and action items. This time around, it provided a strong insight on what type of product manager to hire, and how to structure product teams for success. I will likely return to this book towards the end of the year to review what I have been able to implement. I strongly recommend that this becomes assigned reading for product managers everywhere. It is very thought provoking. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Apr 11, 2019 Moshe Mikanovsky rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: business, non-fiction, product-management THE book for product managers. Great to read it again after about 8 years and after experiencing first hand many of the good and bad in product management practices. Need to put my hands on the 2nd edition to check what has been updated, but my guess is that other than examples and maybe emphasis on SaaS, not much really flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Jul 30, 2018 Joel Pacheco rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Comprehensive Thorough literature of customer-centric product development using agile practices with top-notch real-life cases from Apple, Google, Amazon, and such. Recommended for leadership executives who want a comprehensive overview of the roles in a product development team and product managers, designers, and engineers working for tech companies. Thanks, Marty! flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Oct 10, 2018 Angelo rated it really liked it · review of another edition I read this to get a good overview of product management for professional purposes and I definitely got that. At times, it was a bit lacking in substance but this is a good book to reference back to and I anticipate re-reading parts of it for use in my professional career. flag 1 like · Like · see review Jun 03, 2019 Arua Caselli rated it it was amazing · review of another edition Shelves: produto Great for all levels of knowledge. Recommend having a printed copy of you work with Digital Products or is a CEO of a startup. flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review May 07, 2018 Jorge Camargo rated it it was amazing · review of another edition If you’re a product manager (tech), or a stakeholder in the product management process, this is a must read book. flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Mar 09, 2019 Mike Costanzo rated it it was amazing · review of another edition An absolute must read for anyone interested in the role of product management and/or building high quality product teams. Just read it. flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Sep 18, 2017 Siyu rated it it was amazing · review of another edition A very informative book on sharing the author’s product management experience. Each chapter is very short, so it is easy to be followed. The book is more like a desk handbook for reminding ourselves to be careful with the product management process. A good introduction for people who has no product management experience to have a sense of what is product management. And a good reminder for people who are already product managers. However, the book, still, like other product management books, more focused on consumer/internet services product, not enterprise product. It indeed talks a little about enterprise product, but stays at very high-level. I strongly agree with the author on all the things he points out around enterprise product management pain points in this book, which I think is harder for people to truly understand how important the things he mentioned if themselves ever worked on enterprise product. All in all, great summary of all the tips for product management. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Mar 19, 2019 Marcus Cramer rated it liked it · review of another edition Great ideas for product management but a little too much management blabla and a little too few examples for my taste flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Mar 08, 2019 Tatiana rated it really liked it Shelves: product-management A great read for any PM - from junior to director level. Helps immensely in understanding why some people in the organization are doing what they are doing and how to thrive on it while delivering great products. flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review Apr 21, 2018 Alex rated it it was amazing · review of another edition I loved it a lot: not only this books describes the structure, roles and processes in the Facebook teams super well, it also tries to explain WHY they work. The method described in this book is obviously imperfect. Its biggest weakness is that it requires a smart, multi-modal, experienced, persuasive and modest Product Manager in every team: a rare kind! But this is the best method that the industry has so far, and no magic process, consultant or book had so far been able to overcome this requirement. (less) flag 1 like · Like · comment · see review « previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … next » . new topic Discuss This Book topics started by posts views last activity do you have a nespresso machine? 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