🍚 Stop using RICE / PM Snacks #49

1️⃣ Prioritization Beyond Algorithms
Apr 2021 • 3 min read • #execution #strategy #roadmap
Stop blindly using RICE or any other “magical” formula to prioritise items in spreadsheets. Sure, these frameworks facilitate better conversation with stakeholders & make it a bit more “unbiased”, but they lack context. Do read Rich Mironov’s take on this, to find out why. Spoiler:
1/ Strategy comes before scores (company to product strategy, OKRs)
2/ Acknowledge your team context (product’s stage, different kinds of work)
3/ Think like an investor: allocate fractions of your budget to various kinds of work & bets

2️⃣ The art of interviewing in Product Discovery
Oct 2021 • 17 min read • #discovery #interviewing
Pierre Fournier is back at it with this think-piece on how to handle great product interviews. Highly recommend it! Before diving in, a quick side-note: interviews (even with great skills) is just one of the many tools you can use to understand users’ behavior. Consider testing mockups or apps on users to observe them, and monitoring granular data to spot intriguing behaviors whenever possible. Anyway, here are my takeaways:
2/ Free the words: spend a considerable amount of time explaining that you want critiques to improve the product. Disarm users’ politeness to go deeper.
4/ Hunt down language shortcuts: learn to recognize these patterns to ask follow-up questions and get to know what the users really think. Always reframe and/or stay silent to give space to the interviewee.
5/ Ask for behaviors rather than opinions

3️⃣ Why We Crave Software With Style Over “Branding”
Oct 2021 • 11 min read • #design
First our industry started creating products like “artisans”, then in the last 10 years, implemented guidelines, components and finally design systems. Now, we are all the IKEA of tech, assembling standardised blocks to deliver faster. As a result, most softwares look alike. Fortunately, the author of this article reminds us of the importance of style over branding. Learn how Notion or Superhuman styled their SaaS to differentiate themselves.

4️⃣ Product OS for Notion
Sept 2021 • 3 min read • #tool #process #execution
I’m currently setting up uKu’s notion space to welcome the team and drive a stellar execution. While wondering how to configure the best tool possible, I found out about Jonathan Sabbah “Product OS”: a pre-made notion’s template for sale. If your team runs on Notion, it’s a 80€-buy that makes a lot of sense. Disclaimer: I’m not being sponsored for this promo, I just genuinely enjoy it and want to support creators whenever possible.

5️⃣ A beginner’s guide to NFTs & The Metaverse
Aug 2021 • 24 min read • #web3 #crypto #NFT #mustread
This article is a very good introduction to the Non Fungible Tokens (= NFTs) that enable true interoperable digital ownership (on the blockchain) for the first time. You’ll get to understand their cultural importance: from reinventing business models for supporting creators, creating incentivised communities to enabling the “metaverse” vision to begin. You may have heard this term from Mark Zuckerberg himself (he is good at trying to capture the zeitgeist) but his vision is so reductive compared to what could happen in the next 15 years.

I’m Olivier Courtois, product maker for 10y+, currently building my startup (uKu), sometimes product coach & Startup advisor. Former VP Product comet & Product Director ManoMano.

If you liked what you read 👉👉 Join over +1.7k readers from some of the best product led companies (like AbTasty, Blablacar, Cowboy, Double, ManoMano, Payfit, Productboard, Spendesk, etc.)