📚 Resources
💡 AI generated Summary of this Session: 👇
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📚 What Are You Going to Learn?
Understanding product sense – the ability to understand what products will be valuable for users and how to develop this critical product management skill through frameworks, practical examples, and hands-on exercises.
🎯 Why Does It Matter to You?
Product sense is fundamental to successful product management. It helps you make better decisions about what to build, saves team resources, and is a crucial skill tested in product management interviews at leading companies.
💡 Key Takeaways
- Product sense combines user empathy with creative problem-solving
- Direct user interaction is crucial – 60% of PMs don’t talk to users enough
- Three key frameworks: Jobs to be Done, Brains’ Needs, and Five Whys
- Problem-solving requires being well-informed and using analogies
- Regular practice through product teardowns is essential for development
🧠 Understanding Product SenseThe instructor defines product sense as understanding what will be valuable for users. Unlike customer support or engineering teams who understand either user needs or solutions separately, product managers must combine both:
- Understanding user problems deeply
- Creating effective solutions
- Connecting problems with appropriate technological solutions
Example: Descript transformed video editing by understanding that content creators found timeline-based editing difficult and converting it into a familiar document-editing experience.
👥 Developing User Empathy
1. Direct User Interaction
- Spend 2-3 hours weekly with users
- Remove filters (don’t rely solely on customer support/sales feedback)
- Build systems for regular user connection
2. Company Examples
- Meshow: New employees spend first week in customer support
- Facebook: “Start from the people” approach
- Amazon: Working backwards framework
- Intuit: “Follow me home” program
3. Key Frameworks
- Jobs to be Done: Understanding user objectives
- Brains’ Needs: Mapping functional, emotional, and social needs
- Five Whys: Getting to root causes
🛠️ Creative Problem Solving
1. Being Well-Informed
- Stay updated with industry trends
- Understand available technologies
- Build knowledge through research
2. Using Analogies
- Study competitor solutions
- Look for similar problems in different industries
- Example: “Uber for X” pattern in marketplace businesses
3. First Principles Thinking
- Break problems into fundamental components
- Example: SpaceX reducing rocket costs by understanding basic components
📊 Product Analysis Framework
📱 Practical Application: 7-Product Teardown Challenge
Challenge Structure:
- Analyze 7 products over 14 days
- One day for product usage/research
- One day for analysis using six-point framework
- Document findings in Notion
- Share progress in designated channel
Learning Benefits:
- Practical application of frameworks
- Pattern recognition development
- Solution toolkit building
- Competitive analysis skills
📚 Recommended Resources
Two essential books for developing product sense:
- The Mom’s Test: For better user research and question techniques
- Thinking Fast and Slow: For understanding user decision-making patterns
The instructor concludes by emphasizing that product sense isn’t innate but requires consistent practice and application. The 7-product teardown challenge serves as a practical way to develop this skill through structured analysis and reflection.
