Principle #2 - Focus On What Matters Most (21 Days Of Principles Used By Successful Product Leaders)

Uncategorized Oct 04, 2018

Let's continue highlighting 21 product principles that help us to make better decisions and build better products.

Today it's...

PRINCIPLE #2

Everything seems important. And urgent.

You need to get this done. They've got to release asap. This must be fixed today. We have to close this sale.

Often we don't dare to stop doing, and the thought of slowing down seems crazy.

But actually, that's a lazy way to feel productive, because it takes less mental effort to say yes to everything.

Funnily enough if we are faced with a real threat to survival, lots of those same things become unimportant.

Then it's much easier to get everyone aligned and focused on what really matters.

But do you want to wait for an existential threat before you assess what you're doing and why?

A better way to get that focus is to get clear on what you want to achieve.

You don't need to implement every good idea to be successful.

Not even every great idea.

You don't need to build as fast as possible.

You don't need to satisfy everyone.

You DO need to first define success.

This means success for both the user and the business.

And then focus like a laser on learning and iterating to deliver JUST that.

Questions you can use to start applying this principle: