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I’m seeing this sentiment pop up with alarming frequency. Many product people are dealing with career uncertainty — and not just the “will my company make it through the pandemic?” variety. Without the usual distractions of life available, things that were easily overlooked are now front and center.

And what are many of these product people realizing without the distractions of normal life?

They’re set up to fail.

Their work environment and culture is not set up to create strong products. It is distinctly not set up to empower the collaboration of product, design, and engineering to build things that matter.

This has led many to realize it’s time for a job change.

As product people, we want to work in a product-led company. Note: this does not mean that the product org is “in charge,” giving orders and engineering/design have to get on board. It does mean a place that truly values the craft and contribution of product, and that empowers individuals and teams to work to their highest potential. A place that is built around creating amazing products that truly make life better for the people they’re trying to serve.

This is inherently and fundamentally a collaborative process that no single functional org rules by fiat. (The most common counterexample is a sales-led organization.)

We all know it’s possible. It’s what the best product companies are doing. Yet despite many attempts tried, there are many frustrated PMs that can’t seem to get their work environment to change. Why not?

Part of the reason is that transformation is extremely hard, even in the best case.

But the real reason is they joined the wrong company in the first place.

They took a role where good product work occurs in spite of the dominant practices and culture, not because of them.

Jobs like this waste precious years of your career. I’ve made this mistake too, and it hurts. I hope this article helps you avoid it in the future.

I launched a podcast, and 14 episodes in, I just remembered to explain why I did it and what it’s about. Whoops.

TL;DR

I started a podcast last fall, ENLIVEN. As of yesterday, we’re 14 episodes in.

The show is an exploration of what’s possible. It’s me going on a learning journey with my guests, exploring how we make products and companies that have a soul. Exploring how we make things that truly make things better, and use business as a force for good.

If you’re the kind of person that is interested in a positive future of business, who believes that business has the potential to be the greatest force for good the world has ever seen, then this is a show for you.

I don’t have the answers. I’m exploring the questions. I invite you to come on that learning journey with me.

You can find all 14 currently released episodes, as well as links to subscribe to the show, here. Please rate it on Apple Podcasts and subscribe!

See you out there.

More context below…

Hypothesis & intention of the show

The hypothesis behind the show is that there is a new, latent form of organization seeking to exist in the world. One that leaves everything it comes into contact with better for that contact. I call this kind of organization an “enlivening organization.”

The word “enliven” means “to give life, action, or spirit to; to animate.”

What if this was the effect our companies had on every person and environment they affected?

If there’s ever a time of year when we want to feel human connection, it’s around Valentine’s Day. And connection requires vulnerability and honesty, experiencing the world through another’s eyes.

Here are two questions that I’ve found helpful in authentically opening up my work and thinking to others over the last few months, which has led to some wonderful connections and conversations:

1. What do the things that I feel compelled to do tell me about myself?
2. Why do I want this thing that I want?

[Read more…] about Analog Hearts In A Digital World

I’ve come to believe all creative work is a constant struggle between hope and fear. Hope that what I’m making will add value to the world. Hope that it will be accepted by the market. Hope that it will be interesting or resonate in a meaningful way. Fear that it won’t. Fear that everyone will laugh at me. Fear that people will call me names and think I’m an idiot for having made something so laughably dumb.

There’s a lot of fear. Especially when I let the noise in or get sucked into the trap of comparing myself to others.

But none of these fears outshines the biggest fear I have. Top billing is reserved for a fear that whispers to me in my quiet moments, the moments when I’m otherwise unencumbered and have some space to think: my fear of getting too comfortable. My fear that I’ll stop growing, which is the day a creative starts dying. The mere suggestion of such a stall scares me. But I remain hopeful.

Hope – Fear = Momentum

[Read more…] about Have You Gotten Too Comfortable?

It’s an incredible moment when you meet the real person inside someone you’ve casually known for years.

Tonight I was at a dinner at USC with a large group of people I’ve known since my time there. Most of us have met before, had some meetings, maybe even been out socially in that sort-of-colleagues-but-also-sort-of-friends way that was so common in my life before I got that I have to bring who I really am to everything I do.

At dinner, I re-connected with a college peer I’ve known for about six years. I wouldn’t say we were ever friends, but we knew each other and had worked together. After dinner, we walked together across campus and had the first real conversation we’ve ever had. It was exciting—I made a new friend, a real friend—we had independently experienced similar struggles and were discussing our journeys since leaving college. When we parted, I felt like I had just met an entirely different person. We hugged, and without even thinking I said “nice to meet you” to a guy I’ve known for six years. But in a sense, I had just met the real him for the first time.

Conversations are powerful.

Conversations are powerful because moments are powerful. Moments are where we take risk. Moments are when we expose ourselves in hopes that another will respond. Moments are when we push pause on our mental treadmills and appreciate something in the past that we were too busy experiencing to grasp the significance of. Moments are where we suddenly stop reaching, trying, stretching for something external and just…are.

Conversations may well be the most important tool we have for uncovering these moments. Conversations are often when those moments happen, or synthesize, come together, and coalesce into a cogent whole that has meaning and power.

Deep conversations like the one I had tonight are when I get to experience my favorite moment.

Whether it’s out of frustration, desperation, or exhaustion, eventually there is a moment where we all just get tired and say “Fuck it.” To the career path that cultivates money at the expense of meaning. To doing what we’re supposed to do instead of what we want to do. To playing the small game we’ve been told to play instead of the big game our heart yearns for.

This moment is precious. It’s exciting. Because the moment you stop trying to speak with somebody else’s voice is the moment you hear the first whispers of your own. And those whispers mark the beginning of the path that leads to what each of us is really seeking: ourself.

It’s the moment when someone begins to come into their own. The moment when untapped potential becomes reality-on-the-way, when hope becomes action, when things long dreamed of become memories soon to be cherished.

How you arrive at this moment doesn’t matter, but I believe we all must arrive there eventually if we’re to live the life we’re capable of.

There is nothing I want more than to help everyone I come in contact with to be closer to living at their potential, to experience these moments and the ripple effects in their life. That unleashing of potential in people and ideas is what I live for.

And there is an effective vehicle to get there: real conversations. I’m going to try to have more of them from here on out.

So I hope I have occasion to say “nice to meet you” to someone I’ve already met, again, very soon.

I wish the same for you.