About

Over the years of shipping in large and small organizations, I’ve learned many lessons and cultivated an evolving mix of best practices. I’ve also developed some useful habits to keep my teams shipping the right solutions at the right time. In the process, my teams have been able to harness  opportunities, achieve objectives, and stay out of trouble [mostly]. 

I was looking for a way to pull all this knowledge and experience together to share with others, and the Adaptable Product Framework was born.

The Story of the Adaptable Product Framework 

For a little background, I first developed the Framework during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic lock-down as a personal side project. As the world faced new challenges on many levels, I reflected about what I had learned that might be helpful in navigating this new reality. My goal was to see what I could cull together from 20 years’ experience in technology and innovation management together, and mix it together with the best thinking from my favorite books, methods, and mental models.

The Adaptable Product Framework evolved from that analysis. And as It started to take form, it quickly became clear that this was something I wanted to share with the world.

Who is the Framework for? 

I purposely didn’t want to write something primarily for CEOs or startup founders. To be honest, I’m a little sick of the books and blogs written by management consultants, motivational speakers, reporters, and academics that seem targeted  at people with the power to reshape the world (or just hire them as consultants or lecturers).

Sure, many of these ideas are great and backed by research, and it would be awesome if more leaders did re-organize their teams along proven principles. But too often the authors’ suggestions require a whole new way of organizing a company. I know that as a product manager out on the front lines trying to ship (often on a team I am stuck with — whether they liked it or not), this type of advice isn’t very helpful. 

What the Framework is NOT about

But I feel that this basic stuff has been told by every product manager and their mother with a blog. They all seem to think they just discovered ‘hypothesis statements’ for the first time, and they seem super excited to share it with others. Good for them. But I wanted to do something different. 

What the Adaptable Product Framework is about

In a past life, I used to be a organizational change consultant. While  fancy pants consulting work wasn’t my thing (all talking, no shipping), I did find a passion for the concepts and models of organizational design,  change management, knowledge management, collective intelligence, innovation management, and team performance optimization. I especially loved thinking about how organizations can  more effectively adapt to change. 

As I followed my own career path in product management, I began to appreciate the unique role that product managers can play in helping organization’s evolve in times of change. 

Unfortunately, as I have worked with many product managers, I’ve found that some don’t necessarily take the opportunity to effect real change when they could. It seems that many product managers just show up and ship a few features and move on, and they are content with that. On the other hand, I think the really transformative product leaders are the ones who make a lasting impact on the organization. These are the true leaders who step up and take responsibility for helping their organizations adapt. 

So this is where the Adaptable Product Framework comes in. My goal was to offer advice that can help turn reactive product managers into proactive ones. I want to make it accessible so any product manager could pick and choose the right gems, advice, and tips for any stage of the product life-cycle. I also aspired to create something practical and flexible  that would evolve. And so, I fully expect it to change it over time as we learn more.

What this blog is about

This blog is my attempt to explore the concepts of the Adaptable Product Framework and it’s implications for modern organizations. I also want to share it’s evolution as we see it unfold.

Additionally, I will be sharing more of my own stories, experiences, and insights along the way. I will also be collecting any ideas, articles, stories, and concepts that are relevant from the wider world. I want this space to represent a place to consider the path of change. I want it to include a constantly evolving set of useful best practices that can help you grow as a product manager as you ship ever-more successful initiatives with your team. 

If you are a leader of a department or group of product managers, don’t feel left out. I will also offer advice to people who manage product organizations. There is a lot product leaders can do to help improve the adaptability of all their teams.  

And of course, I’ll also offer a few scary stories and words of warning from some of my own failures, so you can hopefully avoid my mistakes. 

Invitation to collaborate 

To that end, I hope you find something useful in this to share with your team. Drop me a message if you want to connect, I would love to hear from you and to learn if you have found the framework or articles useful.