Category Archives: Product Management

What if the Avengers were Product Manager?

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A Product Manager has one of the most broadest and vaguest job description ever. There are product managers with completely different set of skills and still equally successful. There are companies where product managers are just a “cog in the wheel” and then there are companies where product managers are “the wheel”. We, as product managers, often like to think of ourselves as “the CEO of the Product” or “the one wearing multiple hats” and many other similar buzzwords. In our own world, we are nothing less than a superhero. So, let’s take this fantasy a step forward and figure out “What if the Avengers were Product Manager?”

Avengers - Iron man, Thor, Captain America, Hulk
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Top 9 User Experience (UX) design Twitter does wrong

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With a total user base of 1.3 billion comprising of monthly active users (MAU) of 330 million and daily active users (DAU) of 145 million, Twitter is one of the top social media platforms. Twitter became a hit soon after it’s launch because it brought a radical shift in the content game. You no more need to write 1000s words long blogs/articles to get your point across and don’t need to worry about getting decent exposure. Twitter made everybody a content creator. However, user experience (UX) is not considered to be one of Twitter’s forte and one can say that Twitter is winning the game primarily on the basis of content and engagement. What if Twitter ups its UX game? Could it drive more engagement and user growth? Let’s discuss the top 9 user experience designs that Twitter does wrong.

User Experience design
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Top 5 Product management tools every Product Manager must be good at

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In the current digital and remote working age, we are increasingly reliant on a lot of digital tools to get our job done. Companies are now migrating to digital solutions for processes that have been manual for decades. With time, these tools have evolved from just being a helping hand to an absolute must in their field. Different teams have their own unique requirements and thus their own set of favourite tools. Let’s discuss the top 5 product management tools that every Product Manager must be good at.

Multitasking manager
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Facebook is profiling you (even if you are not on Facebook): 5 ways to stop it

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First of all, this is not a tutorial on how to update your Facebook privacy settings or how to delete your Facebook account. There is already enough information available on that. Google it. Also, lets be clear that Facebook has your data. There is no doubt around that. Doesn’t matter if you have deleted your Facebook account or uninstalled the Facebook app, there are lots of other apps (WhatsApp, Instagram and a lot of third party apps) that you use on a daily basis which are regularly sending your data to Facebook. Often when concerns are raised around user data privacy with Facebook, people have one of the 2 reactions –

  • Facebook is evil. Let’s delete Facebook and a bunch of deletefacebook hashtags start trending on social media for a few days. Then we forget all about it and Facebook gets back to collecting your data like nothing ever happened.
  • People feel defenceless against such a big tech giant and they try to hide their helplessness by saying “I got nothing to hide”, “So what if Facebook has my data? I’ll get better ads. Nothing wrong with that”.

And this narrative is fine to a certain extent. I don’t really mind if my data is being used “only” for the purpose of personalizing ads for me. But the truth is, that nobody knows how and when your data can be misused and by whom. I mean who would have thought that taking a simple personality test would end up influencing your voting decision. Remember Cambridge Analytica?

Data Privacy
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Apple bullies its way into the Mobile App Ad market

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Apple recently hit the market cap of $2 Trillion and became the most valuable company in the world. Innovation, customer focus, design excellence, great marketing and an incredibly loyal user base are some of the key drivers of this magnificent growth. But “absolute power corrupts absolutely” and of late, Apple has been kind of a bully in the tech ecosystem. They do whatever they want without consulting the other industry stakeholders and more often than not their decisions seem to be inspired by driving more sales of their hardware/services or more adoption of their digital products. And now it looks like Apple has made plans to bully its way into the $80 billion Mobile App Ad market.

Multiple Mobile Apps
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5 User Experience (UX) design Instagram does wrong

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Instagram is the 6th most popular social network in the world and we spend a good amount of time daily on Instagram. Instagram is often praised for its UX design which has made it a hit among youngsters. However, there are quite a few UX design principles / standards that Instagram breaks regularly. Is this something that differentiates Instagram from the rest or is this a missed opportunity by Instagram? Let’s discuss the 5 User Experience design that Instagram does wrong.

User Experience - Preview Image
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Facebook Web User Experience is dead

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When was the last time you accessed Facebook through the web (laptop / desktop)? I’m sure it’s been quite some time for most of you. A lot of us probably don’t even remember our Facebook password because we are just always logged in to the Facebook app through our phones and just don’t feel the need of logging in through the web. However, on those rare occasions when you do have to login through the web, the user experience totally puts you off. It feels like it’s just been quickly put together by someone in no time and is there just for the sake of it. There is no way it looks like a product with 16 years worth of rich UX data and insights. In my opinion, the Facebook Web user experience is dead. It’s not just “not good”, it’s bad.

Facebook Desktop

Facebook’s web page can be broken down into 5 major components – 

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Gmail issues – Why Gmail Why??

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Gmail probably is “the” most used email client all over the world. However, even with it’s countless advantages, Gmail also has its fair share of feature gaps and user experience issues. But we still keep using it, being fully aware of these known issues and hoping that it’ll soon be fixed in the upcoming updates. And when these issues don’t get fixed, then over a period of time they start annoying you a lot more than they normally should and makes you go “Why Gmail Why??”. Highlighting a few such issues below –

Furious businessman
Coffee photo created by drobotdean – www.freepik.com
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Lord Krishna – The best Product Manager ever

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First of all, apologies for the clickbaitish title. However, i do believe that Lord Krishna was a great product manager (if not the best) and there is a lot to be learned about Product management from Lord Krishna and his life.

1. Shrimad Bhagavad Gita – “The” best PRD ever

It is a well established opinion that Shrimad Bhagavad Gita has answers to all the problems of life. This is akin to the concept of PRD (Product requirement document) in the Product Management world.

When Arjun (i.e. the Developer) was having doubts about performing his duties as a warrior (i.e. Product development) in the battlefield (i.e. Sprint), he reached out to Lord Krishna (i.e. the Product Manager) and Lord Krishna guided him by reciting verses which later constituted Shrimad Bhagavad Gita (i.e. the PRD)

Shrimad Bhagavad Gita - PRD

Thus, we can say that Shrimad Bhagavad Gita is the best and the most detailed PRD ever created by the best Product Manager ever.

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How Covid-19 permanently changed the course of Product Management?

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The Covid-19 pandemic is for sure gonna be “the” most defining moment of most of our lives. It has forced us to change/rethink every big and small aspect of our life. However, here i am just gonna focus on how Covid-19 has permanently changed the course of Product Management.

Covid 19 - Digital transformation

Work From Home

This is one of the biggest impact Covid-19 has made on almost every business and profession across the world. Pre Covid there was more or less a general consensus that work from home decreases productivity. Many companies as a policy didn’t even allowed work from home for its employees.

However, due to Covid-19 and the worldwide lockdowns that followed, companies were forced to allow extended work from home policy.

And just like that, the myth got busted. Companies realized that there is no significant impact on productivity due to work from home. This was even more prominent in the Tech domain and as a result, some companies like Twitter and Slack have even gone ahead with the bold move of permanent work from home.

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