#pm_library: “Continuous Discovery Habits”
A few words about the fantastic book that I recently added to my #pm_library. I took this book everywhere I worked: to my office, a coffee shop, and on the train. Why? “Continuous Discovery Habits” by Teresa Torres is both inspiring and practical.
Teresa Torres helps Product Managers answer the fundamental question: “What to build to deliver real value to users and help the business achieve its goals?”. The answer is broken down into two parts: Discovering Opportunities and Discovery Solutions. The motif that runs through the entire book and the foundation of the discovery process is the continuous discovery habits.
Before returning to the book review, I would like to share my observations from work. When as a team, we conducted recurring interviews with users and analyzed data in a timely fashion, it was then that the changes we introduced in the product provided the most significant value to users (and business). On the contrary, when we felt too confident in our insights and focused almost exclusively on delivery, something started to break, and we were losing traction.
Teresa Torres is telling us precisely about this. First, she is proving (better than I did in the paragraph above) why it is worth developing continuous discovery habits (regular, cyclical meetings with users, looking for opportunities to talk in every possible situation and occasion). Second, she gives a lot of practical advice on organizing it and how to convince/change the organization to support this approach.
Another fantastic thing that Teresa Torres describes is Opportunity mapping. It’s a visual representation of opportunities that helps to organize and prioritize them. But not only that. Opportunity maps are also a brilliant tool for communicating our way of working with other teams and stakeholders. I have checked it in practice recently. It works great.
The author’s essential advice is not to blame the organization and superiors for the lack of discovery. Teresa says that she was always able to introduce discovery habits in every situation. And I agree with that. I believe that in our world of product management, there is sometimes too much complaining about the CEO, sales executives, etc., and not enough education and persistent work in this direction.
I see a lot of value in the “Avoid these anti-patterns” scetions added at the end of each chapter. Unfortunately, Honestly, I have struggled with many of the bad practices raised here.
I recommend this book to all product managers above the junior/associate level. IMO it’s nice to have some experience to get the most out of this book. “Continues Discovery Habits” is one of the books that has had the most significant impact on my work as a Product Manager. Thank you, Teresa!
