Everything I read on my way to a Product Management role

After more than a decade writing code, I was ready for a change. In my case, the intersection of my skills and passion pointed towards product management. Books have always been my go-to to learn about a new topic. So, I scoured the web for the best books I could read about product management. But, I also wanted to find a way to jot down the essence of the book so I could retain more in my head and refer to them in the future. These sketch notes mark my journey to product management. I hope you find them useful and wish you good luck with your personal journeys into product.

1. Originals by Adam Grant

A lot of what a product manager works on relates to ideas: collecting, vetting and bringing ideas to life and this book is extremely relevant to a PM in that sense, and to anyone interested in how great ideas come to life and what we can do to encourage those ideas all around us. If I had to pick two adjectives to describe the book, I’d pick ‘original’ and ‘startling’ but wiser folks have uttered more profound words about this profound book. So, go read it!

2. Inspired by Marty Cagan

Inspired is a great read for any product manager or aspiring product manager looking for a comprehensive overview of what product management is all about. It covers all the stages of product management, starting from: recognizing opportunities to bringing a product to life, all the way from product discovery to minimum viable products!

3. Zero to One by Peter Thiel

I loved the contrarian question that the book begins with:

What is a truth that you hold that most people would disagree with?

Thinking about this question helps us:

• Search within ourselves to establish a unique perspective
• Take a look at the world with a fresh set of eyes
• Move away from “conventional wisdom” and “social proof” that might bias us

Closely related to this idea in the book is the alluring premise that there are many secrets to be uncovered in the world. Secrets that are held by people and by nature. Finding those secrets help us uncover big ideas.

4. The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton Christensen

Clayton Christensen’s book is an eye-opening read to understand why large firms with the best resources at their disposal, with the best intent (to satisfy and delight their current customers) and with an excellent track record of success by investing in sustaining technologies fail in the face of seemingly inferior disruptive technologies by unknown, small companies.

5. The Innovator’s Solution by Clayton Christensen

This book is a long read and definitely worth investing the time to read it especially if you want real life examples of industries and how the theories discussed in this book can be used to explain their growth trajectories. Here’s a nice executive summary that captures the essence of this book.

6. Mobilized by S.C.Moatti

What I loved about this book was the way the author packed her insights into a succinct formula. There are also tons of examples in the book of successful, delightful mobile products that capture the essence of her formula. It’s also a super quick read, so go on and get your copy!

7. Competing Against Luck by Clayton Christensen

This book dives further into the Jobs To Be Done innovation theory that he introduced in the Innovator’s Solution. I love the examples in the book focusing on JTBD, specifically the milk shake’s job to be done and the story of the American Girl as a purpose brand. His 3 books together (The Innovator’s Dilemma, The Innovator’s Solution and Competing Against Luck) are a must read for anyone interested in disruption and innovation.

8. Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath

If you liked “Influence” and “The dragonfly effect”, you will enjoy this book — it has a good mix of human psychology and marketing principles and ideas that leave their mark on people i.e what kinds of ideas and messages stick in people’s minds and why. I love the acronyms that Chip and Dan Heath offer in their books. SUCCES is a simple way to remember the concepts discussed in the book. If you are interested in presenting your ideas in a persuasive manner and learning how to get people to remember, care and act about your ideas, you should read this book!

9. Good to Great by Jim Collins

For people interested in patterns that characterize great companies and their transition from a good company to a great company, this book is an insightful read. I found the hedgehog concept, BHAG (big hairy audacious goals) and the Stockdale paradox fascinating. Here is Stockdale’s quote from the book: “This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end — which you can never afford to lose — with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.”

10. Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moore

The book talks about the chasm that products fall into when scaling from an early market of technology enthusiasts and visionaries to a market of more conservative customers that refer one another to adopt a product and prefer to adopt the market leader. The book then details the strategy needed (dominate a niche market) to cross the chasm and capture the early and late adopters.

11. Positioning by Al Ries & Jack Trout

I love this marketing classic! It makes you think differently about branding and marketing. Positioning is more about the prospect and what’s in her mind rather than the product in isolation! The book is a really quick read and has a ton of examples: best practices and what not to do when marketing your product.

12. Naked Statistics by Charles Wheelan

I loved the real life examples in the book. They illustrated how Statistics can be used to break down seemingly unsolvable problems into digestible numbers and reasonable conclusions, how data can be represented in completely different ways by focusing on particular aspects of the data and the most common mistakes related to Statistics and how to avoid them.

13. Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely

This classic on behavioral economics is a fascinating book that discusses how human behavior is different from what we expect it to be: a logical, rational thought process leading to reasonable choices. The author talks about various biases that heavily influence the way we make decisions, based on a number of experiments that he conducted with fellow professors to study human behavior. If you are interested in psychology and how we make decisions in our lives, do read this book!

14. The Art of War by Sun Tzu

This ancient Chinese military treatise from the 5th century has been described time and again as a classic to understand great leadership, strategy, dealing with conflict and competition during difficult times and going to war. I found this book particularly hard to condense into a sketch and still do justice to the wisdom contained in such a tiny book. A great read if you are in the mood for deep thinking and re-reading to digest concepts presented in the book.

15. On Writing by Stephen King

This book is a classic for anyone interested in fine-tuning their writing and story-telling skills. I absolutely enjoyed reading this book because it discussed my favorite genre (story telling and writing fiction) in an honest and endearing style! I loved the autobiographical portions of it as well where the author discusses how he became a writer and the really scary, life or death moments that came to shape his journey as a writer.