Attention — that skill for Product Managers
“Do stuff. be clenched, curious. Not waiting for inspiration’s shove or society’s kiss on your forehead. Pay attention. It’s all about paying attention. attention is vitality. It connects you with others. It makes you eager. stay eager.”
― Susan Sontag
I’m a linguist by profession and I always analyze concepts and break them down into pieces of phrases, words. Product Management isn’t any exception and first of all, it semantically consists of 2 words for me:
Product — referring to an article or substance that is manufactured or ideated for sale.
Management — the process of dealing with or controlling (hmmm) things or people.
What I find interesting in these 2 concepts is that they’re totally different and Product Management actually combines 2 professions in it. As a person of product, you must be attentive to the details the product brings in itself. As a manager, you need to be attentive to the team you work with and to the outcome you have at the end.
We all have noticed that our attention is always changing from 1 thing to another, but we never focus on the fact that those changes happen faster and faster.
Recent studies have shown that an average attention span has decreased from 12 seconds to 8.5 only in the past 15 years. One of the reasons is our phones, we tend to pick them up nearly 1500 times during a week and spend 3 hours of our days “in them” (I’m above average, spending not less than 4 hours… ouch).
As Chris Bailey describes in his talk, the problem behind this attention spans getting shorter is not a distraction, the real problem is overstimulation. We’re so afraid of boredom, we’re so much addicted to being stimulated by the new technologies, information, data, that we’re unable to get that space of focus on something important that we feel we should have accomplished.
It sounds like a problem that many of us would face, however, it is the job that we do as Product Managers that involves much more need in attention and we should be eager to find out and solve the core problems of attention loss.
Attention to the product we build:
Research
As a Product Manager, you’re probably spending a lot of time researching competitors or trying to get some new ideas from other apps and software.
I’m working on a mobile application and do a ton of research in similar apps to get inspiration. I keep them downloaded inside my personal phone, which is WRONG! Please don’t do that. Take a test device and keep ONLY the apps you need to research for, don’t get distracted by personal messages and notifications (unless you’re working on a messaging app itself haha).
Or if you’re surfing the internet using your computer then believe me opening as many tabs with as many different articles, concentration music, task management tools as you can won’t help you to focus on your research. The Research tabs will only do so. Please, just close the others.
Design
Do you pay attention to the design you request? Do you check every pixel and angle of the mocks? No? Then go check them now! You nearly forgot that the most creative part of your job is getting the visualization of the idea you had, so you need to seriously focus on it. You need to observe it like a mother would observe a newborn child and make sure she is totally healthy in all aspects.
Moreover, do you compare the new design with the already existing design in the app? Or do you ask for feedback from people who interact less frequently with your product? Give the mocks to random people and ask to check attentively and provide you with that precious feedback.
Feedback
Are you really attentive to the feedback you get about your product? Do you keep a notebook and write down every bit of advice or complaint you get? Focus on them more, as they may open up new ideas and horizons for you.
Use some classic forms of feedback collection:
- Organize small surveys among your users or among your employees. Sometimes the best feedback is given by the developers who work on the product.
- Find some of your important users and send them an e-mail asking for feedback.
- There are great platforms, where you could do usability tests like UsabilityHub or User Testing. Use them!
- And of course, if you spend so much time on social platforms (see above study), so why not to use it as a tool for feedback. A small poll on Facebook or Instagram would do the job for you.
At the end of the day, you will find out how much deeper you went into your product compared to your lonely contemplation in between distractions.
Attention to our management style:
People
No matter how successful your product is, how smart you are in your position and how satisfied your company is with you, you deal with people. People are the most important aspect of the Product Manager’s job. You need to be attentive to each and every member of your team. You need to know every single detail about them, their desires, longings, their life, and hobbies.
Keep asking yourself:
- Do I truly know with whom I work?
- Do I know the coding guy sitting there?
- What’s his hobby?
- What does he like in this life except for this job or does he even like his job?
If you don’t know those details, do not hesitate, go and ask. And keep it in mind secretly written somewhere.
Next time when you’re bored and wanna grab the phone ask one of your employees to take a cup of coffee with you instead and chat about things not connected to the job.
Business culture
As a Product Manager, you’re a demo version of an entrepreneur. You should care about the business values of the company you work in. Always pay attention to what metamorphoses the company goes through and take lessons from them. If there is a shift in the business model, maybe the same shift should be done inside the team as well.
Be responsive to the culture changes as well. If there is a problem that caused people to be fired, check the reasons and share them with your teammates. Firstly it will encourage the team members to be more involved in the companies’ life and secondly they will see that you care for them as members of 1 big family.
Concluding, I would like to mention 1 important aspect of this bipolar word “attention”. It is important to not seek attention, but pay attention. Seeking attention will make you narrow-minded and less creative. You will start doing things for getting attention. Being attentive will make it vice versa, you will start noticing details that once past you by.
So please be attentive!
P.S. Would love to hear your opinions. Leave a comment if any.
