All the product management jargon, delivered

Maybe not all of it.

This is a medium-lean glossary of WTF we’re talking about when we talk about building, managing, strategizing, or just thinking about software products. Because let’s be frank with ourselves, we’re full of it. (Jargon, that is. Obviously.)

There’s a vision, a value prop, objectives, a thin slice (a medium slice?), a go live, an OKR or many, a North Star, an elevator pitch, a mission, goals, iteration objectives (I thought you already mentioned objectives), and to many, many people out there this all sounds like it belongs on the spectrum of same, same, but different. That is, unless you’re talking to a product person and your brain starts playing with all the incredible distinctions. They’re crucial to understand especially if you’re on the team owning the product — developers, engineers, designers, data scientists, blossoming product managers, and more. So let’s give it a go, and I’ll take it from the top:

Vision

This is where you’re going long term. It’s your castle in the sky, your nicely painted, inspiring, and exciting picture of where you want to end up. It is something to rally behind that is, by its name, visionary. It is not prescriptive, it’s not a step-by-step plan and it’s not a systems map. It is your North Star. You see it (Polaris!). It’s one of the brightest stars in the sky so don’t get distracted by the others. Now you figure out a way to get there. The vision can (appear to) be set for a product or suite of products…