Hello! Our joint Tekhnotrek educational project with MIPT includes a semester course on Product Management . My name is Stanislav and I am the lead instructor for this course and also the product manager for the DonationAlerts project. In preparation for the course, I have put together an impressive list of helpful materials. Made for you from this list a selection of books and blogs that will be useful to product or project managers.
The list is compiled based on my experience as well as recommendations from colleagues and industry experts. Each book has a micro-review and a formal description. The selection is extensive, and it will be interesting to see your recommendations in the comments.
Personal recommendations
Books
Daniel Kahneman, Think Slow, Decide Fast (one of the most powerful books on consumer thinking and our patterns).
In the 1970s, two assumptions were generally accepted. First, that people are generally rational and have common sense. Second, most deviations from rationality are attributed to emotions. But Kahneman's research has shown that persistent thinking errors in people are due more to the mechanism of thinking than to the influence of emotions. Today, in general, researchers agree with the thesis that our minds are prone to systematic errors. Kahneman's main idea is to demonstrate the work of the mind, taking into account the latest discoveries in cognitive and social psychology.
Robert Cialdini, The Psychology of Influence (old but gold)
The author raises the question of why we are doing what we did not intend to do and did not want to do. He identifies six basic principles of influencing people. The psychologist says that almost all people are influenced by others. For example, the general desire to be like everyone else, to do like everyone else. People tend to rely on the majority opinion. This is also used in advertising, which provides statistics that millions of people use their product. Advertising calls to buy a product at a discount are designed to make a person worry that they will then have to buy the product for the full amount. Although in fact, he may not be needed at all. Also, a well-known weakness of a person is the desire to justify his choice and find advantages where there were none before. The psychologist gives many other examples and explains how it is possible to influence the actions and opinions of a person,what are the weak points of the "managers".
Nassim Taleb, "Antifragility" (on why some companies fall apart in a crisis, while others rush to the top)
Taleb says that the absence of stressful situations is harmful. Sooner or later, every object (person, company, etc.) may experience a disaster, a catastrophe of its own kind, and he will not be ready for it. The presence of minor stressors helps to achieve antifragility. People need to be under some (not too much) stress to awaken to activity. Taleb advises not to pay attention to minor hazards, but to invest energy in protecting against significant harm. “ We usually insure against small and probable losses, not large and rare ones. That is, we do everything the other way around . "
Tom DeMarco, Deadline. A novel about project management "(about how sometimes it is difficult to organize and optimize work)
At a spirit-uplifting event organized by the company for laid-off employees, Mr. Tompkins meets a charming lady. She turns out to be an industrial spy. After chatting with him for a bit, she ... puts him to sleep and transports him to the country of Morovia, where Tompkins eventually takes over the leadership of a megaproject to develop several software products: the country is going to become a leader in the high-tech sector.
As events unfold, the main character finds out a lot of useful things. How to get bad news on time? What condition determines the success of a project? What are the words of a potential team member - a signal to immediately hire him? How and why to calculate the project size in functional units? What adjustments can the tyranny of the powerful of this world make and what can be done about it? How to find a compromise between the number of people in the team and the speed of work? He does not have time to solve one problem - immediately another appears.
Sergey Abdulmanov, Dmitry Kibkalo, “Business for our own” (rather, it is about business in Russian realities, but many useful thoughts and funny situations + lively language) + can be supplemented with “Business as a game”
Our first book, Business as a Game, consisted of 140 stories about how we built a network and what difficulties we encountered on all fronts. Luckily for us, everyone on the team knew what to do (or how to use their head to find out).
And then we faced growth challenges. When there were more than 200 of us, knowledge began to be lost: training was put in person at the very beginning, but it’s impossible to teach everyone that way. We stepped on the dumbest rake possible and caught a huge box office gap. Dozens of cases of theft were identified. Sometimes things happened in stores that I wanted to fire everyone on the same day. Technological debt was accumulating. Once we got together and wrote down all the problems of the company - and it became completely incomprehensible how we still exist. The amount of work to rework all of this was impressive. But we started spring cleaning and went through, probably, the worst possible. And in parallel, we launched several more projects, besides Mosigra. We have become more cynical, more experienced and have learned to work for a result in any conditions.
In general, before you is a squeeze from our small, but already ten years' experience. All this is the reality that we went through with the whole team. This is not a dogma, and perhaps tomorrow we will already think that all this is garbage. But right now it reflects our view of business. This is exactly the time when you still manage to explain in simple words what to do, and not fall into a gloomy boring theory that is important for the survival of medium-sized businesses.
Jason Schreyer, "Blood, Sweat and Pixels" (also not entirely about product management, more about game development, but energizes and gives the right vector)
The book will tell you what's on the flip side of the video game industry. Here you can learn about creating games, both the simplest and the most complex, large-scale and impressive. The author conducted interviews with the creators of the games themselves, so readers will be able to find out what is behind every cult game of our time.
The book contains many interesting stories about how the idea of the game became reality. How the projects were implemented, what changes were made to them and why. What each particular game might look like and why it looks different. Why the release is delayed, what obstacles the creators face.
Robert Fitzpatrick, “Ask Mommy” (on polls and research)
Steve Blank, guru of the startup movement, says that the main thing for a budding entrepreneur is to “get out of the office,” that is, start directly asking customers what they need. Whether or not you get really important information, however, depends on the questions you ask. By the way, the most popular question is “Do you like our idea or product”? - is incorrect. It's like asking your mom if she likes your idea: she loves you and will praise you anyway, not wanting to upset. 99% of clients do the same. In general, to be a successful entrepreneur, you need to know how and what to ask, and from the book by Rob Fitzpatrick you will learn how to do it!
The author will help you understand when the answer is given out of politeness and does not carry any value, will tell you in which direction the conversation should be developed, what clarifying questions to ask, how to avoid socially desirable answers, how to understand what is good or bad in a product, whether the market needs it how to position it correctly - and all this with many real-life examples.
Lawrence Levy, Pixar. Reboot " (about scaling, getting out of the crisis and ways to rescue complex projects)
It's hard to find someone who hasn't watched Pixar cartoons. But how did the tiny ad studio grow into a giant of the film industry? This is a story about strong people and strong-willed decisions, about choices and absurd arguments that allowed history to happen. It is about how competent management and control over the situation can withstand any risks. Through this book, you will discover what has been the driving force behind Pixar and how it has managed to cope with its many challenges.
Ray Bradbury, "Zen in the Art of Book Writing" (one of the best books for finding inspiration in work, and in general any; suitable for times of crisis)
A collection of essays by the author, written over the years, in which he tries to understand the nature of his creative energy. What did he come to:
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Eric Berne, "People who play games" (why we behave the way we do, and how it is tied to the desire to play)
The system developed by Berne is designed to relieve a person from the influence of life scenarios that program his behavior, to teach him less " play ”in relationships with oneself and others, to find true freedom and encourage personal growth. In this book, the reader will find many useful tips to help understand the nature of human communication, the motives of their own and others' actions and the causes of conflicts. According to the author, the fate of each of us is largely determined in early childhood, but in adulthood it may well be realized and controlled by a person, if he wants to.
Kerry Patterson, Joseph Granny, Ron Macmillan and Al Switzler, Difficult Dialogues(one of the best books about negotiations and conversations, both for work and for everyday life)
When people first hear the term "difficult dialogue", the first thing in the imagination of many people is the images of presidents, prime ministers sitting around a huge table and discussing the future of their people. Of course, their dialogues usually lead to very widespread consequences, but this book is not about them. We mean interactions in which each of us can become a participant. These are the dialogues that we carry on day in and day out and which have a very powerful effect on our lives.
Jack Mitchell, "Hug Your Customers" (on how to make a product truly customer-centric )
The book is about that the main thing in sales is the relationship with customers. About how to build their loyalty from the very first visit. Jack Mitchell has a philosophy of "hug", which means a sincere desire to make the customer happy. This is the foundation of all the work at Mitchell and other retail stores owned by the Mitchell family. And they do it perfectly: the database contains data on hundreds of thousands of customers, the sellers know all the features and needs of each visitor, and when visiting the store, everyone feels like the only one, unique and very important. And sales are constantly growing.
Jake Knapp, Sprint. How to develop and test a new product in just five days " (about how to quickly prototype and test hypotheses)
There are many methods for developing new products, but they all take time. Therefore, Google has developed a "sprint" - a technique that allows you to test any idea in just five days. Its authors have helped hundreds of startups learn how to quickly solve the most important problems. How should the product look like? Who will buy it? Which features should be added and which should be removed? Who should I show the prototype to?
Blogs
- https://t.me/proproduct (Ani Buldakova's channel, who came from the media and became a very successful product)
- https: //medium.com/no-flame-no ... (her own blog, but on Medium)
- https://gopractice.ru/summary/ (blog of Oleg Yakubenkov, creator of the GoPractice simulator; a lot of useful information about metrics)
- https://t.me/zamesin (Vanya Zamesin about life and entrepreneurship)
- https://t.me/product_love ( , «»)
- https://t.me/proudobstvo (« », )
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- Intercom, «Jobs-to-be-Done»
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- https://t.me/menedzhery ( )
- https://t.me/productsense ( )
- https://t.me/addmeto ( )
- https://t.me/ruspm
- https://t.me/uxhorn ( UX)
- https://t.me/temno ( )
- https://t.me/pmdaily ( )
- https://t.me/psilonsk ( )
- https://t.me/alexcouncil ( )
- https://t.me/changemarketing
I hope you enjoyed the collection. Write in the comments what books and blogs you would add to this list.