Published 4 March 2024

· 10 min read

The product guru complex

It's time to ditch the dogma and introduce a strong dose of pragmatism if product management is to avoid an existential crisis, argues Becky Yelland.

Is Product in existential crisis? With all the current noise about tech layoffs and commentary about the right way to “do” product management, you could be forgiven for wondering this.

Mind the Product conducted a couple of snap polls to find out whether the Product community believes there is a crisis. The results are revealing, with 30% of you saying they believe it is, and a further 20% of you saying they don’t know what to think.  So there’s certainly a problem that we need to deal with before it gets worse.

Perhaps job insecurity is a contributor. We know that many people feel the recent tech layoffs have played especially hard on Product as a discipline – despite evidence that this is not the case. The stats and more recent analysis of the numbers from layoffs.fyi show that Product has not been hit harder than other disciplines. So let’s consider what else could be causing such anxiety among so many product people? To better help us understand, MTP put out a second poll which found that 81% of you suffer from feelings of anxiety or imposter syndrome specifically when reading posts from product thought leaders.

Well this is a head scratcher, what is it about the content from product thought leaders that causes anxiety? Surely their content is broadcast as a means to HELP the product community? How are words of advice and guidance causing anxiety? I’ve stepped into various communities and had discussions with many product people to find out what they believe leads people to feelings of anxiety. Their reflections mirror some of the challenges I highlighted in my Mind the Product post about a year ago on the noise in the industry, ProductTech: The industry, the discipline, have we gone too far?

Many people read the puristic advice, theories and approaches broadcast by senior product thought leaders and attempt to apply their thinking into a myriad of different contexts, scenarios, product domains and organisations. Unsurprisingly, the results are often unsuccessful. The result is disenfranchised product people and frustrated stakeholders, which leaves product professionals thinking:-

“I am doing this all wrong”
“I am an imposter”
“How do I prove my value”
“My company just does not get product”

If we go back to the source of these theories and principles, it starts to not be too much of a stretch to surmise that these senior product thought leaders are the ones actively helping to talk us into a crisis. So who are they?

Introducing the product guru

Let’s face it, LinkedIn has become more than a way to connect with people. It’s evolved into a source of education and support for your career and a marketplace for you to sell your wares. For those of us in the Product community this means product coach, product tools, product consulting, product books (the ProductTech industry). Among this crowd there is a small niche, an elite group who consider themselves a ‘product guru’. These are seasoned product leaders who position themselves as leaders of the community.
The problem comes from the product gurus who, consciously or unconsciously, have begun to focus solely on what content/advice/method best suits their agenda, often prioritising this agenda above the impact their words will have within the product community as a whole. They’re what I refer to as a product guru with a complex.

Let’s look at how the Product Guru Complex has now become the epicentre of the current problem that could well turn into a crisis.

History of the product guru

In the early 2000s there was a need for a centralised set of principles and agreement on what the role of product in software actually was. Unlike the 17 software development practitioners who created the Agile Manifesto in 2001 –  four values and 12 principles for software development – the Product profession did not create a centralised doctrine or set of beliefs that everyone could refer to and contextually apply. We did however collectively agree to a set of principles – thanks to thought leaders who placed themselves in the centre of all things and have continued to do so in the following 20+ years. I would argue that the Product community has moved on. Our needs are no longer the same, but the way many of the gurus respond has unfortunately not evolved.

Puristic doctrine has remained static

If we see the advent of Agile in 2001 as the genesis of modern product management then the discipline is 23 years into its existence. But as product people we are still questioning our role, and actively having to prove our value to non product leadership/organisations.

I believe that this is in no small part due to the attempted application of the puristic doctrines pushed by product gurus. It’s this, rather than the pragmatic advice that the community actually needs and craves, that is preventing the Product discipline from maturing into the well oiled machine and craft it should be, central to the success of delivering to business strategies and ensuring growth and success.

What happens when you apply puristic doctrines?

Less experienced or unempowered product people, or product teams led by product leaders with little to no product experience are taking puristic doctrines from product gurus as rote and applying them in their organisations.

They often try to prove value by forcing a methodology or framework in to solve a problem, and in doing so they likely disenfranchise their partners in sales, tech and marketing. They also lose the trust of their senior stakeholders by making everything overly complicated and too long-winded. It leads CEOs / Sales / Marketing to go straight to the engineering teams for a quick steer on “could we do this,” or “how could we give a customer this?”.

The result? The org is left asking – what value is my product team providing? Surely we can bypass them all together? Or just tell them WHAT to build and leave them to execute on our preferred roadmap.

Product teams then focus on being great at producing STUFF as quickly as possible in order to be seen as valuable. But when you’re not empowered to apply product thinking to ensure the STUFF is valuable to the customer / product / business many product people end up feeling at sea, not able to dig into the craft they want to become experts in, and look, hope that there is a magic company out there that DOES get product, that will take them in so that all will be right with the world again.

That was a lot. So let’s summarise what we’ve covered so far:

• Product gurus were needed about 20 years ago to define how we should do it
• We’ve moved on, we understand the doctrine we’ve collectively created.
• Product gurus are STILL promoting puristic frameworks and methodologies.
• Product teams attempt and fail to apply these into their orgs
• The team tries again, maybe with a new framework this time
• Then instead of applying pragmatic reasoning these product teams often jump immediately to the conclusion:

“I am doing this all wrong. I am not sure how I can do it right, I am therefore an imposter.”

Conclusion

If enough people feel this and enough organisations experience this, then we WILL inevitably end up with a discipline in crisis. That is unless we pull together now and collectively agree there is and can be a better way. We need to change the narrative, to recognise that the centralised puristic approach can be where to START but is absolutely NOT where you should end up.

Pragmatic contextual application has always been the best way to ensure:-

• You apply the right method of thinking / analysis at the right time
• To achieve a quick recommendation or set of priority actions
• To ensure all your internal stakeholders can easily engage in the journey with you
• And therefore continually look to engage with Product to collaborate
• Senior stakeholders see product as the core function it can and should be
• The right customer problems are solved at the right time and in the right way
• Product success is achieved
• Business growth is made possible.

Call to arms

The product discipline must move beyond having to continually justify its value and existence in an organisation.

All too often product teams are unsupported by leadership not versed in the product discipline, or product leaders land in a role that’s a “poisoned chalice”, finding that their sole focus is to fix how product works with sales, marketing, engineering and the executive suite. These leaders are then constantly put on the back foot with leadership who want them to prove that Product has a place, either in the organisation or in the C-Suite. It’s a constant fight, which two decades into product management, should not still be happening.

If you think you’re a product guru and are concerned you may have a complex, I expect you are now asking yourself – “how can you be a part of the solution?”.

Here is my suggestion – If you’re pushing what could be considered a puristic approach, think long and hard, is there a better way to top and tail your philosophy? Consider how you can explain to teams how they can better translate your advice and guidance into their contexts. Please always consider the potential impact of your words. Please take into account that many of your audience are not supported, or equipped with enough experience to know how to apply this level of pragmatism on their own accord.

For those who are not a product guru, but who want to ensure we empower the product community to be more pragmatic and brave, let’s take action. Let’s promote, shout about HOW we can get product people to apply an appropriate level of contextual pragmatism when they deploy product methodologies and frameworks in their organisations. This is especially important for product teams with leadership that has not grown up in Product.

Let’s look for ways that we can remove the fear and anxiety from unempowered product people. Instead of pointing at the myriad of puristic doctrines of our craft let’s collectively recognise them  as such.

We need to promote, and promote again:

• Use your common sense
• Build up trust by nurturing good relationships
• Apply any/all advice with a level of contextual pragmatism
• Riff on that, adjust till you get it RIGHT for your team and organisation
• And finally – don’t be afraid to promote the part you had to play in the ensuing success!