The Beautiful Mess

Home
Archive
About
New
Top
Discussion
TBM 257: How to Make the Case for Slowing Down to Speed Up
How can we make the case for slowing down to speed up when we are already going slow, and when shutting things down and starting over is not an option?
 • 
John Cutler
2
TBM 256: The Slide
I can guarantee that at some point in your career, you've experienced The Slide. Things stop making sense. Team confidence drops. It becomes hard to…
 • 
John Cutler
5
TBM 255: The New Airbnb (Lenny's Podcast) w/Melissa Perri
This post was co-written with Melissa Perri. We started chatting about the podcast, and an hour in we figured…hey, let’s put this out there. You've…
 • 
John Cutler
 and 
Melissa Perri
9
TBM 254: Self-Gaslighting and the Doubt Loop
Are you gaslighting yourself? Many of the dynamics we deal with at work are not overtly toxic or unhealthy. We know people mean well and do their best…
 • 
John Cutler
4
TBM 253: Don't Fix Things. Write a New Story
Some thoughts on why the push to “align on the problem” is often counterproductive, and why a better approach is to focus on breaking the narrative…
 • 
John Cutler
12
TBM 252: How to Troubleshoot Status Updates and Syncs
I've often wondered why some companies can develop strong habits around introspection, weekly goals, weekly reviews, progress logs, and regular updates…
 • 
John Cutler
1
October 2023
TBM 251: Scale vs. Efficiency
I received great feedback on my last post on tradeoffs and polarities. In that post, we explored tradeoffs like quality vs. speed at different levels of…
 • 
John Cutler
TBM 250: Dear Executive...
I wrote this post for you—product nerd and general fan of the mess—to share with an executive at your company. Product development isn’t their main jam…
 • 
John Cutler
10
TBM 249: Return on Investment (and Allocation)
How do we answer… Where are we investing our money? Where is the money going? What are we getting for our money? Let’s start with what not to do…
 • 
John Cutler
1
TBM 248: Project-ish
Imagine a spectrum. On one side, you have a team basking in the warm glow of a sunny afternoon, free from constraints, shipping high-quality products at…
 • 
John Cutler
7
TBM 247: 15 Metaphors for Waste In Product Development
The drag is there, but you might not be able to see it
 • 
John Cutler
7
TBM 245: True Empowerment
There's a fine line between empowerment and absolving oneself of responsibility. Effective delegation is a key leadership skill. The key is discerning…
 • 
John Cutler
4
© 2023 John Cutler
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start WritingGet the app
Substack is the home for great writing