You work as a product manager at an e-commerce company. Your team prioritizes a performance tweak you hope will improve page load time. You release an improvement and find that time spent on site increases, correlating with a higher average order value (AOV) and increased ad revenue.
This is excellent John. I’ve often felt that product velocity is essentially a function of thrust (conviction, team/talent, clarity) minus drag (risk aversion, coordination costs, WIP).
The chase for metric purity is often rooted in risk aversion & mitigation more than anything else. It’s also why [measure what matters] might be true, but not everything that matters can/should be measured.
OTOH conviction can act as “jet fuel” to achieve “escape velocity” in the face of substantial ambiguity and risks.
How do you think this more nuanced view of metrics-based strategy for big bets / experimentation fits together with "North Star"-style metrics? I feel like this post is way more relatable and representative of the early-stage startup experience, but I'm guessing the two aren't mutually exclusive concepts from your perspective?
This is excellent John. I’ve often felt that product velocity is essentially a function of thrust (conviction, team/talent, clarity) minus drag (risk aversion, coordination costs, WIP).
The chase for metric purity is often rooted in risk aversion & mitigation more than anything else. It’s also why [measure what matters] might be true, but not everything that matters can/should be measured.
OTOH conviction can act as “jet fuel” to achieve “escape velocity” in the face of substantial ambiguity and risks.
How do you think this more nuanced view of metrics-based strategy for big bets / experimentation fits together with "North Star"-style metrics? I feel like this post is way more relatable and representative of the early-stage startup experience, but I'm guessing the two aren't mutually exclusive concepts from your perspective?