31: Why Customer Centric Vision is Essential in Product Management

In this episode of the How to Succeed in Product Management Podcast, marketing professor Jeff Shulman and The Product Management Center advisory board members Red Russak and Soumeya Benghanem  welcome Sagar Kulkarni (Microsoft) to talk about creating a customer centric vision within any organization. Whether there is misalignment in vision between teams within the same organization or working in opposing workflows, what matters the most is that the product vision aligns with the customer needs.

Support for How to Succeed in Product Management is brought to you by Apptentive, which enables product managers to measure shifts in customer emotion and gather actionable feedback across the mobile customer journey. To learn more, go to Apptentive.com/UW.

What to Listen For:

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:29 Creating a customer centric vision
• 06:59 What does vision stand for in product management?
• 11:43 The core of user-centered visions
• 18:02 Customer feedback is a big indicator of your success
• 22:54 Focus on vision around strategic prioritization
• 32:07 The mindset you should have to meet customer requirements
• 41:50 Bridging through misaligned vision but completely aligned with customer needs
• 49:15 Is it possible to keep the same domain and break into product management?
• 50:26 Customer centricity is sometimes taken for granted