

The Product Experience
Mind the Product
The Product Experience features conversations with the product people of the world, focusing on real insights of how to improve your product practice. Part of the Mind the Product network, hosts Lily Smith (ProductTank organiser and Product Consultant) & Randy Silver (Head of Product and product management trainer) “go deep” with the best speakers from ProductTank meetups all over the globe, Mind the Product conferences, and the wider product community.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jan 15, 2020 • 42min
Keeping Track Of Your HEART – Tomer Sharon on The Product Experience
There’s a lot of debate in the product and research communities about quantitative vs qualitative approaches to metrics, so we sat down with Tomer Sharon (MD/Head of User Research and Metrics at Goldman Sachs) to talk about how he uses Google’s HEART approach to track what matters. Formerly of Google and WeWork, Tomer talks about [...] Read more »The post Keeping Track Of Your HEART – Tomer Sharon on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Jan 8, 2020 • 38min
Where Do Good Ideas Come From? – Gal Josefsberg on The Product Experience
One of the hardest skills for product people to acquire is that of saying no. After all, when everyone comes at you with ideas, prioritisation can be a massive challenge. So it’s refreshing when we get a chance to come at it from the opposite direction in order to generate good ideas. Gal Josefsberg, VP [...] Read more »The post Where Do Good Ideas Come From? – Gal Josefsberg on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Jan 1, 2020 • 51min
Crazy Busy Product People – Rian van der Merwe on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast]
We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes over the holidays. We’ll be back with new interviews in early January. But don’t despair! In the meantime, we’re re-running two episodes that fit the theme of the season: reflection and planning for 2020. Randy’s Pick ‘Tis the season to make a list of resolutions for [...] Read more »The post Crazy Busy Product People – Rian van der Merwe on The Product Experience [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Dec 25, 2019 • 38min
Moving Up the Career Ladder with Thor Mitchell [Rebroadcast]
We’re taking a short break from releasing new episodes over the holidays. We’ll be back with fresh interviews in early January. But don’t despair! In the meantime, we’re re-running two episodes that fit the theme of the season: reflection and planning for 2020. Lily’s Pick I think, by now, we all know that product management [...] Read more »The post Moving Up the Career Ladder with Thor Mitchell [Rebroadcast] appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Dec 18, 2019 • 46min
How To Rock Your Workshops – Jonathan Courtney on The Product Experience
Jonathan Courtney shares insights on design sprints, workshops, and product design. He discusses the benefits of design sprints, effective facilitation in meetings, innovative workshop strategies, and the importance of avoiding common mistakes. The episode wraps up with gratitude towards the guest and a teaser for upcoming interviews.

Dec 11, 2019 • 36min
Let’s Play a Game – Todd Green on The Product Experience
Todd Green knows a few things about creating and managing things that attract a lot of attention – before he joined King (makers of Candy Crush etc), he helped to define the digital experience for The X Factor, and the [Your Country] Idol and [Your Country]’s Got Talent franchises. We talked to him about how [...] Read more »The post Let’s Play a Game – Todd Green on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Dec 4, 2019 • 35min
The Truth Behind the Data – Jimena Almendares on The Product Experience
Jimena Almendares has held senior product roles and leadership positions at Zynga and Meetup, and now runs the Global Expansion efforts for Intuit. She has plenty of great stories to tell from those roles, but it’s her time as Chief Product Officer at OKCupid that we wanted to talk about. Jimena’s team completely revamped the [...] Read more »The post The Truth Behind the Data – Jimena Almendares on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Nov 27, 2019 • 33min
Don’t Call it Improv – David Farkas on The Product Experience
If you’ve got a background in waterfall processes, it can seem as if agile techniques are just about making it up as you go along. (MTP’s own James Mayes once commented that waterfall, on the other hand, “is making it up before you even begin”.) What happens if we embrace this, and bring improv techniques [...] Read more »The post Don’t Call it Improv – David Farkas on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Nov 20, 2019 • 35min
Beats, Bootstrapping and Life – Mat Clayton on The Product Experience
Mixcloud CTO and co-founder Mat Clayton helped bootstrap his company from humble beginnings in an empty warehouse with no internet connection to more than 15 million active users over a 10-year period, all before they took their first round of funding. He joined us to talk about startup life, scaling, making hard decisions, and more. [...] Read more »The post Beats, Bootstrapping and Life – Mat Clayton on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.

Nov 13, 2019 • 38min
Learning to Unlearn – Barry O’Reilly on The Product Experience
Author, advisor, professor, and podcaster Barry O’Reilly joined us on The Product Experience where we learned that he has a lot of sympathy for senior executives. These are people, he points out, whose entire career has led them to a position of responsibility and reward – so it naturally follows that the behaviours that got [...] Read more »The post Learning to Unlearn – Barry O’Reilly on The Product Experience appeared first on Mind the Product.Our HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She’s currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She’s worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury’s. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group’s Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He’s the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager’s Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon’s music stores in the US & UK.


