Slow Horses

Autonomy as Selfish Leadership

Let people bring themselves to the work; you trade a little visibility for higher velocity, morale, and results.

Strategy3 steps

Code Quality Doesn't Equal Product Success

Solve the real problem for real users; architecture and code quality are nearly orthogonal to success

Conway's Law Reorg: Go Functional Before You Go AI

Restructure engineering into one functional org before expecting company-wide AI or technical depth

Customer Research as a Documentarian

Observe like a non-judgmental documentarian, find the pattern, then validate the truth with data

Drive AI Adoption By Using It Yourself On A Real Problem

Executives using the tool daily on their own real problems beats any top-down mandate or think-piece

Self-Mastery4 steps

Guilty-Pleasure Career Bet

Find the thing you feel guilty getting paid for, do the hell out of it with intensity, and take non-linear risks.

Innovation3 steps

North Star Exploration

Turn aimless tech-tinkering into learning by chasing an arbitrary-but-real goal and being stubborn about reaching it.

Leadership3 steps

Pioneer, Town Settler, City Planner PM Matching

Match the PM archetype you hire to the product's stage of maturity

Strategy4 steps

Question the Base Assumption Before Build-or-Buy

Before building OR buying a tool, ask whether the process needs to exist at all

Ride the AI Value Wave

Treat today's AI capability as the worst it will ever be and expand where it's most efficacious

Communication5 steps

Ruthless Simplification for PM Writing

A set of concrete tools to strip PM documents down to only what's necessary.

Marketing4 steps

Small-Pond ICP Narrowing

Constrain your first ICP so tightly that customers talk to each other — then let word of mouth light the fire.

Standing Up a Product Discipline From Scratch

Turn an implicit PM function into a real one by writing the ladder first, then wiring hiring to it

Entrepreneurship3 steps

Start Small, Don't Boil the Ocean

Narrow scope to the achievable thing in front of you, then build momentum on top of it

Communication3 steps

Start-With-Why One-Pager

The PM's core artifact: define the thing by nailing the problem and why-now before anything else.

Strategy3 steps

The 51-49 Decision Rule

When options are near-even, just pick one fast — more data won't meaningfully improve a close call.

The AI Expertise Layer

Don't outsource all AI to foundation models — keep expertise and measurement to break the quality glass ceiling.

The Career S-Curve for Attracting Talent

Map where a candidate sits on the ambiguity-vs-scale S-curve, then sell them their next step

Mindset3 steps

The Data-Driven Red Flag

When someone brags about being 'data-driven,' suspect weak product judgment, not strong analytics.

The Design-Partner Pod Model

Give each cross-functional pod 6-12 real customers to co-build with, so features ship pre-validated.

Strategy8 steps

The Landscape-First Product Strategy Doc

A bullet-driven Google Doc that builds an unbroken logic chain from company mission down to a single team priority.

Innovation3 steps

The Love-Hate Disruption Test

Gauge whether an idea is truly disruptive by how polarized the reactions are, not how positive.

Productivity3 steps

The Research Coordinator Role

Borrow the recruiting-coordinator role to schedule all customer research, so PMs never lose time to logistics.

Innovation5 steps

The Seedling Model for Going Multi-Product

Incubate new product lines as separate 'seed companies' with dedicated teams and adjacency-based selection

Self-Mastery3 steps

The Spiral Method for Learning Fast

Chain expert-to-expert referrals until you hear only repeats — that's how you know you've hit the bullseye.

Leadership3 steps

The Three Threads of Great PMs

The three durable behaviors that separate great product managers from good ones, in any company type.

Strategy4 steps

User-Value Thermodynamics

Users are lazy; adoption only happens when total value delivered exceeds total effort spent, ideally by 10x.

What-If Before Why-Not

Evaluate a disruptive idea by imagining its upside first, then treat the objections as your build list.

When to Hire Your First PM

Stay founder-as-PM until bottlenecks, hijacked eng/design, or new customer segments force the hire