And The Answer Is…

The Cranky PM says, maybe, depending on internal politics at your organization. Others say your success hinges more on your experience.

No, Seriously. The Answer Is…

I think it depends on the person. When I enrolled for my MBA (specializing in e-business, not in product management) in 2003, I’d been a Product Manager for about three years.

Right or wrong, I felt there were Big Gaps in my repertoire–gaps that couldn’t be bridged in my normal day-to-day. More than that, I felt outclassed, outgunned, by the more senior people in the organization who had both degrees and experience.

My MBA experience deepened my understanding of how business works, expanded my managerial toolkit, and gave me a welcome +20 in self-confidence. Within days of starting my first course, I was forging connections between what I was learning in school and how I was approaching my work.

Hindsight

Looking back, the brass tacks of my MBA experience were about the basics of management, economics, and business strategy. Could that have been picked up on the job? Maybe.

However, the more important throughline of the experience relates to critical thinking, perspective, and learning when to lead and when to follow.

On the job–especially as a young PM–it can be easy to lose perspective, to miss the forest for the trees. At the time, I was definitely into the plate-spinning, the go-go-go, the tactics and day-to-day. No time to think; just keep moving.

The MBA experience forced me out of the tactical and into the strategic–made me understand, you’ve got to strike the balance between short and long term to make things work. An expensive lesson to learn, for sure, but well worth it. And that’s why I’ll pay that school loan every month with a smile on my face.

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To recap: In a desperate bid to escape total annihilation, I activated the Space-Time Energy Projection crystal — which ripped a hole in the fabric of time, sending my team and I back to prehistoric Earth.

Unfortunately, I didn’t notice the Rulon flagship latch onto us with a tractor beam, allowing those evil bastards to follow us back to the past, where they immediately enslaved the dinosaurs in an attempt to… to… oh. Wait. That’s Dino-Riders.

Here’s what really happened.

Many Will Enter, Everyone Will Win?

On midnight, December 28. Eights days after launch. Hours after the Lead Developer had departed for Brazil. Bad Things Went Down.

The product (a new sweepstakes platform) revealed its fatal flaw: Instead of selecting one winner from the eligible entries and notifying that lucky person of their win, the system in live service opted to email everyone who entered–thousands, upon thousands of people–and tell everyone they’d won.

The engineering manager caught the error, took the necessary steps to handle the technical side of things and select the one, true winner. But I was left with the rather dark task of telling one person he’d won… and thousands of other people that they hadn’t actually won.

And Then I Made Things Worse

Here’s the text of the email we sent out, breaking the bad news:

Dear [redacted] -

We would like to take this moment to apologize for the email you received from [redacted] on December 28, 2003, titled ‘You won the iPod sweepstakes!’. This email incorrectly identified you as the winner of the iPod in our weekly Rewards sweepstakes. Unfortunately, you are NOT a weekly winner at this time.

We could bore you with the technical reasons for why the sweepstakes was not capable of running as planned. Instead, please rest assured that the issue has been resolved and that the correct winner has been determined and notified.

To apologize for this technical error, we are going to deposit 10,000 bonus Rewards into your [redacted] account. Once these Rewards have been deposited into your account, they are yours to keep or redeem. These bonus Rewards will be deposited in your account by January 15, 2004.

As always, we very much appreciate your patronage … and your feedback. Feel free to contact us any time if you have questions or issues about Rewards or anything.

Sincerely,
The staff of [redacted]

Fortunately, we had a good community of people, and many wrote back, expressing sadness but understanding. Others were really angry–not just at what happened, but at my messaging.

“Please, Bore Us Tiny Folks With The Details!”

Pros of the above email: we addressed every message individually; proactively sent them out within hours of the bug’s discovery; and offered every affected member a form of compensation.

However–the phrase “We could bore you with the technical reasons” struck a strong, strong chord with some folks. My attempt to defuse, instead, incited people. Made them feel like they were being belittled, insulted.

“Please, bore us tiny folks with the details!” (and various variations) flooded our in-box.

I was horrified. But there was nothing further to do. The emails were out and could not be rescinded.

To a much lesser degree–people also took issue with the message coming from the amorphous “staff” rather than an individual. Upon reflection, that was really lame: My name should have been on it.

Lessons Learned

Within a few weeks, the issue had evaporated. No other customer blowback. No protracted legal or PR issues. No board of inquiry.

But the experience definitely changed how I viewed my job, my products, and my way of interacting with customers.

My own core set of rules started to develop…

• Never launch a major initiative a week prior to your lead developer going on vacation;
• When you apologize for a mistake, don’t try to lighten the mood;
• Being “online” is not a “Get out of jail free” card;
• Consider both the potential value of the release to your customers as well as the potential harm buggy software might inflict on them and your reputation;
• Don’t let internal politics over-rule your common sense.

In hindsight, these are all pretty obvious. But, at that time, there was no one to teach me such things–and the incredible pressure of internal politics, of the sand shifting beneath my feet, convinced me to leap when calmer heads should have prevailed.

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Everyone does or says the wrong thing from time to time.

It’s true for Cap, and it’s true for me. Gather ’round, everyone–while I share with you The Biggest Professional Mistake I Ever Made, and what you can learn from it.

Picture It: Waltham, Massachusetts.
December 2003

An olive-skinned Product Manager prepares to launch an Exciting New Product. ENP has been tested, it’s ready to go. But the situation, internally, is less than ideal.

For one, his parent company is in turmoil, and resources from every division (including his) are being reallocated to The New Corporate Initiative.

For another, the lead developer on ENP is about to go on vacation for six weeks in South America.

The Product Manager needs to decide… do we release Exciting New Product now, a few days before Lead Developer departs so he can deal with any issues that crop up–or wait until Lead Developer returns six weeks later, not knowing if the company will still support the product and allow ENP to launch upon his return to the States?

I Made My Choice

No surprise (given the title of this post)… the olive-skinned Product Manager in this story is me.

And I decided to go for it.

After all, it’s the web, right? We’re not printing and shipping discs. If something goes wrong, just patch it or shut it down.

Unfortunately, something did go wrong.

On midnight, December 28.

Eight days after launch, and just hours after Lead Developer boarded a plane for Brazil. Even worse, what happened wasn’t something that could just be patched, and it literally affected thousands of people.

Tomorrow…

We’ll look at what happened–and how my attempt to correct the situation made things worse.

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Then buckle up, buster, because we here at Product Management Meets Pop Culture are going to flush that fear right out of your head and replace it with some practical tips on extracting maximum value from your media experience while avoiding the major pitfalls.

Destro & Dr. Mindbender opted for the scorpions. They chose… poorly.

Here’s Advice That’s Generally Good But Generally Bad In Product PR

My mother loves Disney films, and apparently learned some of her parenting skills from them. Because she would often quote them while disciplining me. One of her signature lines came from the movie Bambie:

“If you can’t say something nice… don’t say nothing at all.”

Generally, that’s actually pretty good advice. Unless you’re a product manager who’s supposed to interact with the media. In which case, that’s the worst advice.

If the media has contacted you, it’s because they think you’re interesting for some reason.

If you’ve contacted them, it’s because you think you have something newsworthy. (Hopefully you do.)

Either way, don’t clam up when it’s time to talk. Unless your company has a specific policy in place about talking with the media; in that case, always refer to the policy.

5 Things You Should Always Do

• Know your key messages, cold. Double-check your facts. Be able to convey your #1 message in 20 seconds or less.
• Avoid one-word answers. Those will make you sound simple-minded at best and combative at worst.
• Avoid jargon. Technobabble was tedious on Star Trek, and it’s tedious in real life. Use common language. Your goal is to be clear and compelling. Not to show off your specialized knowledge.
• Be passionate! You’re the subject matter expert, right? And you’ve studied this topic because you care about it on some level. Don’t act aloof in a misguided attempt to seem in control; let your feelings shine through.
• Be quotable! The media love comments that are strong, simple, and (at least, seemingly) original.

5 Things You Should Never Do

• Don’t assume the journalist knows everything about your business. Because a) they don’t, and b) they don’t need to.
• Don’t lie, vamp, or omit pertinent facts. That can only come back to haunt you. And if you’re thinking of BS’ing your way through an answer? Stop. If you don’t know the answer to a question, tell the journalist you’ll get back to them by [insert an appropriate time] with the answer. Honesty with the media is the best policy.
• Don’t abuse your contact information. Sure, you may feel like you and the reporter hit it off. But don’t mistake professional courtesy for friendship, and never contact them unnecessarily–especially when they’re on deadline.
• Don’t expect the media to explain why your product or service is superior. You need to explain that to them.
• Don’t tell the media how to do their job. Because, really, who likes that? And, yet, I’ve seen it happen.

3 Bonus Tips!

During the interview…

• Say the name of your company and product! Sounds obvious, right? But in the heat of the moment, it’s easy to forget. At least, it was for me.
• Don’t bad mouth the competition! It’s tempting, but wrong. Be positive. Sell your product. What’s the benefit? What makes it special? Was it first? Best? The one and only Product that does XYZ?
• Be interesting! Start with a human interest angle, if possible. An anecdote. Identify trends and market movements. Supply third party facts & stats.

+1 Super-Important Piece Of Advice

Answer the question you wish you’d been asked.

In real life, that approach would probably lose you some good friends. However, in PR — and this is a lesson that I’m still learning — a question is more of a jumping-off point. An opportunity to articulate your key messages.

Don’t let a question box you in. And don’t just answer the question. Answer the question in a way that advances your agenda.

Special Thanks

To my PR guru Kathy O’Reilly, who taught me more about public relations than I ever wanted to know!

Additional Resources

• Media Toolbox
• Publicity Toolkit
• KnowThis.com PR

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