Lenny's Podcast: Product | Growth | Career - Teresa Torres on how to interview customers, automating continuous discovery, the opportunity solution tree framework, making the case for user research, common interviewing mistakes, and much more

Teresa Torres on how to interview customers, automating continuous discovery, the opportunity solution tree framework, making the case for user research, common interviewing mistakes, and much more

06/30/22 • 47 min

Lenny's Podcast: Product | Growth | Career

Teresa Torres is an internationally acclaimed author, speaker, and coach. She teaches a structured and sustainable system for continuous discovery that helps product teams infuse their daily product decisions with customer input. She’s coached hundreds of teams at companies of all sizes, from early-stage startups to global enterprises, in a variety of industries. She has taught over 11,000 product people discovery skills through the Product Talk Academy and hundreds through her coaching practice, and is the author of Continuous Discovery Habits.

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Thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible:

• Persona: https://withpersona.com/lenny

• Dovetail: https://dovetailapp.com/lenny

• Stytch: https://stytch.com/

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In this episode, we cover:

[3:37] How Teresa is in the top 5 people in the world who’s helped the most PMs.

[5:25] What is the “opportunity solution tree framework”?

[8:19] What’s an example of an opportunity solution tree, for Netflix?

[14:17] Why do we usually approach opportunity finding wrong?

[18:10] What should you do if your company is a feature factory?

[21:00] What is continuous discovery, and why is it so important?

[23:13] What do you do if your leaders tell you there’s no time for user research?

[25:55] How can you automate weekly conversations with customers?

[29:04] How do you stay unbiased as a PM about a potential solution?

[31:23] Should a PM have more say over other functions?

[35:33] What are Teresa’s best tips for how to interview customers?

[39:57] What’s the most common mistake people make while interviewing customers?

[40:25] How does discovery change as your company grows?

[43:27] When should you do user research and when should you run an experiment?

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Where to find Teresa:

• Product Talk: https://www.producttalk.org/

• Opportunity solution tree: https://www.producttalk.org/opportunity-solution-tree/

• Continuous Discovery Habits : https://www.amazon.com/Continuous-Discovery-Habits-Discover-Products/dp/1736633309

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/teresatorres/

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ttorres

Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

—

Thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible:

• Persona: https://withpersona.com/lenny

• Dovetail: https://dovetailapp.com/lenny

• Stytch: https://stytch.com/

—

In this episode, we cover:

[3:37] How Teresa is in the top 5 people in the world who’s helped the most PMs.

[5:25] What is the “opportunity solution tree framework”?

[8:19] What’s an example of an opportunity solution tree, for Netflix?

[14:17] Why do we usually approach opportunity finding wrong?

[18:10] What should you do if your company is a feature factory?

[21:00] What is continuous discovery, and why is it so important?

[23:13] What do you do if your leaders tell you there’s no time for user research?

[25:55] How can you automate weekly conversations with customers?

[29:04] How do you stay unbiased as a PM about a potential solution?

[31:23] Should a PM have more say over other functions?

[35:33] What are Teresa’s best tips for how to interview customers?

[39:57] What’s the most common mistake people make while interviewing customers?

[40:25] How does discovery change as your company grows?

[43:27] When should you do user research and when should you run an experiment?

—

Where to find Teresa:

• Product Talk: https://www.producttalk.org/

• Opportunity solution tree: https://www.producttalk.org/opportunity-solution-tree/

• Continuous Discovery Habits : https://www.amazon.com/Continuous-Discovery-Habits-Discover-Products/dp/1736633309

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/teresatorres/

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ttorres

Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

Previous Episode

undefined - Brandon Chu on building product at Shopify, how writing changed the trajectory of his career, the habits that make you a great PM, pros and cons of being a platform PM, how Shopify got through Covid

Brandon Chu on building product at Shopify, how writing changed the trajectory of his career, the habits that make you a great PM, pros and cons of being a platform PM, how Shopify got through Covid

Brandon Chu is VP of Product at Shopify, where he leads the app platform ecosystem, new initiatives group, and M&A investments. Brandon helped scale Shopify’s PM team from five to hundreds, and worked his way up from an IC Senior PM. Prior to Shopify, he was a Director of PM at FreshBooks and, before that, a founder. Brandon might be best known for his writing on the art and science of product management as part of a collection on Medium he calls “The Black Box of Product Management.”

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Thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible:

• Stytch: https://stytch.com/

• Persona: https://withpersona.com/lenny

• PostHog: https://posthog.com/lenny

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In this episode, we cover:

1) Brandon’s path to VP of Product at Shopify.

2) What has Brandon found to be the most important skill set for super-successful PMs?

3) What is it like to build product at Shopify?

4) How did Shopify adjust after the shock to e-commerce during Covid?

5) How did Shopify build a one-click team offsite flight/hotel/activity booking platform?

6) How did Brandon motivate himself to start, and keep, writing?

7) As a PM, why is writing one of the highest-ROI uses of your time?

8) What’s Brandon’s favorite piece of writing?

9) What are the biggest surprises, pros, and cons about being a platform PM?

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Where to find Brandon:

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/brandonmchu

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonmchu/

• Brandon’s writing: https://blackboxofpm.com/

• Making Good Decisions as a Product Manager: https://blackboxofpm.com/making-good-decisions-as-a-product-manager-c66ddacc9e2b

Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

Next Episode

undefined - Sanchan Saxena (VP of Product at Coinbase) on the inside story of how Airbnb made it through Covid; what he’s learned from Brian Chesky, Brian Armstrong, and Kevin Systrom; much more

Sanchan Saxena (VP of Product at Coinbase) on the inside story of how Airbnb made it through Covid; what he’s learned from Brian Chesky, Brian Armstrong, and Kevin Systrom; much more

Sanchan Saxena is VP of Product at Coinbase. Before Coinbase, Sanchan was Head of Product and GM at Airbnb, founder and Head of Product of Instagram Shopping, Director of Product Management at Yahoo, and Lead PM at Microsoft.

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Thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible:

• Dovetail: https://dovetailapp.com/lenny

• Persona: https://withpersona.com/lenny

• Productboard: https://www.productboard.com/

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In this episode, you’ll learn:

[3:50] How Sanchan worked his way up to VP of Product at Coinbase

[6:15] Sanchan’s best advice to early-stage PMs

[9:41] What to look for in a company to join

[12:09] What Sanchan learned from Airbnb

[16:40] Behind the scenes of how Airbnb survived the Covid downturn when travel completely stopped