Product Operating Model Guide - The Lost Art of Focus: Why Saying No Powers the Greatest Product Innovations

Issue #34

In today's edition, among other things:

💜 Editor’s Note The Illuminators: Why Great Product Leaders Don't Lead—They Light the Way
💜 Product Operating Model Series - All you want to know about product transformations

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It will take you almost an hour to read this issue. Lots of content (or meat)! (For vegans - lots of tofu!).

Grab a notebook 📰 and your favorite beverage 🍵☕.

DeStaRe Foundation

Editor’s Note by Alex 💜

The Illuminators: Why Great Product Leaders Don't Lead—They Light the Way

The Leadership Paradox: Hold the Fucking Flashlight

At the recent Product Pro Summit in Sopot, something unexpected happened during our discussion panel. I was sitting alongside Michał Miller as guests, with Grzegorz Kurzyp hosting, talking about leadership and growth in product management. The conversation took a deeply personal turn when I shared something I rarely discuss in professional settings—how certain leaders in my past had broken me like a crystal into a thousand pieces, leaving scars that still haven't fully healed.

The room fell silent. I could see it in their eyes—recognition, empathy, maybe even some painful memories of their own. That's when a question crystallized for me, striking with the force of revelation: "Should we even be leading at all?"

Is a product leader someone who leads from the front, or someone who makes sure nobody gets left behind? Should we push our teams forward while providing a safety net and light, or should we position ourselves as examples to follow?

That's when it hit me like a sledgehammer: we've completely misunderstood what leadership in product actually means.

Here's the uncomfortable truth that nobody wants to admit: the "visionary product leader" who points the way forward and expects the team to follow is a dangerous myth. It's the kind of hero-worship bullshit that's causing more product failures than any lack of technical skills or market fit issues.

Let me ask you something: When was the last time your best product innovation came from one person's brilliant vision rather than the collective wisdom of a truly empowered team? When has following a single leader's direction—no matter how charismatic or experienced—ever led to the kind of breakthrough that changes your market?

Graphic notes by extraordinary GOTEK Rysuje

I'll wait.

The data doesn't lie. According to research from MIT's Center for Collective Intelligence, the smartest teams aren't the ones with the smartest leader—they're the ones where leadership is distributed, where diverse perspectives are valued, and where psychological safety allows everyone to contribute without fear.

So here's my thesis, and it might sting: True product leadership isn't about showing the way forward—it's about illuminating the landscape so your team can find their own path. It's not about being the expert with all the answers; it's about creating the conditions where collective intelligence can emerge.

This isn't just philosophical musing. It's about survival in a world where change is the only constant, where yesterday's expertise is today's obsolescence, and where the most dangerous words in product development are still "trust me, I know what I'm doing."

The Failed Promise of "Lead by Example"

"Lead by example" is the battle cry of mediocre managers everywhere. It sounds noble, doesn't it? Be the change you want to see. Show, don't tell. Work harder than everyone else.

But here's what behavioral scientists know that most product leaders don't: human brains don't work that way.

Daniel Kahneman's research on System 1 and System 2 thinking reveals why "leading by example" fails so spectacularly. When you position yourself as the expert example to follow, you activate your team's System 1 thinking—the fast, instinctive, and emotional part of cognition. They don't learn to think critically; they learn to defer to authority. They don't develop judgment; they develop dependency.

And that dependency is a product killer.

Amy Edmondson's groundbreaking work on psychological safety shows that teams perform best not when they have a strong example to follow, but when they feel safe to think independently, challenge assumptions, and yes—make mistakes without fear of retribution.

The traditional "lead by example" approach creates the exact opposite environment. It establishes a hierarchy of knowledge where the leader knows best, and everyone else should strive to be more like them. It's ego masquerading as leadership, and it's strangling the life out of your product culture.

Don't believe me? Look at the data. A study from Harvard Business Review found that teams with leaders who positioned themselves as experts saw 50% less creativity and risk-taking than teams with leaders who admitted their limitations and encouraged diverse thinking.

That's right—your expertise is actively holding your team back.

The problem goes deeper. In today's complex product landscape, no single person can possibly have all the knowledge needed to make optimal decisions. The myth of the all-knowing product visionary isn't just wrong; it's dangerous. It creates a bottleneck where every important decision must pass through one person's limited perspective, one person's biases, one person's blind spots.

As Teresa Torres brilliantly puts it: "Product management isn't about having all the answers. It's about asking the right questions and facilitating the discovery of answers."

So if "lead by example" is failing us, what's the alternative?

From Direction to Illumination: The Leadership Shift

Recently, I was listening to Mariusz Witkowski's "Umysł Początkującego" podcast where he interviewed Piotr Urbanik about leadership. I highly recommend this episode—it's a masterclass in rethinking leadership fundamentals. They explored the Leadership Circle model, which identifies four distinct domains of leadership: reactive, action, relations, and creative.

The Leadership Circle framework, developed by Bob Anderson and Bill Adams, offers a profound insight into how we operate as leaders. The model maps leadership competencies along two axes: Creative (above the line) versus Reactive (below the line) tendencies, and Task-focus versus Relationship-focus orientation. It reveals how our internal operating system—our beliefs, assumptions, and thought patterns—directly impacts our leadership effectiveness.

What fascinated me most was the distinction between reactive leadership (driven by problems, fears, and external validation) and creative leadership (guided by purpose, vision, and internal values). In product management, we often default to reactive leadership—responding to market threats, fixing problems, meeting deadlines—without realizing how this limits our teams' potential.

As I contemplated this model, something clicked for me.

The best product leaders I know don't operate primarily in the action quadrant—telling people what to do and where to go. They operate in the creative and relational spaces—illuminating possibilities and building the psychological infrastructure for teams to excel.

They don't give directions. They give compasses.

Think about the difference. A direction tells you where to go, but a compass helps you orient yourself in any landscape. A direction becomes outdated as soon as the terrain changes, but a compass remains useful regardless of where you find yourself.

In a VUCA world (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous), direction-setting leadership is a liability. By the time your team follows your carefully plotted course, the landscape has already shifted. The market has evolved, user needs have changed, and that brilliant vision you were so confident about? It's already obsolete.

But a compass—a clear set of principles, values, and frameworks that help teams navigate complexity—that never goes out of date. It empowers teams to respond to change in real-time, without waiting for new directions from above.

This is where the illumination metaphor becomes powerful. The best product leaders I know don't shine the spotlight on themselves; they hold the light so the team can see the landscape more clearly. They don't say, "Follow me!" They say, "What do you see, and where do you think we should go?"

And here's the really fascinating part: research from the field of complexity science shows that this approach doesn't just feel better—it produces measurably better results. Complex adaptive systems (like product teams) perform optimally when they operate with simple guiding principles rather than detailed instructions. When teams have autonomy within clear boundaries, they demonstrate greater resilience, faster adaptation, and more innovative problem-solving.

As Amy Edmondson puts it: "In complex, uncertain situations, leadership is not about knowing the answer. It's about creating the conditions for others to discover the answers."

The Science of Collective Intelligence

Let's get scientific for a minute, because the research here is mind-blowing.

James Surowiecki's work on "The Wisdom of Crowds" demonstrated that under the right conditions, groups consistently make better decisions than even the smartest individuals within them. Scott Page's "Diversity Bonus" research shows that cognitively diverse teams solve complex problems more effectively than homogeneous ones, even if the homogeneous team consists of objectively "smarter" individuals.

This is why I stated earlier that the sum of our individual intelligence is less than our collective intelligence. It's not just a feel-good platitude; it's mathematically proven.

But—and this is crucial—collective intelligence doesn't emerge automatically. It requires specific conditions, and traditional directive leadership often destroys those very conditions.

For collective intelligence to flourish, you need:

1. Diversity of thought (undermined when everyone follows one leader's example)

2. Independence of opinion (impossible when the leader's view is seen as the "right answer")

3. Decentralization of knowledge (threatened by the expert leader model)

4. Effective aggregation of ideas (the skill most directive leaders never develop)

This is where facilitative leadership becomes so powerful. A facilitator-leader creates precisely these conditions. They don't present themselves as the source of knowledge; they position themselves as the curator of the team's collective wisdom.

Daniel Kahneman and Dan Ariely's research on cognitive biases reveals another critical insight: we're all subject to numerous decision-making flaws—confirmation bias, anchoring, sunk cost fallacy, and dozens more. No leader, no matter how brilliant, escapes these limitations. But a diverse team, properly facilitated, can help counterbalance individual biases.

As Annie Duke explains in "Thinking in Bets," good decision-making isn't about being right all the time; it's about creating processes that increase your odds of success over time. A facilitative leader doesn't bet everything on their own judgment; they improve the odds by leveraging the full cognitive diversity of their team.

Facilitation as Leadership Forge

There are striking parallels between what makes a great facilitator and what makes a truly effective product leader in today's environment. Both require:

• Leading without formal authority: Guiding outcomes through influence rather than command

• Asking rather than telling: Using powerful questions to unlock insights rather than providing ready-made answers

• Creating space for emergence: Allowing solutions to arise naturally from group dynamics rather than imposing them from above

• Maintaining neutrality on content: Focusing on process excellence while letting the team own the substance

This is why I believe facilitation is the leadership forge of our time. It's where the skills most critical for modern product leadership are developed and honed.

Think about what happens in a well-facilitated session. The facilitator doesn't tell the group what to think; they create structures that help the group think better together. They don't provide answers; they ask questions that reveal new possibilities. They don't take credit; they ensure everyone's contribution is valued.

Now imagine a product leader operating this way. Instead of declaring "here's what we're building next," they ask "what problems are most worth solving for our users right now?" Instead of dictating priorities, they create frameworks that help the team evaluate options more effectively. Instead of being the source of ideas, they become the amplifier of everyone's insights.

Marty Cagan talks about this shift in "Empowered" when he describes the evolution from feature teams to product teams. Feature teams need directive leadership—they're executing someone else's vision. But true product teams need facilitative leadership—they own the outcomes and need the autonomy to determine the best path forward.

The most powerful facilitation techniques transfer directly to product leadership:

• Diverge before you converge: Explore many possibilities before narrowing to solutions

• Make thinking visible: Use visualization to expose assumptions and create shared understanding

• Separate generation from evaluation: Create space for creativity before introducing constraints

• Distribute participation: Ensure all voices contribute, not just the loudest or most senior

• Build on ideas: Help the team develop each other's thinking rather than competing for attention

Master these skills, and you're not just a better facilitator—you're a fundamentally different kind of product leader.

The Courage to Illuminate, Not Dictate

Let's be honest: this approach requires real courage. It's much easier to position yourself as the expert with all the answers than to admit uncertainty and create space for collective exploration.

In a business culture that still largely rewards confidence over curiosity, choosing facilitative leadership means swimming against the current. It means being vulnerable when others are projecting certainty. It means trusting your team when conventional wisdom says you should trust only your own judgment.

Brené Brown's research shows that this kind of vulnerability isn't weakness—it's the most accurate measure of courage. It takes tremendous strength to say, "I don't know the answer, but I believe we can find it together" in a culture that expects leaders to always know the way forward.

And let's acknowledge another uncomfortable truth: facilitative leadership is harder to measure. When a directive leader succeeds, the causal link seems clear—they made the right call. When a facilitative leader succeeds, the victory belongs to the team, making their contribution less visible to those who don't understand this model.

This is why so many organizations still default to directive leadership, despite the overwhelming evidence in favor of more distributed approaches. It's not just about effectiveness; it's about who gets the credit. Facilitative leadership requires checking your ego at the door.

As Kim Scott puts it in "Radical Candor," the best leaders care personally while challenging directly. They create psychological safety not by avoiding difficult conversations, but by ensuring those conversations focus on ideas rather than identities. They challenge without threatening, disagree without diminishing. I push my mentees and team members, but first, I take time to learn their potential and limits. It’s about being challenging enough to create change, but not about breaking a person. And you need to care. If you don’t care, STFU!

This approach requires what Robert Kegan calls a "self-transforming mind"—the ability to see your own perspective as just one of many valid viewpoints, rather than the objective truth. It means recognizing that your expertise, no matter how hard-won, is limited by your experiences, your biases, and your blind spots.

Lighting the Way Forward

So where does this leave us? With a challenge that's both simple to understand and incredibly difficult to execute:

Stop leading. Start illuminating.

Stop positioning yourself as the person with the answers. Start creating the conditions where answers can emerge from collective intelligence.

Stop directing your team's path. Start illuminating the landscape so they can navigate more effectively.

Stop showcasing your expertise. Start amplifying the diverse knowledge already present in your team.

This isn't just philosophical—it's practical. In a world changing too rapidly for any individual to comprehend fully, the only sustainable advantage comes from harnessing the full cognitive capacity of your entire team.

As I've reflected on my conversations at the Product Pro Summit and the insights from Mariusz Witkowski's podcast, I've become increasingly convinced that this shift—from leader as expert to leader as facilitator—isn't just a nice-to-have. It's an evolutionary imperative.

The most effective product leaders I know aren't those with the most impressive resumes or the most commanding presence. They're the ones who have mastered the art of stepping back, creating space, asking powerful questions, and trusting their teams to find the best path forward.

They don't lead by example. They show by living what they preach, and people observe their example. Then people take it—or not—but they interact with it. That's the profound difference.

They don't give directions; they offer compasses.

They don't shine the spotlight on themselves; they hold the light so others can see.

They understand that in today's complex product landscape, their most valuable contribution isn't their individual brilliance—it's their ability to create the conditions where collective brilliance can flourish.

So let me challenge you: How are you leading today? Are you the expert at the front of the room, or the facilitator creating space for others to shine? Are you giving directions, or illuminating possibilities? Are you building dependency on your expertise, or developing your team's capacity to navigate complexity without you?

The future belongs to the illuminators—those rare leaders who understand that their job isn't to know all the answers, but to help their teams ask better questions. Those who recognize that in a world of increasing complexity, the most powerful leadership doesn't come from having the best map; it comes from helping others develop their own sense of direction.

It's time to put down the megaphone and pick up the flashlight. Your team doesn't need another expert telling them where to go. They need someone brave enough to hold the light while they find their own way.

That's not just better leadership. That's the future of product management.

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📝 The Lost Art of Focus: Why Saying No Powers the Greatest Product Innovations

Why the Product Operating Model Matters

Organizations are increasingly recognizing that traditional approaches to building digital products simply aren't delivering the results they need. Whether you're struggling with slow time-to-market, building features that don't deliver value, or finding it difficult to innovate consistently, the root cause might be in your operating model.

That's why we're excited to launch a multi-week exploration of the Product Operating Model in our newsletter. This isn't just another methodology or process framework - it's a fundamental reimagining of how companies organize themselves to build technology-powered products that customers love and that deliver real business results.

As Marty Cagan puts it, the product operating model is "about consistently creating technology-powered solutions that your customers love, yet work for your business. From the financial perspective, it's about getting the most out of your technology investment."

The gap between companies that excel at digital product development and those that struggle is widening. Organizations that have adopted the product operating model are consistently outperforming their competitors - they respond faster to market changes, they innovate more consistently, and they get more value from their technology investments.

But transformation isn't easy. Many companies have already tried to transform—at least once—before they realized they've spent a lot of time and money going nowhere. The path is filled with challenges, from organizational resistance to misunderstandings about what the model actually entails.

What's most exciting about sharing this knowledge with you is that we're not just regurgitating frameworks or promoting a one-size-fits-all solution. We're taking these proven principles and adapting them to our unique product reality.

The product operating model itself emphasizes "principles over process" - recognizing that blindly following frameworks rarely leads to success. Instead, we're focusing on understanding the underlying principles, then applying them in ways that make sense for our specific context, customers, and challenges.

As we explore this model together, we'll share how we're interpreting and implementing these concepts in our own organization and our clients. We invite you to do the same - take what resonates, adapt what needs customization, and create your own version of the product operating model that works for your unique circumstances.

We've seen firsthand the dramatic results that come from successful transformation to the product operating model. Companies that make this shift don't just improve their products - they fundamentally change what they're capable of as an organization.

Ultimately, most companies want to be able to identify and take advantage of the most promising opportunities, and to respond effectively to the most serious threats. The product operating model gives organizations this capability, building the muscles needed to consistently create value in a rapidly changing world.

Whether you're just beginning to explore this approach or you're well into your transformation journey, we hope this series will provide valuable guidance and inspiration.

Introduction to Focus Principle

In Marty Cagan's transformative book "TRANSFORMED: Moving to the Product Operating Model," the principle of Focus stands as one of the four essential pillars of effective product strategy. This principle represents a fundamental shift in how companies approach product development and may be one of the most challenging principles to implement in practice.

What is the Focus Principle?

At its core, the Focus principle states that strong product companies are selective about which opportunities to pursue rather than trying to do everything. As Steve Jobs famously noted: "Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things."

Focus is about making deliberate choices about what not to do, which is often more difficult than deciding what to do. It's the disciplined practice of concentrating your limited resources on the most important problems that will drive the greatest impact for your customers and business.

Why Focus Matters

The Cost of Diffusion

Most companies try to do too many things at once, spreading their resources too thinly across numerous initiatives. This diffusion of effort leads to:

• Teams making minimal progress on too many fronts

• Lack of substantive progress on critical initiatives

• Increased time to market for everything

• Reduced quality across all deliverables

• Team burnout and frustration

As legendary CEO Jim Barksdale said, "The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing." Or, if you prefer the proverb: "If you chase two rabbits, you will not catch either one."

The Reward of Concentration

When you commit to focus:

• Teams can move faster on fewer priorities

• Quality improves dramatically

• The odds of true innovation increase

• Teams build deeper expertise in specific areas

• You get to market faster with solutions that matter

How to Implement the Focus Principle

1. Establish Clear Criteria for Prioritization

Develop a transparent framework for evaluating opportunities based on:

• Strategic alignment with product vision

• Potential customer impact

• Business value

• Technical feasibility

• Market timing

2. Perform Regular Portfolio Reviews

Schedule quarterly portfolio reviews where you:

• Evaluate ongoing initiatives against strategic priorities

• Make explicit decisions about what to continue, what to pause, and what to stop

• Categorize products/features into "invest," "sustain," and "sunset" buckets

• Free up resources from low-impact work to focus on high-impact opportunities

3. Create a Compelling "Not Doing" List

Maintain and communicate a clear list of opportunities you're deliberately choosing not to pursue right now. This serves several purposes:

• Makes the trade-offs explicit and transparent

• Prevents the same ideas from being repeatedly reconsidered

• Helps stakeholders understand the rationale behind decisions

• Demonstrates the discipline of your product strategy

4. Practice Saying No (Gracefully)

Saying no is a core skill for product leaders. When declining opportunities:

• Acknowledge the value of the idea

• Explain how current priorities better serve strategic objectives

• Keep good ideas in a backlog for future consideration

• Offer alternatives when possible

5. Lead by Example

Product leaders must model the focus mindset by:

• Limiting their own initiatives and pet projects

• Avoiding the temptation to add "just one more thing"

• Celebrating teams that make tough prioritization decisions

• Defending focused teams from scope creep and distractions

Common Obstacles to Focus

Stakeholder Demands

In many companies, each department or business unit has its own agenda, and stakeholders push for their priorities regardless of overall strategic alignment.

Solution: Make prioritization transparent and collaborative. Involve key stakeholders in understanding the strategy, while maintaining final decision authority with product leadership. Show how focused execution benefits everyone in the long run.

FOMO (Fear of Missing Out)

Companies often chase competitors or emerging trends out of fear of being left behind.

Solution: Develop a clear product vision and strategy that articulates your unique value proposition. Not every trend or competitor move deserves a response.

Organizational Politics

Sometimes priorities are set based on who has the loudest voice or most political capital.

Solution: Implement data-informed decision making. When priorities are backed by customer insights and business metrics, it's harder to override them with politics.

Sunk Cost Fallacy

Companies continue investing in initiatives that aren't working because they've already invested so much.

Solution: Normalize stopping work that isn't delivering results. Create a culture that values learning and pivoting over persisting with flawed initiatives.

Case Study: Apple's Return to Greatness

When Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, the company was producing a confusing array of products with overlapping features. Jobs immediately reduced Apple's product line by 70%, focusing on just four products: two desktops and two laptops, one each for consumers and professionals.

This ruthless focus allowed Apple to:

• Concentrate engineering talent on fewer, better products

• Simplify manufacturing and supply chains

• Create clearer marketing messages

• Improve quality across all products

• Begin the turnaround that made Apple the world's most valuable company

Focus in Practice: Techniques from TRANSFORMED

Cagan suggests several practical approaches to implementing focus:

1. Objectives and Key Results (OKRs)

Set a small number of clear objectives (2-3) for each quarter with measurable key results, rather than long lists of features or projects.

2. Product Vision

Create a compelling product vision that serves as a filter for opportunities—if an initiative doesn't advance the vision, it should be questioned.

3. Strategic Bets

Frame major initiatives as strategic "bets" with clear hypotheses, timelines, and expected outcomes. This crystallizes what you're focusing on and why.

4. Team Topology

Design your team structure around focused areas of ownership, allowing teams to develop deep expertise in specific customer problems or technical domains.

The Strategic Value of Focus

The Focus principle is not just about efficiency—it's fundamentally strategic. By deliberately choosing where to concentrate your efforts, you:

1. Create Differentiation: When you focus, you can go deeper than competitors who are spreading themselves thin

2. Build Moats: Concentrated effort allows you to create sustainable competitive advantages

3. Accelerate Learning: Teams focusing on specific areas develop unique insights faster

4. Increase Adaptability: Focused teams can more quickly redirect when needed, as they're not juggling multiple priorities

Conclusion

In an era of endless opportunities and constant distractions, the ability to focus has become a rare and valuable organizational capability. As Cagan emphasizes in TRANSFORMED, moving to the product operating model requires the discipline to say no to good ideas in service of pursuing great ones.

Focus isn't just about doing less—it's about doing more of what matters. It requires courage from leaders, clarity of vision, and organizational discipline. But the rewards are substantial: better products, happier customers, more engaged teams, and sustainable competitive advantage.

As you evaluate your own organization's approach to product development, consider: Are you truly focused, or are you spreading your resources across too many initiatives? The answer to this question may be the key to unlocking your team's true potential for innovation and impact.

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📝 The Lost Art of Focus: Why Saying No Powers the Greatest Product Innovations

Have you ever wondered why some product teams seem to make magic happen while others spin their wheels despite having equally talented people? I've spent years observing this phenomenon, and I've come to believe that the difference often comes down to a single principle that's surprisingly difficult to master: Focus.

The Courage to Say No in a World of Endless Yeses

Let's be honest—saying "yes" feels good. It makes us popular. It creates momentum. It feels like progress. But here's the uncomfortable truth I've learned after decades in product development: saying "yes" to everything is the surest path to mediocrity.

As Marty Cagan puts it in his transformative book "TRANSFORMED: Moving to the Product Operating Model," Focus isn't just a nice-to-have principle—it's the