The Hardest Thing for Product Managers — Staying Neutral
Product managers can come from a lot of backgrounds, and most of them will bring a different set of valuable skills to the table. Regardless of the skills that we have, the hardest thing for me is to be neutral.
What does it mean to be neutral and why is it so damn hard?
We need to always go forward in the product iteration and evolve. Our mind is constantly on the hunt for that next killer feature. Most of the time we are too busy trying to find user problems and identifying user drop off that we forget one thing: does this solve anything?
We need to step back for a moment and stop thinking about what we will offer to customers. Instead, empathize about what your customers really want and desire in the first place.
Humans have the tendency to be biased — and as we spend more time in the product, our thinkings are swayed by cognitive biases. Here are some challenges that we might find as a product manager trying to be neutral:
- Confirmation Bias — The tendency to search for, interpret, focus, and remember information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions.
- The Anchoring Bias—The tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information acquired on that subject.
- The False-Consensus Effect — The tendency to overestimate how much other people agree with you. The other group that doesn’t agree with you is just outliers.
Confirmation and anchoring bias is one of the most dangerous biases. Our minds will make excuses to execute a bad product or shot down a good product. The nature of human psychology is that you will mold the reality so hard until it fit the way you think.
This is where exactly product managers need to be neutral. We need to have the ability to stop seeing our product as an offering or feature, but to see the product as a solution. Do we solve the problem that the customer has? Or do we solve the problem that we have in our minds?
Never ever fixated on a feature. Focus on what it solves.
Of course, with that being said, there are some exercises to help reduce cognitive biases in our thinking. Here are what we can do:
- Recognize the bias: Most likely biases will influence your thinking and recognizing this is the first step to reduce it.
- Identify the bias: After we can recognize that there are some biases on our thinking, we need to be able to identify what are the biases at play. Try to step back and revisit the information that was processed. Do we process it neutrally? Or do we have preconceptions when we process the information?
- Challenge the bias: After we can identify the bias, now we can challenge it. Try to see the problem or information from someone else’s point of view. Now try to see it under multiple scenarios. Or try to see the information as if you are seeing it for the first time with no background and see how does that change your perception.
Try to do these exercises when making decisions. Hopefully, we can all become a more neutral product manager and see things from where our users see things. Remember, the user of your product is not you — but everyone else.
