Product Management in the Age of AI

Picture this: You walk into a gym and see someone with arms so massive they can barely fit through doorways, but legs so thin they look like they might snap under the weight of their own torso. It's both impressive and concerning – and it's exactly what's happening to most product teams without them realizing it. Product is surprisingly similar to fitness. Both require consistent effort across multiple dimensions, both tempt you to focus on your favorite areas while neglecting others, and both punish imbalance in spectacular ways. The difference? At the gym, muscle imbalances are immediately visible. In product, the dysfunction takes longer to surface – but when it does, it's just as devastating. The Product Gym: Common Muscle Imbalances The "Feature Bias" Team: All Biceps, No Foundation We've all met this team. They can build absolutely anything – their delivery muscles are so developed they could benchpress an entire stack overflow. But ask them about user research or market validation, and they wobble like someone trying to squat 300 pounds on toothpick legs. These teams create products that are technical marvels but solve problems nobody actually has. They're the equivalent of someone who can curl 200 pounds but can't walk up a flight of stairs without getting winded. The features are impressive, but the foundation – understanding what users actually need – is completely underdeveloped. The result: Products that wow other developers but confuse actual users, leading to high churn and low adoption despite impressive technical capabilities. The "Marketing Bias" Teams: All Show, No Substance This person has developed their promotional muscles to Olympic levels. They can generate buzz, create compelling presentations, and make anything sound revolutionary. Their marketing chest is so inflated they need to turn sideways to fit through doors. But when it comes to actually delivering on those promises? Their product development arms are about as useful as wet noodles. They're essentially doing the fitness equivalent of flexing impressive fake muscles while being unable to lift their own coffee cup. The result: Great launches followed by spectacular failures when reality doesn't match the hype, burning through customer trust faster than a sprinter burns through energy. The "Analytics Bias" Teams: Walking in Circles Picture someone with one leg so overdeveloped it looks like a tree trunk, while the other remains normal-sized. They're incredibly strong in one direction but can only walk in circles, getting dizzy while staring obsessively at their fitness tracker. This team member can tell you everything about user behavior metrics, conversion rates, and A/B test results. They've developed their analytical leg to superhuman proportions. But they've completely neglected the experiential side – they know what users are doing but have no idea why, or what users actually feel about the product. The result: Optimization of meaningless metrics while the actual user experience deteriorates, like improving running speed while running in the wrong direction. The "Design Bias" Teams: Beautiful But Brittle These team members have sculpted the most aesthetically perfect product abs you've ever seen. Every pixel is perfectly placed, every interaction beautifully choreographed. They're the gym equivalent of someone with magazine-cover aesthetics. But try to add a new feature or handle edge cases, and their functional strength reveals itself to be practically nonexistent. They're all show muscles with no practical power – beautiful interfaces that break the moment real users with real needs start using them. The result: Products that win design awards but can't handle actual business requirements, like having a perfect physique that can't lift groceries. The "Speed Bias" Teams: Fast but Unfocused This person is all legs – they can move incredibly fast and ship features at lightning speed. They're like a roadrunner on caffeine, constantly in motion with impressive velocity metrics. But they keep tripping over their own feet because they've never developed coordination, planning, or balance. They're sprinting full speed in whatever direction feels right in the moment, leaving a trail of technical debt and confused users in their wake.  The result: Rapid iteration that goes nowhere meaningful, burning through runway while building features nobody asked for at unsustainable pace.

Let me tell you a tale of two teams. Both shipped on time. Both nailed UX. Both hit NPS targets. Only one is still around. Why? Because the other had not a real product manager. They were obsessed with velocity - but ignored viability. They launched. They celebrated. They ignored product imbalances. And 12 months later? 💸 Burned budget 🧊 Stalled adoption 📉 Cancelled product Meanwhile, the survivor team? Their PM didn’t own the product P&L - but they damn well acted like it. ✅ Obsessively modeled product profitability ✅ Challenged scope creep that killed margins ✅ Aligned product decisions to value-based outcomes ✅ Partnered with Sales & CS - not just Design & Dev They used every product viability lever they had: 📈 Knew the pipeline better than Sales 💰 Balanced dev cost with services overhead 🧮 Services ROI 🎯 Growth + retention metrics: Tracked feature adoption by account tier 🚫 They didn’t just ask “Can we build it?” ✅ They asked, “Should we build it - and will it pay off?” Product viability is not a finance topic. It’s a product mindset. This isn’t a heroic story. This is table stakes. And it’s the difference between being a strategic asset or a feature factory. So here’s the challenge to every PM out there: 📌 Can you explain how your product generates revenue (or at least value) - or avoids unnecessary cost? 📌 Do you know what the top churn reasons are for your product? 📌 Have you seen your product’s margin trend over time? If not - why not? 🧨 If you don't work with sales, services, finance, and partners to shape a viable model, you are missing half the job. 🧨 If you aren’t asking “how does this feature move our pipeline?” you are just building ... not managing. "One ships features. The other ships outcomes." Which one are you? Let’s stop pretending Product ≠ Business.

In today's fast-paced and fiercely competitive business environment, achieving lasting customer loyalty and turning satisfied customers into vocal advocates requires more than just delivering great products or services. It demands a strategic and structured approach to customer engagement and advocacy—a methodology that can significantly elevate a company's market position and create enduring value. This is where the concept of the Customer Advocacy Pyramid comes into play, serving as a comprehensive framework that enhances every interaction with customers and turns these engagements into strategic advantages. Understanding the Customer Advocacy Pyramid The Customer Advocacy Pyramid is an innovative model that organizes various dimensions of customer engagement into a cohesive, scalable system.