How can you expand your product manager network to include diverse perspectives?

As human beings, it is inherit in our experiences that we only have one POV - how we grew up, where we live, our environment that we are familiar with, our psyche, the things that interest us etc. When we try to solve a problem for other people - which is the core of what Product Management is all about - there is no way we can understand it all with our narrow POV. If we wish to really solve that problem, and create value to many people, we got to be humble about our ability to know all POVs, and be open to many other POVs that together can provide us with a clearer understanding of the problem (if one exist that is...) That's where diversity plays a huge role - getting as many POVs as possible.

When kicking off a project, I like to make sure all team members - engineers, designers, business ops, etc. - are familiar with the user insights, data, and context. That helps everyone understand the purpose and direction and therefore enables them to suggest ideas and allows the team to bring forth diverse perspectives.

Divergent thinking, including cultural and functional diversity, is a conscious decision. It requires an outside-in approach. The key is first understanding the problem you must solve & remembering that your opinion, while interesting, could be irrelevant. Product Managers need the brains of an engineer, an artist's creativity and a diplomat's words. To gain this skill set, the ability to communicate and listen to "strangers", from diverse backgrounds, with a common interest in a specific problem that needs solving will give you perspectives that can not be found listening to a small cohort of people you are familiar with. - Diverge before you converge. - All perspectives are good - Strangers usually have the most interesting insights.

In order to gain diverse perspectives in your area of interest it is also valuable to get insights from thought leaders in this field who may not have the product manager title. They can be founders, creators, marketers, researchers and even technical experts. Product managers wear multiple hats and including ‘outside’ perspectives into your discovery process is invaluable and often your source of competitive advantage. Conferences, coffee-chats, alumni meets and even colleagues are great ways to find and make these diverse connections.

Something that's worked out for me is willing to project that I'm being open to perspectives. This creates more room for a candid discussion, and once a fellow PM knows you're not listening to them with the sole idea of contending or overly-supporting, they try to get more direct about their thoughts. The major goal of observing and learning from the product community is to collect diverse viewpoints, and only when need calls, avoid some sections completely. Other times, open chats are thought-provoking. Creating shared goals, recurring catchups, and planned action items to do together are super effective as well.

Based on my experience, seeking diverse perspectives can sometimes result in confusion and chaos. To navigate this, let's focus on developing features based on distinct personas and their product stakes. However, it's important to avoid altering the core product's abstract model for every stakeholder's viewpoint. This will not only help in betterment of the product but also streamline the development process.

While diverse perspectives are great, you should keep in mind that everyone's situation is different and what worked for them on the surface level only did because of a million other moving parts. The key then is to recognize those nuances and ultimately apply them to your work. One should avoid blindly copying an approach just because it's different or worked for others. This is possible through pre-mortems and simulations.

An important element in Product Management is where you look for information about a specific problem, to ensure you have a diverse amount of information to work with. This depends entirely on the problem you are trying to solve. While Online Resources are interesting getting caught in a confirmation bias loop is very easy. This must be avoided. Observation of the problem rather than participation is where the gems are found. If your problem exists in the real-world for example, then actually visit the problem, the observations & insights will not be found sitting at your desk. Also be very aware of “CEO” and “Sales” factor, quite often the short term goals (very convergent) do not exposure the real problems that need solving.