Summary
In the article, Martin Cagan discusses the mistakes managers make in their work and offers the ideas of how to avoid these mistakes. Products may be bad due to their usefulness or too complicated instruction (Cagan 1). Product management is a serious issue that can never be neglected (Stark 2), and the identification of mistakes seems to be a necessary task.
People make many decisions on how to achieve success with their products and face considerable pitfalls on their way to recognition every day. The importance of this article lies in the fact that each product has to be studied before it is presented on the market. A number of techniques and processes have to be done beforehand as well as all possible mistakes have to be determined, and each member of the team that works on product development has to perform his/her own functions completely.
Important Ideas
- Product strategy and innovation: engineers should not consider the idea of innovation only but takes care of a product’s true value and its functions.
- Customer and product requirements: engineers have to identify the quality of products considering the needs of customers (Blazey 148), not their own ideas.
- Customers vs. users: people, who buy products, are always the users of the products, and the developers should consider this little still significant detail.
- Features vs. benefits: communication with customers will help to realize that product benefits should never be replaced with its specific features (Varley 254).
- Right product vs. product right (Charvet, Sandlin, Collier, and Wilson 310): the product is created and demonstrates the successful performance of its functions.
- A good product requires good business: it is necessary to introduce a product and think about the supportive means to prove the worth of the chosen product (Ali 249).
- Emotional element: a boring product, even it is characterized by a number of functions, maybe failing; therefore, a portion of the excitement is necessary.
- “To add” vs. “to improve”: when a team thinks about additional features of a product, its members should not admit that they add something to the already existing thing but information about its possible improvement on the basis of the current achievements.
- “Complete” vs. “sellable” products: a product may undergo changes and improvements all the time to be sold.
- A true success of a product: when a product is launched in time, gets positive reviews, or takes a leading market position, it is not successful; customers should be happy and satisfied with the product and stay loyal to it (Herr, Page, Pfeiffer, and Davis 833).
Relevance
The chosen reading related to the course due to its intention to provide people with information about the enhancement of problem-solving activities and the techniques crucial for successful innovations and work in a team. In my daily life, the mistake because of confusing innovation with value takes place. I like buying things without paying attention to their functions and values.
I am obsessed with the products’ general views and prices. If I like a thing, I do not analyze it but buy it. A not long time ago, I bought a fancy box to gather my small staff. Still, the instructions on how to use it are too complicated and require much time to study all of them. The results are annoying – the box stands as a beautiful, not useful object in my room.
Works Cited
Ali, Hassan. “The Process in Developing a New Successful Product.” STEdex 6 (2014): 249-253. Print.
Cagan, Martin 2005, The Top 12 Product Management Mistakes – and How to Avoid Them. PDF file. Web.
Charvet, Francois, Sandlin, Doral, Collier, David, and Wilson, Darryl. “CRM, SRM, and Integrated NPD: Having the Right Product versus Having the Product Right.” Proceedings of the 2008 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference. Ed. Leroy Robinson. New York: Springer, 2015.310. Print.
Herr, Paul, Page, Christine, Pfeiffer, Bruce, and Davis, Derick. “Affective Influences on Evaluative Processing.” Journal of Consumer Research 38.5. (2012): 833-845.
Stark, John. Product Lifecycle Management: 21st Century Paradigm for Product Realization, New York: Springer, 2015. Print.
Varley, Rosemary. Retail Product Management: Buying and Merchandising, New York: Routledge, 2014. Print.