Drew Barontini

Building Better Products: Improve Delivery & Productivity

Chief Product Officer at Differential

Implement the Shape Up methodology to ensure consistent on-time product delivery.

Mastering On-Time Product Delivery

Increase productivity and collaboration by optimizing for uninterrupted work time.

Boosting Team Productivity and Collaboration

Improve stakeholder alignment and satisfaction through clear development processes.

Aligning Stakeholders and Meeting Goals

A well-defined product strategy accelerates your career. It improves your odds of success. It inspires teams. In this highly interactive, case-based workshop, you'll learn seven vital strategic frameworks, plus how to run a product strategy meeting as we simulate a modern-day Netflix Quarterly Product Strategy Meeting towards the end of the session. THE CHALLENGES Today, product leaders are constantly challenged to act and think "more strategically." These tools help product leaders frame their thinking strategically and accomplish work that pushes metrics tied to each product strategy. Another challenge is building alignment across an organization. Everyone in a company has a perspective on how a product can be better, even folks with no experience building products. These tools and frameworks enable product leaders to develop a common language and plan that can be understood across the organization to build cross-functional alignment. Last, everyone within an organization has a point of view on how and where resources should be allocated. The simulated Quarterly Product Strategy Meeting enables students to participate in a meeting that will teach them to debate product strategy in open, more effective ways within their product organization and to allocate resources intelligently. WHAT YOU WILL LEARN You learn how to:1. Describe the positioning and "something bigger" of your product that helps to build a brand using language that appeals to your customers and is well-understood by your marketing partners.2. Craft a long-term product vision that provides clear direction. This vision also breaks down the plan into shorter, step-by-step "bite-size chews" that maintain flexibility as you invariably encounter speedbumps and roadblocks.3. Define a succinct product strategy—a hypothesis on how you will move your key metrics—by developing hypotheses that will delight customers in hard-to-copy, margin-enhancing ways.4. Articulate metrics and tactics for each product strategy to effectively "align the wood behind the arrow."5. You'll learn to tease out how to prioritize Growth, Engagement, and Monetization, depending on the company's size and goals.6. Communicate a quarterly plan using two roadmap formats: a "rolling four-quarter roadmap" and a "Now, Next, Later" approach.7. Debate 2-3 modern-day Netflix cases, demonstrating how these product strategy frameworks help to form a common language that enables better communication and more thoughtful debate. HOW THE COURSE WORKS This course is designed to be very efficient. There's no required pre-reading, and it's three hours plus an optional thirty-minute Q&amp;A session. We'll open up the class fifteen minutes before the start time -- so you can ask questions at the beginning -- then we'll go through each framework with lots of juicy examples from Netflix's past and present. The session will be sprinkled with many mini-cases where students will be asked, "What would you do if you were the product leader at Netflix?" We'll use Slido to build engagement and draw all students into a fast-paced conversation. This is not a boring lecture. It's a lean-in experience where you will be at the edge of your seat and diving into the conversation-- when you're up for it. At the end of the session, we'll simulate a Netflix Quarterly Product Strategy meeting, allowing you to see what a world-class product organization thinks about and how they discuss and debate product strategy. The three-hour session is a lot of fun! No reading will be required in advance -- people are busy -- but there will be plenty of "leave behind" materials to read about product strategy and each of the frameworks defined in this course. I will also provide pre-populated Google Slides you can use to define your product strategy. I will hang out for 30 minutes after class to answer questions. There's also an optional one-hour session about a week later. We'll use this time to give feedback to folks who want to share their product strategy with the group. I will also answer more questions submitted via Slido and in real time.

Become a "go-to" product leader as you learn to define a product strategy.

Provide a brief description for each module as a way to sell the value of what students will be learning throughout the course.

First Module

Second Module

Third Module

Course syllabus

You're a consumer or enterprise product leader, from entry-level to "Chief."

You're in a product management, project management, engineering, design, or data role, from APM to "Chief Product Officer."

You're a founder in a startup or Head of Product at any stage of a company.

Who is this course for

Apply proven tools, models, and frameworks to define a product strategy in a step-by-step way.

You'll define what your product or service is, the benefit you'll deliver to customers, along with the "personality" of your product and "brand promise."

Positioning

The GLE model (Get big, Lead, Expand) helps you outline steps for how your product will "dent the universe" in the long term.

Product Vision

You'll learn to outline product strategies using the DHM model to "Delight customers in Hard-to-copy, Margin-enhancing ways" to deliver both customer and shareholder value.

To build alignment across all company functions, you'll prioritize three factors—Growth, Engagement, and Monetization.

You'll align Strategies, Metrics, and Tactics. You'll identify proxy metrics for each product strategy and assign tactics to each.

You'll build a roadmap, demonstrating how your product strategies will come to life over time.

Rolling, Four-quarter Roadmap

We'll simulate a modern-day Quarterly Product Strategy Meeting, demonstrating how Netflix defines and debates product strategy on an ongoing basis.

Quarterly Product Strategy Meeting

Use the step-by-step approach I developed at Netflix to craft a product vision, align around strategy, and hold product teams accountable.

Gibson Biddle

Former VP/CPO  at both Netflix & Chegg

Cohort 2

Cohort 3

Product teams often get stuck focusing on outputs and predictable delivery (what and when am I building a thing) instead of outcomes (what will change as a result of building this thing). This leaves out the critical element of making sure you are building the right (most impactful) things in the right way. Jon's has 25+ years of experience in technology companies from CNN to Google, and has created this course to provide you with a comprehensive set of tools to help you develop impactful products by shifting from output-based thinking to outcome-based thinking. You will deepen your understanding of your customers and their needs as well as identifying and de-risking the different kinds of hypotheses built into your roadmap. You will also work to understand how your work contributes to your company's strategy. You will learn and apply frameworks to ensure your features solve user problems that drive business impact which connects all the way up to your company's goals. We will also help you develop successful products by understanding customer needs, identifying opportunities, managing risks, and creating value for customers. Using a combination of lectures, interactive hands-on exercises, and case studies from Airbnb, Dropbox, Zappos, and more, the course will focus on practical application and provide you with the skills and knowledge necessary to level up and apply these tools in real-world product management scenarios.

Move from feature factory to customer outcomes and drive impact in your business

Inside-out thinking is where you focus on what you are doing to your product. Outside-in thinking is where you focus on the outcomes that your product can achieve for your users.We'll explore the benefits of outside-in outside-in thinking and how to apply it to your job. We'll also discuss common traps to avoid and provide tips for success.

Outside-In vs Inside-Out thinking

Customer journey maps are a visual representation of the user's entire experience while trying to solve the problem your product addresses. In this module, you will learn how to create customer journey maps, identify pain points, and improve user experience, and end up with a first draft of a customer journey map for your product.

Customer Journey Mapping

The Confidence/Risk Matrix is a tool for managing risk and uncertainty in product development. In this module, you will learn how to create a Confidence/Risk Matrix, understand the difference between MVP and RAT, and make informed decisions that balance risk and reward so you can "build to learn" or "build to earn"

Confidence/Risk Matrix

Impact maps are a powerful tool for product managers to align product development with business goals and outcomes. You will create an impact map and review with your peers. Then we'll workshop so you can prioritize your efforts for maximum impact to the business and your career.

Impact Mapping

Four two-hour live sessions where you will learn with a group of peers via framework overviews, case studies, group discussions and live instructor feedback.

Live Sessions

Key Exercises:<ul><li>Creating your own Customer Journey Map</li><li>Creating an Impact Map</li><li>Developing your Hypotheses</li><li>Quantifying your Impact Map</li><li>Assigning Risk to your Impact Map</li></ul>

Projects & Exercises

Course Structure

You're a senior product manager who wants to delivering outstanding impact and business value to your users and your business.

You're an early career PM and want to level up your career and understand how to deliver business impact.

You're a startup founder who wants to validate ideas and develop products that meet customer needs and create value for them and your biz.

Who this course is for:

What you’ll get out of this course

You will learn how to identify the most impactful opportunities using Impact Mapping and other framing techniques and shift from output orientation ("what are we building?") to outcome/impact orientation ("what will change as a result of building these things?")

Learn how to prioritize the most impactful opportunities to move the needle for your business

You will learn how to better understand users and the problem space they are working in through Journey Maps that are customized for Product Managers

Grow your user empathy and customer discovery skills

By making explicit the different hypotheses in your plan and identifying the riskiest ones, you will be able to quickly validate the riskiest assumptions and improve your outcomes.

Understand the risks and hypotheses built into your roadmap

By working through user outcomes and how they drive business outcomes, you will be able to clearly tie your features to user behavior that drives business results.

Understand how your features tie in to the company goals

The course is designed to provide you with practical experience applying these tools to real-world product management scenarios. You will build actual journey and impact maps for your actual users &amp; products.

Create actual artifacts for your products

You will benefit from an instructor who has seen product management done well and poorly in his career as a product leader and consultant. Learn best practices and traps to avoid from companies like Google, CNN, Ford, and numerous startups and midsize companies.

Learn from an industry expert with 25+ years of experience

By developing these skills, you can enhance your PM career prospects and become a more valuable member of your product teams.

Boost your career

Learn with and from our community of product leaders from companies like Google, Microsoft, Electronic Arts, and ServiceNow both in the course and in our community Slack channel for class alumni.

Become a part of a community of impactful product leaders

Up-level your PM career by shifting your thinking from outputs to outcomes and ship features that deliver results for your company.

Jon Harmer

Product Management Leader

October Cohort

Cohort 9

If you are a middle manager or a senior IC, you aspire to become a leader with more influence and impact.&nbsp; Unfortunately, no one teaches you how to become an elite product leader. There is no handbook, no training. Satya, Sundar, Larry, Bill, Fidji and many others. I have learnt from some of the most successful tech leaders out there. Through my journey, I have collected a range of learnings, insights &amp; observations on what the top 1% leaders do.&nbsp; You know what inspirational product leadership looks like. There are leaders whose ideas always inspire, they create clarity, their teams are high-performing and motivated and they are decisive. Maybe you’re doing some of this already, but you’re not sure what it takes to get to the elite level.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leadership is complex and demanding. It is more art than science. And most of the time, leadership theory is simple but its application is challenging.&nbsp; This course draws from my 15+ years of experience in Product leadership roles. Over the course of my career, I have built 0 to 1 products and teams for Google Meet, Wallet and Duo. I have worked on successful, scaled products like Microsoft Teams &amp; Facebook’s News Feed under visionary leadership. I am excited to share my practical learnings with you. No fluffy theory, straight from the arena.&nbsp; You will leave with a deeper awareness of your leadership style and gaps. And some handy tools and frameworks to start elevating your game.&nbsp; WHAT WILL YOU LEARN IN THIS COURSEIn this intense bootcamp, you’ll learn how to master the skills that are essential to operate at an elite product leadership level. This is a highly interactive course with fast paced lessons, real world case studies, live discussion and Q&amp;A.&nbsp; Over the course of 6 hours of live instruction, you’ll learn how to navigate the most common leadership challenges you face: 1. Communicate for Impact&nbsp;• Craft a compelling narrative and get buy-in from your CEO, Board and stakeholders&nbsp;• Set an effective communication cadence with your team and partners• How to be effective in meetings and how to build your personal brand.&nbsp; 2. Decision Making&nbsp;• Create clarity even in the face of ambiguity and impartial information&nbsp;• How to make tough and unpopular decisions.&nbsp;• Fostering transparency in decision making across the org. 3. Managing Teams and Managing Yourself&nbsp;• How to handle tricky situations like layoffs, re-orgs, pivoting / sunsetting products.&nbsp;• How to hire the right talent. How to play to the strengths of the people on your team• How to build a culture of excellence and optimism.&nbsp;• How to manage your time, emotions and energy.&nbsp; COMPANIES REPRESENTED IN THE FIRST COHORTMeta, Microsoft, Genentech, Google, JPMorgan, Amazon, Airbnb, DoorDash, Linkedin, Reddit, Qualcomm, Fidelity, Cisco, and many more.

Becoming an Elite Product Leader: Skills to Lead at the Top 1%

PM Leaders who are managing products and people. Career stage titles include Lead Product Manager, Group Product Manager, Director, VP.

Cross functional leaders in Design, Engineering, Data Science, Product Marketing and Operations, who aspire to amplify their leadership.

Founders of startups who are building products and want to learn how to scale their influence.

<ul><li>Building trust and credibility with C-suite and cross-functional teams.</li><li>Managing conflicting priorities and expectations.</li><li>Navigating organizational politics to achieve alignment.</li></ul>

Leading with Clarity
 

<ul><li>Strategic decision-making in complex environments.</li><li>Balancing short-term wins with long-term vision.</li><li>Using data and intuition in high-stakes decisions.</li></ul>

Advanced Decision-Making Frameworks

<ul><li>Creating a culture of accountability and excellence.</li><li>Leading through change and uncertainty.</li><li>Coaching and mentoring for team development.</li></ul>

Building and Leading High-Performing Teams

<ul><li>Translating business strategy into product roadmaps.</li><li>Measuring success: Key metrics and KPIs at the leadership level.</li><li>Cross-functional collaboration and breaking down silos.</li></ul>

 Driving Organizational Impact and Strategic Alignment
 

Level up from mid-level manager to the most influential product leader at your organization.

 

Amit Fulay

Cohort 2 

Product people are naturally curious — but many work in this role without being equipped with the essential skills. Instead of driving business growth and building products people love, they end up feeling stuck and exhausted. We created this course to change that — not by just teaching theory, but by helping you apply learnings in your real-world context. Whether you’re a PM with a few years of experience, transitioning into Product from a related role, or stepping up as the lead of a product team, this course is for you. Why This Course is Different There are endless great resources out there to learn Product, but understanding the ideas fully and applying the techniques in your individual setup and environment is a very different game. We designed this course drawing from over 25 years of experience across various product roles, companies, and industries. We bridge the theory into practice without getting lost in framework details. We’re not from big tech — but we understand what it’s like when things get tough. We know there’s no one-size-fits-all solution for effective product work. You’ll learn directly from us and other product professionals who face the same challenges you do. This isn’t about hypothetical scenarios; it’s about learning and training the exact skills you need to succeed in your role. With small cohorts, we ensure you get personalized attention and meaningful engagement with others, helping you grow both your skills and your network. How You Will Learn This six-week program is packed with actionable knowledge. We use a flipped classroom approach: you get the theory as compact video content, and our sessions are dedicated to discussing, exploring, and training these skills within the group — as no other course does. What We’ll Cover •	Understand the big picture of product management and how discovery, strategy, and delivery fit together.•	Identify knowledge gaps to learn more about your business.•	Practice talking to users to uncover insights that typically stay hidden.•	Craft a basic business case and tell a compelling story to get the buy-in you need.•	Dive into the tech details to build confidently and minimize gaps in your specs.•	Communicate and align effectively with stakeholders, and learn to resolve conflicts.•	Create a clear strategy and stay focused using the right tools. Check out the full curriculum for everything we’ll cover together. Why This Works We provide a safe space for you to learn, practice, and take action. That’s why we run this course in small cohorts—to give you the environment you need to succeed. Join us and a community of forward-thinking product managers, and let’s set a new standard for your career.

Unlock the Secrets to Becoming an Outstanding Product Manager

We'll meet three times a week from 9:00am to 10:30am CET (GMT+1). This will be our

Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays

We follow a "flipped classroom" model that provides you with short, focused videos and theory and concepts to maximize the use of time in our live sessions

Knowledge input

We'll facilitate additional practice sessions to go deep on certain topics (e.g. interview training, business case building, communication training)

Weekly practice sessions

Course schedule

Product people with a few years of experience who want to level up their skills and get the basics right.

Product adjacent roles (e.g. UX design, QA, Engineering, ...) that want to move into product management.

Young product leads with a different background who need to get a grasp of the foundations to better lead their teams.

Understand the roles and responsibilities of a product manager so you can find your areas of improvement

Product Role and Responsibilities

Learn to build up the knowledge you need to make profound decisions and convince stakeholders

Building Domain Expertise

Master the art of user research by actively training the skills and learn ways to get the insights you need

Master the Art of User Research

Learn how to root-cause insights and ideate the right features that drive user and business impact.

Solve Problems that Matter

Learn how to assess opportunities and prioritize them so you can ensure to build features with impact

Opportunity Assessment

Explore different techniques to experiment and validate hypotheses and fill knowledge gaps

Experimentation & Hypotheses Testing

Learn about the characteristics of a vision, mission, roadmaps, goals, and KPIs and how to use them to make decisions and stay focussed

Strategy, Roadmaps & Goals

Craft a business case and understand the financial aspects of the features you build

Business Case modeling

Learn to tailor information-flows so you and your teams are well-informed and build trust with your peers

Information Flows

Master the art of communication to resolve conflicts

Conflict Resolution

Learn how to craft a story to convince people and get the buy-in you need

Storytelling

Learn to align with stakeholders, your team, and key people in your work so you can work collaboratively with ease

Collaboration & Team Alignment

Practice ways to create good products from customer-facing to uncover technical details that your development team needs to perform. Understand the principles needed to build high-quality products while still shipping fast

Building the Product

We offer a 1h coaching session after the course to discuss very individual questions you might have

Bonus: 1h Coaching Session

knowledge, tips, and tricks on how to run Product better and more efficiently.

...and many more

Become a better product manager with a guaranteed impact on your business – in only 6 weeks.

Lightning Lessons

Building Better Products: Improve Delivery & Productivity