Increasing Product Manager impact through Strategy, Continuous Discovery, & OKRs

I’ve helped leaders, founders, and VCs unlock business impact and value by closing the gap between competing features and actionable strategy. I'm a Principal Design Enablement Manager at KeyBank, Substack author, and Product/Strategy coach who's spent 15+ years turning enterprise chaos into clarity. 

If your teams are shipping features but not moving metrics that matter, Product Strategy Decoded is for you.

As Principal Design Enablement Manager, Design Excellence & Operations (DExOps) – Key Experience Design (KeyXD) Team at KeyBank, we centralize and support KeyBank's world-class design function. 

My core competencies include Strategy, Product Management, Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), Continuous Discovery, solution development and delivery, Agile leadership, solution innovation, PMO leadership, SDLC management, information architecture, iOS and Android application development, delivery management, program and project management, budget and resource management, user experience enhancement, client engagement leadership, client relationship management, and technology team leadership. 

I am passionate about building great products that leverage Lean and UX-driven, Design Thinking-centered approaches to deliver measurable client-focused business outcomes. I am also an author and public speaker, sharing my insights and best practices on Product, Strategy, OKRs, and Agile delivery.

All views expressed are my own.

Michael Goitein

The reason it takes so long to build software with large teams isn't what you think...

It's called "High WIP" (Work in Progress), and it's destroying your teams' ability to get stuff done.

You've all seen it:
• 100 projects started. 
• 0 finished
• 37 stuck at 97%
• How could it be that everyone's so “busy," yet nothing's getting done?

The downstream results aren't good, as team morale tanks over time.

But the worst thing? These teams' ability to have any material impact on meaningful business results becomes non-existent.

But the truth too many leaders miss is that high WIP isn't the problem – it's a SYMPTOM.

The real reasons are hiding below the surface:
1. The inability to make strategic choices – saying "yes" and trying to do it all. 
2. The outdated "vendor" mindset, with "The Business" throwing requirements over the wall to "IT." (It's time to wake up and collaborate earlier instead of dictating. Last I checked, it's 2026...)
3. We're managing software development like a factory assembly line (velocity?), when it's actually a learning journey toward changing customer behavior
4. Leadership refusing to understand and accept true team capacity, instead of always pushing for more. ("Hoping" will never make it true)
5. The unending search for the next shiny object: (“NOW we're all doing agentic AI on our roadmaps! ...until the next hot thing comes along.) 

We have to face that we've become addicted to starting things, but hate doing the hard work of finishing them.

The only way to break free? Start by accepting that less = more.

Fewer things done well will be worth far more than trying and failing to do many more things badly.

Your teams don't need more to do. 

You owe it to them to make clear, thoughtful strategic choices and prioritize the fewer, truly essential moves you need to make for your customers and your business.

Agree? Share your thoughts below 👇

I help product teams turn confusion into actionable strategic choices | Enterprise Product, Strategy & Discovery Coach | KeyBank | Author

Typical story: PM tries to vibe-code a prototype. Goes down the rabbit hole trying to connect databases & refactor spaghetti code.

Meanwhile, the assumption they were trying to prove/disprove goes untested.

While there are many "vibe-coding" platforms out there, what sets Magic Patterns apart is founders Alexander Danilowicz and Teddy Ni's laser-focus on front-end only, faithfully capturing and extending a company's existing design system so quick prototypes don't distract with blatantly wrong UI.

Forget about massive documentation. Magic Patterns revolutionizes the  software development lifecycle by shifting that part of the process "left."

"We're data-driven" may be the most dangerous phrase in product.

Roger Martin saw how some of the biggest breakthrough innovations didn’t come from data-obsessed companies. Instead, products like the iPhone and the Aeron chair came to life because there was no data, and moving forward required a leap of imagination.

Data can't tell you what's possible. It can only tell you what happened in the past.

I once worked with a team that watched their analytics dashboards like day traders. One tiny dip triggered all-hands, red-alert panic. They analyzed furiously.
What didn't they do? Speak to a single customer.

What’s one critical opportunity you’re ignoring because you don’t have the data?

I'm looking for product trios to join me for a 30-minute session where I'll walk you through a strategy framework from "Playing to Win for Product Teams" to help balance data with strategic imagination. Drop "DATA" below if this hits home.

Strategy isn't magic. It's a learnable skill.

This will inflame the strategy gatekeepers who've spent years reading dusty volumes and want you to believe it's some rare talent, reserved for the special few.

That you're either born with it or you're not.

That only they possess the "secrets."

But strategy is way simpler than they want you to think:
Strategy: A set of choices to influence customer behavior.
Great strategy: Intentionally pairing choices that reinforce each other, consistently.
Success: The result of focused action.
Anyone can learn this. 

And that's exactly what "Playing to Win for Product Teams" is designed to teach.

Comment "skill" in the comments if you're tired of strategy being treated like some secret club.

Notion founder Ivan Zhao calls it "sugaring the broccoli":
Hide revolutionary capabilities inside familiar experiences.

Too much software still tries to impress you with all its cool features out of the box. Feature tours. Onboarding flows. Tutorials explaining everything the product can do.

Zhao made a far different choice, influenced by Apple’s approach to focus and simplicity.
Open Notion for the first time, and you see a simple, familiar note-taking interface. 
You can start taking notes and get value within 30 seconds.
But Notion gradually reveals the powerful, next-gen software development platform hidden underneath as you go. Notes become pages. Pages become databases. Databases become custom apps.
By the time you realize you're building your own software, you're already hooked.
This is a clear "How to Win" choice. Instead of competing on features, Notion competes on the gentlest possible learning curve toward the most powerful outcome.
What's your product's version of “sugaring the broccoli”?

There are two types of Tech Leads. Only one helps your product deliver business results over the long-term.

I worked with a super-capable tech lead who ended every discovery conversation the same way: "Whatever the product manager and stakeholders want, I'll build it."

Seemed great. Collaborative. Easygoing.

Until the product collapsed under the weight of its own tech debt.

Being "nice" and "serving The Business" masked a lack of strategic leadership that eventually cost us everything.

Another tech lead I worked with asked a totally different question in discovery:
"Can you walk me through the user journey, how this delivers against our strategy, and the customer & business metrics we’re trying to drive?”

One focused only on the next feature release.

The other knew everything we discovered and delivered had to create sustained user AND business impact.

Any tech lead can learn client-centricity and strategic thinking. "Playing to Win for Product Teams" is designed to help everyone on the product team be more strategic.

I'm offering a limited number of product trios a free 30-minute session to walk through a simple, powerful strategy framework. Drop "tech" in the comments or DM me if this hits home.

Design isn't about making things look "cool" or "intuitive." It's about working with product and tech to deliver business results.

But when you ask "who’s this for?", all you get are vague answers like "users" or "prospects."

So you look for design inspiration elsewhere and create brand-safe, "attractive" choices. Generic layouts. Because nobody upstream made choices.

My teams’ greatest breakthroughs have happened when design sits down with product and tech and walks through an experience with the right people to better understand their needs in that moment.

Great design uses simplicity and constraints to solve for unmet customer needs. 
But it depends on understanding who you're designing for, and who you can exclude.

As a designer, your best work depends on getting the strategic clarity you need.

When's the last time vague direction held back the level of design work you knew you could deliver for your team?

I'm looking for 3 product trios to join me for a 30-minute session where I’ll walk you through a specific strategy framework from my upcoming book, 'Playing to Win for Product Teams' to help you get the clarity you need. 

Drop a comment and connect if you're dealing with this now.

Is your product strategy fundamentally broken? Find out with the Toggle Method, a 10-second diagnostic. It can't tell you everything about your strategy, but it will tell you if something fundamental is broken.

Every product strategy has two core choices:
 • Where to Play: Which customers do you serve, to address which problems, in which contexts?
 • How to Win: What's your differentiated approach to serving them?

Take your Where to Play and your How to Win, and ask:

Does this How to Win ONLY work for this Where to Play?

Toggle your Where to Play to a different customer segment. A competitor's customers. A related market. Does your How to Win still make sense for them?

If your How to Win would be wrong or undesirable for those other customers, you have a matched set. Your choices reinforce each other.

If your How to Win would work just as well for them, something is broken. Either you haven't made real choices, or your choices don't fit together well enough.

But the Toggle Test can only surface a symptom. 

You’ll need a separate test to diagnose which problem you actually have.

Subscribe to “Product Strategy Decoded” where I share the full framework, together with prompts to help test your strategic thinking.

Sometimes your most strategic move is building something that doesn't fit your strategy.
I used to think my only job was keeping the team aligned to and enforcing our strategic choices. 
Over time, and after some needless friction, it turns out the real flex is knowing when to let a misaligned feature through for the sake of the longer-term relationship.
Maybe your VP needs a quick demo for a board meeting. Or sales is inches from closing a key deal that needs a tiny fix. Or an influential stakeholder has political capital riding on a feature that doesn't exactly fit your "Where to Play."
Trust me, you can wave your strategy one-pager, be "right," and die on that hill.
Or you can build the thing, nurture the relationship, and gently steer back to your strategy.
Of course those choices matter. But so does staying in the game long enough to bring it to life.
The best product leaders know when to hold the line and when to bend. 
Winning is worthless if you lose the trust necessary to help your organization win over the long term.

Reed Hastings tried to sell Netflix to Blockbuster for $50 million. The Blockbuster team laughed him out of the building.
But Hastings understood something Blockbuster's mission statement never revealed: rewind fees were a huge revenue driver. Customers hated them. And Blockbuster couldn't give them up.
Hastings made that gap the centerpiece of Netflix's strategy.
Today, Netflix is worth over $300 billion. Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy in 2010.
Want to find your competitor's blind spot? 
Forget their mission statement. Just ask three questions:
1. Where are they spending money? Engineering headcount, marketing channels, partnerships.
2. What are they saying no to? Features they don't build, customers they ignore, markets they avoid.
3. What can they not change? Business model, brand positioning, technical architecture.
The answers reveal their actual strategy and where they're vulnerable.
Try this on your biggest competitor this week. Where does what they do differ from what they say?

Your razor-sharp, 42-slide roadmap deck took eight straight days to build, working nights & weekends. 

2025 recap, every 2026 Q1 feature justified with data, ICE scores, tied to OKRs, and mapped to a customer complaint.

Leadership asked a minor detail question, said "thanks," and moved on. No real digging. No debate. No insights, direction, or warning about potential upcoming moves across the org.

The problem? When you overwhelm leadership with features, outputs, and data, you miss the opportunity to tell a simple, clear business impact story.

What opportunities are we prioritizing? Who are we serving and not serving this quarter? What's an emerging advantage to exploit? What are we betting will be true about the market? And how do we anticipate these choices to drive customer and business results?

Next time, try one slide on the customer opportunity, one on who you’re serving and how, one on the numbers that matter to tell that story, and present 3-5 choice possibilities for the coming quarter. 

See how the conversation shifts.

Four reasons for the Strategy Gap. Which one hits you hardest right now?

1. Strategy treated as executive mystery — reserved for the "ivory tower"
2. Strategy disconnected from execution — "it's on the roadmap" becomes the only answer
3. Strategy is rarely taught — design schools teach visual thinking, engineering schools teach systems architecture, but almost no one teaches product strategy
4. The opposite is taught — business schools emphasize strategic planning (data-driven, analytical, internal-facing) over strategy (creative, customer-centric)

The thing is, your product team is already being strategic.

You choose to do some things and not others. Many of those choices are made for you.

But even when you're told what to build, you can deliver better against customer, company, and business goals when you make sharper choices within your constraints

That's what "Playing to Win for Product Teams" is designed to teach.

Drop your number (1-4) in the comments. I'd love to hear which one resonates most.

81% of PMs know strategy is core to their role.
Only 25% work at companies with clear strategic direction.

Welcome to The Strategy Gap.

You keep dancing around the problem: 
 – Maybe more planning will help (it won't)
 – Maybe OKRs will help (they won't)
 – Maybe your favorite framework will help…

But you already have a strategy.
It's what you're doing right now.

I've designed "Playing to Win for Product Teams" to give you the tools to understand what's really happening and create the right strategy for your context.

Drop "strategy" in the comments or DM me for early access.

Product stuck? Maybe it’s time to listen to what the market is trying to tell you.

But the most successful product pivots never come from brilliant strategy sessions.

They start when someone notices an unexpected pattern in user behavior:
 • Discord: "Why are 78% of our users non-gamers?"
 • Loom: "Why is everyone ignoring our awesome dev tool integrations and just sending quick videos?"
 • dbt Labs: "Why is our internal tool gaining 1000+ users while our consulting stagnates?"

These questions led to billion-dollar pivots only when these companies let go of their locked-in “Mission” and “Vision,” and created a new set of choices aligned to what their users were actually doing.

Want to find the key for your product?

I've designed "Playing to Win for Product Teams" to give your entire team a set of First Principles, mental models, and frameworks. Not to create the “one, perfect” strategy, but to make strategic thinking across your product team a continuous habit.

Drop "strategy" in the comments or DM me for early access.

There's no better way for product managers to talk about their work than through "Money Stories."
And no one can tell a clearer and more compelling money story than Rich Mironov

40-year B2B product mgmt veteran with 3 exits, 15 interim CPO roles, 6 VC-backed start-ups. Wrote “Money Stories” and “The Art of Product Management.” Coach/mentor for scores of product leaders. Product Camp founder.

Excited to announce my new book, "Money Stories: Communicating the Value of Product Work"

It pulls together long-time thoughts about talking with executives in the Language of Money, framing estimates of financial value for products and features, earning our keep, and avoiding product/process discussions with folks who don't care.

Tagline: DON’T BRING A BACKLOG TO A GUNFIGHT!

https://lnkd.in/eVYZh8vv 

#productstrategy #organizations #leadership #executives #economics

I'll be adding this crucial update to my Gong strategy breakdown:
https://lnkd.in/ek8_RGMM

The US, China, Canada, and Mexico are collaborating—TARIFF-FREE—with Gong. 

Well, kind of. 😏

When we first rolled out translation in Gong, we thought, “Cool feature, nice to have.” 

Turns out, it’s a total game changer for global teams.

	•	No more language barriers. Managers can review and coach deals without speaking a word of the customer’s language.

	•	Teams can learn best practices from each other—across countries, across languages, across time zones.

	•	Hiring just got way more flexible. No need to limit yourself to one language—build the best team, period.

From now on, nothing’s Greek to you. 😉 Enjoy!

Product whisperer. Author of “AI for Product Managers” and “Deliver Great Products that Customers Love”. Product innovation training, coaching, and facilitation.

To all Product Leaders in my network: If you want to help your PMs foster AI competence - whether you build a traditional product or an AI-enhanced one - invite your team to join my "AI for Product Managers" course. 

It's a 2-week intensive bootcamp where PMs learn how to leverage AI tools to accelerate their PM workflow - from discovery to solution validation.
It's designed to be hands-on so that PMs learn first, and then bring home a repeatable workflow on how to use AI in their PDLC.

The benefit? Develop AI competency in your team, accelerate product development, and validate product ideas faster.
More info here:
https://lnkd.in/evu3sMrX
(reach out to me with questions)

Open article: AI for Product Managers by Valerio Zanini on Maven by maven.com

AI for Product Managers by Valerio Zanini on Maven

MetLife

Director-  Agile Enablement Strategic Delivery Lead

ICON Agility Services

(Freelance contractor) 
Leveraged methodologies like Agile and Design Thinking to enhance user engagement and streamline workflows, achieving a 25% increase in user engagement within the first quarter through iterative design sprints.

Conducted value stream mapping workshops, leading to a 20% improvement in user experience metrics by identifying and eliminating process bottlenecks.

Coached product managers on customer-centric development, resulting in a 15% rise in customer satisfaction scores through hands-on guidance and regular feedback loops from users.

Adopted a pragmatic and adaptive approach to tailor practices to each client’s needs, such as customizing Agile practices for non-traditional team structures, improving collaboration, and accelerating delivery times.

Strategically aligned product initiatives with business goals, driving innovation and efficiency. Led a cross-functional team to launch a new feature that met user needs and opened new revenue streams.

Focused on the customer journey and user experience by regularly aligning key metrics to identify areas of opportunity. Revamped the onboarding process based on user feedback, resulting in a 30% reduction in churn rate.

Product Operations and Change Agility Specialist

Envestnet, Inc

Fintech-Wealth Management SaaS company (~2,000 clients) 

Led a pilot project in collaboration with product management and engineering, overseeing the migration to Snowflake for enhanced data analytics capabilities. Utilized Agile product delivery processes to improve the release cycle, achieving bi-weekly stakeholder feedback demos and monthly releases.

Managed a team of 5 Agile Delivery Leads, effectively translating IT SDLC processes to align with Product Operations PDLC, significantly enhancing overall efficiency through Agile practices.

Championed design thinking practices, conducting strategic alignment workshops, design sprints, and customer/user journey mapping exercises, which resulted in a better product-market fit and increased user satisfaction.

Implemented Agile and Design Thinking methodologies, achieving a 25% increase in user engagement and a 20% improvement in user experience metrics.

Coached product managers on customer-centric development, leading to a 15% rise in customer satisfaction scores and enhanced team collaboration.

Aligned product initiatives with business goals, driving innovation and efficiency, and successfully launching new features that generated new revenue streams.

Director of Agile Operations and Enablement

Ingenious Agile

Self-employed Product Enablement Consultant/Coach who helped Product organizations adapt to methods and frameworks to optimize processes to achieve business agility. 
I have worked in various types of product organizations, including companies without a formal product department who have chosen to adopt an Agile framework with roles in Product and needed help to rationalize this transition adopting agile product delivery (SDLC + PDLC) .
Successfully optimized product development lifecycles (PDLC) across diverse industries, including SaaS - FinTech, HealthTech, EdTech, and Retail/eCommerce, leading to faster time-to-market and significant cost savings for clients by implementing Agile methodologies with iterative feedback loops, reducing development risks and speeding up product delivery by 4 months.
Led value stream identification and mapping workshops, coached teams on integrating user research into product discovery phases, and established the use of OKRs, resulting in streamlined processes, an 8% increase in customer satisfaction and retention, and a 10% increase in successful product launches.

Agile Product Operations and Transformation Consultant

WellCare Health Plans

Contractor role

Pioneered Agile practices (Scrum) in a healthcare insurance environment, replacing a waterfall approach to foster iterative development, enhance collaboration, and improve project efficiency; successfully transitioned a large Salesforce and Pega integration project using story mapping for BRD creation, ensuring alignment and on-time delivery while demonstrating strong communication, leadership, and problem-solving skills.

Senior Agile Operations Coach (Contract)

Adheris Health

Pharmaceutical marketing company
Rescued a delayed CRM project, achieving on-time delivery within 3 months through Agile implementation and strong stakeholder collaboration for pharmaceutical marketing company.

Senior Program Manager

Veratics, Inc.

Veteran-owned software consulting company 

Spearheaded the Agile playbook and led the successful implementation of a Scrum pilot program for a healthcare client's Data & Analytics department, improving team processes and collaboration, resulting in a 20-30% reduction in time to deliver insights and reports faster.

Senior Agile Product Delivery Consultant

FlipSwitch

Education SaaS software company 

Spearheaded the PDLC Agile playbook for the entire product department for EdTech software company for secondary education. 
Increased Cross-Functional Collaboration & Project Delivery Efficiency with 2 week product releases through the adoption of organization-wide adoption of Agile methodologies (Scrum & Kanban)
Introduced Agile Marketing concepts with sister marketing company to improved client projects deliveries by optimizing workflow across specialized skillsets within marketing team.

 Product Delivery Lead (Edtech)

American Express

Spearheaded Agile adoption (Scrum) within the American Express mobile product team, fostering collaboration between product managers, engineers, and our third-party design agency. This streamlined development, improved communication, and reduced wait times for new features by 6 months, allowing for faster product iteration and time to market.

Product Delivery Lead  (Payments)

Q Interactive

Online marketing company

Returned back to company to help adopt Lean and Agile practices within IT to improve collaboration and prioritization of projects. 
Minimized competing priorities, improved trust and transparency between product and IT

Technical Program Manager

I’m a Strategic Delivery Lead who builds AI-ready, adaptive operating models that connect strategy to execution and make product delivery scalable and outcome-driven.

What I do best:
	•	Be creative in finding fit-for-purpose solutions—cutting through rigid frameworks and focusing on the basics of product delivery.
	•	Design operating models that elevate product delivery and business operations at enterprise scale.
	•	Create data-driven insights and signals that make the invisible visible and enable leaders to act with confidence.

What drives me:
	•	A passion for AI readiness—helping organizations prepare to adapt and thrive in the AI-driven future of work.
	•	A commitment as a women’s longevity advocate—an underserved need and fast-growing market where innovation, adaptability, and data matter as much as they do in business.

I believe strategy and operations should move together—not apart. My work ensures organizations can scale, adapt, and deliver measurable value while preparing for the future.


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The Battle

Michael Goitein

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