Richard Russell Coaching

ADHD Coach

I split my time between Luxembourg and London.
Available for NED and Fractional Hybrid roles also.

Product Leadership Coach

Whether you’re scaling a product-led company or transforming how you work, I can help you move faster, with less pain *

* There's always pain. Anyone who says otherwise is lying.

But we can make the pain worth it.

My product and engineering background from Google, Amazon and my exposure to countless startups and corporates means I understand where you're coming from.

My experience across every function (marketing, strategy, partnerships, operations, customer service and more) and in many industries (SaaS, Consumer Internet, Retail, Travel, Logistics, Banking, Insurance, MedTech, Crypto, Media, etc) means I know where you want to go.

The key for most of my clients is helping them empower themselves so they can empower their teams. This means transforming from tactical and functional to strategic and cross-functional, developing courage to take the right risks, and balancing the need to hold firm on some topics while disagreeing and committing to the rest of the executive team on others.

If this sounds like you, book a free chemistry call and we can get to know each other and see if there is a fit.

Scaleup Leaders

I host a video podcast and write a newsletter for and about leaders who are scaling up.

Creator & Host

Amazon

Two roles, firstly driving pan-European technology projects to improve the European customer experience, and secondly in consumer localization, where we translate and localize millions of product listings each day across all Amazon’s marketplaces

* Acting Director for Consumer Localization from Jul-Nov 2015 with multi-discipline team of 100
Leading 2016 planning with 2.5x revenue growth (goal met in October 2016), and 2017 planning with 2x revenue growth

* 2015 Q4 Localization output exceeded previous seven quarters combined, and 2016 year end goal met during 2016 Q2

* Cut the time to launch new languages by six months (50%), without affecting revenue or customer experience

* Led “language of preference” program for global consumer websites, delivering second language experience on multiple marketplaces (e.g. Amazon.de and Amazon.co.jp in English), and a program of ongoing expansion to new market segments

* Proposed and secured funding for a broad technology transformation program covering hundreds of interdependent services to allow Amazon’s consumer websites to use non-latin languages

Senior Manager Product Development

High Street Labs

Developed Wlcome (yes, welcome without the e) a mobile loyalty app for brick-and-mortar stores, using geo-location to automatically check a customer into a store location to provide personalised service, loyalty rewards, and payments.

I developed the proof of concept, then product managed ongoing development with offshore dev team. I launched pilot in two coffee shops with 60 weekly actives after 1 month. I learnt a huge amount about marketing and innovation - the hard way!

In November 2013, after becoming a father, I took an interim role as Chief Product Officer at MoPowered, a listed mobile commerce startup.

MoPowered provides a SaaS solution to online retailers, enabling them to sell on the mobile channel. I took on management of the R&D division (Engineering, Product, QA, UX and Security).

- Implemented an agile transformation, accelerating release cycle from quarterly to weekly

- Halved merchant integration costs, reduced maintenance cost per issue from days to hours

- Implemented UI overhaul to enable metrics-driven user experience improvements, increasing basket size and conversion rate for our customers, and enabling improvements across multiple clients at once

- Created a hiring pipeline, set up recruiting process, and trained team on interviewing techniques, doubling team size from 8 to 18 people in 4 months.

- Proposed strategy to reduce cash burn, reducing locations and headcount, bringing key functions in-house, and focusing on product development, implemented by new management after I left

Founder

Google

I was part of the engineering team reporting through the sales division. Over four roles, I was responsible for: delivering Google AdSense technology to European partners including search engines (eg Ask Jeeves, Seznam.cz), portals (AOL, Yahoo), publishers (eg El Pais, De Telegraaf, Le Monde), and broadcasters (eg Channel 4, Sky); developing eCommerce payment partnerships for Google Checkout (eg Kiddicare, eBuyer); negotiating partnerships for global public transport agencies (eg TfL London, Deutsche Bahn, and MTA New York) to put their data on Google Maps; and managing a client solutions team supporting advertising agencies (WPP, Publicis, Omnicom) buying ads through DoubleClick BidManager.

- Recruited and managed a team of 5 in London and Paris offices, receiving a 94% rating as a manager from my team, representing top quartile performance across the business

- Built tools used by DoubleClick Bid Manager Sales & Services teams saving >20 FTEs globally

- Executed EMEA Bid Manager upgrade project, exceeding US counterpart team on all key metrics

- Developed tools to enable scaling of map data operations, launching 4x faster with 50% fewer FTEs

- Product managed european Checkout features including VAT, Chip-and-PIN, and Contactless Payments

- Managed AdSense Broadcast, Publishing and Portal partnerships worth £100M/yr with 80% YoY growth

Senior Engineer & Manager

Deutsche Bank

Ran a team which would now be known as DevOps, managing the build and deployment process and environments for Deutsche Bank’s market-leading online wholesale foreign exchange, bonds and derivatives trading platform, Autobahn, working with traders from DB and white label clients.

- Promoted to team lead, developed release process and launched new product 3x faster than before

- Planned and executed the first successful Business Continuity Test in Global Markets eCommerce

Lead Deployment Engineer, Global Markets eCommerce

Yellow Goanna PTY LTD

IT Infrastructure Consulting - clients included The RSPCA South Australia, The South Australian Metropolitan Fire Service, Austrics (Trapeze), a Satellite ISP Startup, and a B2B Accounting Startup
- Deployed a Satellite ISP and Education CDN in schools around rural South Australia
- Consulted for an online accounting startup, advising on technology strategy
- Developed and run a diploma level IT course for TAFE SA

Systems Administrator and Consultant

Department for Environment and Water

Managing production, development and testing Solaris server environments for mission-critical services for Department of Environment and Heritage (DEH), a preceding agency of DEW.

Systems Administrator

Trapeze Group

Developing a new user interface for a public transport management product.

Programmer - AUSTRICS (Acquired by Trapeze)

Helping leaders do more with less | OKRs & Leadership | ex Amazon & Google

* There’s always pain. Anyone who says otherwise is lying.
But we keep it to a minimum—and make the progress worth it.

You've read the books.
You're working harder than ever.
But the changes aren't sticking, and you're slipping behind.

Ever felt like that?

The three usual suspects:

𝐌𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭: Teams pull in different directions
𝐎𝐰𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩 𝐆𝐚𝐩𝐬: Decisions stall in deadlock
𝐒𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐄𝐱𝐞𝐜𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧: Bold slides, but nothing ships

If you don't change, you’ll miss opportunities, exhaust talent, and watch faster players overtake you.

And it will keep getting worse.

I help you break that cycle — fast.

I’ve led large teams at Amazon and Googl, helped 20+ startup executives navigate these challenges successfully and worked with corporates up to Fortune 500 scale. I love helping leaders like you bridge the gap between technical excellence and business leadership.

These challenges show up differently for every leader, but here are some recent results:

🔥 Series C CEO – Unblocked strategy, shipped a scalable fix in weeks, then raised a Series D.
🔥 Series A CEO – Broke the decision bottleneck, strengthened delegation, and cut attrition.
🔥 Series C VP Eng – Beat impostor syndrome, shaped strategy, and stepped up to CTO.
🔥 GM, Traditional BU – Shifted a 70-person product org from tech-focused order-takers to customer-centric empowered teams.

𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧?

Here's how I can help:

✅ Focused coaching, one-to-one or with your leadership team, to get you unstuck fast
✅ Facilitated strategy, OKR, planning and review workshops to create momentum
✅ Develop proven leadership habits to help you maintain progress
✅ Targeted training to upskill teams

As an individual, this will help you:

👉 Move from functional leadership to company-wide impact
👉 Build alignment across growing teams
👉 Navigate relationships with co-founders and stakeholders
👉 Transition from BigTech or Corporate to Scaleup leadership

For your organisation, this will help you:

🎯 Build your management operating system
🎯 Develop clear vision, strategy, and goals (OKRs)
🎯 Create cross-team alignment and buy-in
🎯 Build execution and review cadences that drive consistent results

Message me to explore if we're a good fit.

Richard Russell

“Best Conference Ever”
“One and a half days of inspiration”
“We made so much progress”

Real quotes from leaders at a transformation conference for a Swedish company that I really enjoyed leading over the past two days.

Heading home now - tired, but energised and happy.

I could do this again. :-)

Performance Coach for ADHD Leaders | Business Coach for Product and Scaleup Leaders | I help you move faster — with less pain*

No alternative text description for this image

I'm on my way to Stockholm for a transformation workshop with a client.

Looking forward to this!

Who doesn't love to receive feedback like this?

"The conference was one of the best, if not in fact the best conference I have attended" - from Håkan Johansson, Lead Business developer,  Tietoevry Industry.

At the end of the conference, I asked each of the 45 attendees for one word that described their experience. The number of people who said some variation of "hope", "inspiration", "progress", or "team" was overwhelming - such a thrill to hear.

I loved the energy, enthusiasm, and potential in this team - and it was a privilege to lead them through this conference kicking off their transformation project. I'm excited to see what they come up with.

I’m in Sweden, at this lovely villa in the snow. The conference starts in 90 minutes and I’m all set.

Yes, most of the preparation happened last minute. I spent a few weeks percolating ideas, with very little to show for it. Then the deadline looms, adrenaline kicked in and I focused like a weapon and got the whole workshop built in a day.

I used to think of this as procrastination and beat myself up for not getting it all done ahead of time.

But now I know this is how I do my best work. The time before the deadline is my brain doing the work in the background. Making connections, testing insights, iterating through concepts.

I have made peace with it, and it works.

How do you do your best work?

Is ADHD really a “deficit” or a “disorder”?

Technically yes, that’s what the definition says.

But practically, it’s just a difference, which at least 5% of the population share - and likely more.

The real deficit and disorder is in our expectation that everyone should be the same.

Yes there are disadvantages to having ADHD. But the with every disadvantage comes an advantage.

Distractability —> Curiousity
Impulsivity —> Creativity
Hyperactivity—> Drive

The challenge is not how to compensate for the weaknesses so much as how to maximise the advantages.

Build a career that fits your brain.
Don't try to adapt your brain to suit someone else's ideal career.

Most careers demand attention to detail and consistent execution. Fast brains tend to fail at this.

 You'll be told to adapt, be more consistent, get organized, try harder, hustle more.

But here's the truth: you're trying to wear someone else's career.

It's like wearing someone else's underpants—fun initially, but gets weird fast, and you're gonna end up with a career wedgie.

So start with your brain.

Find out what your real strengths are. Not just what you're good at, but what gives you energy.

Because if you build around that, your work amplifies you instead of fighting you. That's when you can be world-class.

Ask yourself:
→ What do I do effortlessly that others find hard?
→ What lights me up?

Design around the overlap. Build a career that works for you.

If you agree, hit the share or like button.

If you're a fast brain leader frustrated by the gap between your potential and actual performance, you probably know what to do.

Exercise, sleep, nutrition, habits, productivity systems—it's not rocket science.

But here's the problem: knowing isn't doing.

When you're a fast brain leader, you know what to do, how to do it, when to do it, why to do it.

But actually doing it? That's the hard part.

There's one key thing that makes the biggest difference:

Being surrounded by people who are trying to do the same thing.

* Your spouse as a supportive partner
* Friends who get it
* A coach (reach out if interested)

But one of the best ways is community

That's why I'm setting up Fast Brain Leaders—a community for people working on closing that gap between potential and performance.

We share the same challenges.
We support each other through them.
We've just started.

Check it out at fastbrainleaders.com

Is ADHD overdiagnosed?

No.

About 5% of the population have ADHD.
About 0.5% of the population have a diagnosis.

Yes, we're seeing a lot more awareness and a lot more diagnoses now than ever before. 

But when telescopes were invented, and people got hold of them and started pointing them at the night sky, we started seeing more stars than ever before. 

That doesn't mean that the new stars we saw were "over-detected" or were created by the telescope. We just got better at seeing them.

Same with ADHD.

We are more aware. We're better at assessing it. There are more people qualified to make assessments than ever before (but still nowhere near enough). So we're seeing more of it.

If you're finding yourself frustrated by the gap between your potential and your performance, and you find some things hard that other people find easy, and if "trying harder" or "discipline" just doesn't seem to work for you, maybe you should get checked out too.

Who cares what the nay-sayers think? This isn't about them - it's about you, and finding out what works for you.

But even if you can't find an assessment (there can be long waiting lists), you might benefit from non-medical help like coaching or community. Nothing stops you from getting help without a formal diagnosis.

“See, in my world, leftover pizza is not a thing. If I order a pizza, I’m going to eat THE PIZZA. Not a slice or two, but THE PIZZA. There won’t be leftover pizza. Heh. Leftover pizza. Even the name sounds funny. It’s like leftover wine. It’s not a real thing for the majority of us with ADHD.” - Peter Shankman , Faster Than Normal

ADHD-dar: that seemingly supernatural ability of people with ADHD to find and befriend other people with ADHD in any group setting, even when they aren’t (yet?) diagnosed themselves.

FAQ: Yes I am still offering product leadership, scaleup exec team, and transformation coaching.

I’ve been talking about ADHD coaching for leaders a lot because I love it, but that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped doing what I was doing.

If you need help with:
- transition to the product model (eg from projects or feature factory)
- strategy development and execution including OKRs
- becoming a leader whether as a CEO, CPO, executive or even first time manager of product manager

I’m here for you. 

I work with leaders from vc-backed startups (eg series B-D CEOs), Fortune 500 companies (eg VP product), and individual leaders.

There’s still time left if 2025 to get help within this years budgets.

Connect and send a DM for a chat.

“You just have to try harder.”

Every ADHDer’s heard this — from teachers, bosses, even friends.

And for most people, it’s good advice. Doing important things gives their brains a dopamine hit — the “feel-good” that powers motivation.

But ADHD brains work differently.
We’re already trying harder.
The problem isn’t effort — it’s chemistry.

We don’t get dopamine from what’s important.
We get it from what’s interesting — things that are novel, challenging, urgent, or fun.

That’s why what’s easy for most people can feel impossible for us, and what they find hard can light us up.

So stop trying harder.
Start working with your brain:
make tasks interesting, share the load, trade strengths.

Effort isn’t the issue.
Alignment is.

I’m excited because the founding group of fast brain leaders kicks off tomorrow (Thursday) at 4pm UK/5pm Europe, and every Thursday after that.

Interested?

Send a DM!

Most day planners make fast-brain leaders feel worse, not better.

You open them up and they’re full of:

abandoned weeks
half-finished days
old goals you don’t even recognise
and the quiet shame of “why can’t I just stick to this?”

I’ve tried everything:
Bullet journals, GTD, digital calendars, beautiful spreads, colour coding…
And every system eventually collapsed under the weight of its own expectations.

Here’s what finally worked for me:

👉 A one-page daily plan you throw away at the end of the day.

No backlog.
No planner guilt.
No flipping through old failures.
Just a clean slate — every single morning.

I’ve been using this for months now, and it’s the first planning system that genuinely works with (not against) a fast brain.

I recorded a short video showing exactly how I use it, including:

how to time-block your day realistically
how to choose your One Thing
how to adapt the plan when life inevitably changes
why throwing the page away is the magic

🎥 Watch the video here:
https://lnkd.in/eWaV37Z4

📄 And if you want the free Fresh Start Daily Planner PDF:
https://lnkd.in/eukdqBTp

If you struggle with consistent days — or feel a bit ashamed looking at your old planner — this might help you reset your relationship with planning altogether.

A fresh start, every day.

Sometimes when people connect to me I ask them if they are just here for the content or if they are dealing with ADHD themselves.

It’s a way to open up conversations - and seems pretty natural to me as an ADHD coach who mentions it in my banner, my headline and most of my content.

But last week, the question upset someone who considered it too personal and “unprofessional“.

What’s your take?

Bear in mind that my reason for posting about ADHD on LinkedIn, and the reason most people connect with me is because a core part of my business is helping people with ADHD, and so my question is basically “are you looking for my help?”.

Just listened to Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal’s three episodes on Google (links in comment).

Had two realisations:

1) Google’s best days were approximately 2006-2012 - not coincidentally, the years I was there. I can’t claim credit for everything, but I played my part!

Released or acquired in that period: YouTube, DoubleClick, Android, Docs, Chrome, Nexus (now Pixel), “the cat paper” (which led to the Transformer that is the T in GPT), Drive, Workspace, Appengine (now Cloud), Checkout (now Wallet), Analytics, Calendar, Transit and Traffic (on Maps), Play store, Photos, Hangouts (now Meet), Translate, etc

2) Google is not a product company. It’s a technology company. Every really successful product is built on a technical insight (and brilliant infrastructure), not a product or customer insight.

Similarly, Amazon is an operations company. Microsoft is a sales and marketing company. Netflix is a media company.

Apple and Meta (Facebook) are the only big tech product companies.

What’s your thoughts?

Throwing away my day plan at the end of every day was the key that unlocked the power of day planning for me!

I used to use the Time Block Planner from Cal Newport, but flicking through the days and weeks of failed plans always got me down and made it hard to restart.

Try this method: https://lnkd.in/eMqaAuih (free pdf template)

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

I am a Certified Strategy Professional, ICAgile Certified Lean Portfolio Manager and Certified Professional in Business Agility Foundations (BAF), Certified OKR Coach, Senior Agile Leader, Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO), as well as a Certified Scrum Master (CSM), with over 15 years of experience in coaching, innovating, executing, and delivering end-to-end digital and mobile solutions for Fortune 200 clients in the banking and financial services industry. 

I'm currently Principal Design Enablement Manager, Design Excellence & Operations (DeXOps) – KeyXD Team at KeyBank, where 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

RICE scored your feature at 1,200. You shipped it. Four months later: 3% adoption.
You ran the numbers:
Reach: 1,000 users per quarter
Impact: 3 (massive)
Confidence: 80%
Effort: 2 person-weeks

RICE Score: (1,000 × 3 × 0.8) / 2 = 1,200
Highest on the list. You built it. Celebrated the launch.
Then crickets. Zero retention impact. Wasted Product, UX, and Engineering time, effort & capacity.

What happened?
You wasted time prioritizing features in the solution space. 

What to do instead? 
Focus on how customer opportunities in the problem space connect to overarching strategy.

RICE can never answer:
 - Which customers are we choosing to serve?
 - What distinctive value are we delivering?
 - How does this connect to winning?

RICE gives you the illusion of scientific rigor and objectivity while you build and ship random things that are, at best, random and duplicative, and at worst, actively cancel each other out. 

Because prioritization frameworks are bandaids trying to fix the problems created when leadership either can’t, or won’t, make clear strategic choices.

See the image. Great product teams don't score features. They make strategic choices at the team and product level about which customer opportunities to pursue that deliver against overarching strategy.

Stop ignoring the problem. Start closing The Strategy Gap.

Enterprise Product, Strategy & Continuous Discovery

Y Combinator partners ripped first-time founders Alexander Danilowicz & Teddy Ni for having "the silliest startup idea they'd ever heard."

Two years later, Magic Patterns hit $1M Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) with two founders and zero employees.

And they did it by doing something most AI startups refuse to do:
𝗥𝗮𝗱𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 & 𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘆 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀. 𝗟𝗼𝘁𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺.

That decision explains why they're now generating $500K in ARR per employee, while competitors burn through venture capital in a vain attempt to serve larger Total Addressable Markets (“TAMs”).

Magic Patterns users are obsessed with its ability not only to speed up design, but for something that sounds impossible until you see it happen.

In this week's Product Strategy Decoded, I break down the strategic choices two frontend engineers made to build what VCs now value at over $6M:
→ The critical capability most AI design tools completely miss 
→ Why saying no to a larger user base created a compounding competitive advantage 
→ The metrics they track to nurture free users into 50-seat enterprise accounts

Read the full story & subscribe here:

Open article: How Magic Patterns Hit $1M ARR By Turning Away Most Of Their Potential Customers by michaelgoitein.substack.com

How Magic Patterns Hit $1M ARR By Turning Away Most Of Their Potential Customers

The $200M Product Strategy Lovable Uses To Become The Last Piece of Software You’ll Ever Need

Lovable.dev’s Co-Founder & CEO Anton Osika Reverse-engineering the choices powering Europe’s most successful startup ever in its quest to remove the final barrier to startup success Saving lives and generating $500,000 in funding—without writing a single line of code. Brazilian growth marketer Sabrine Matos was devastated by the tragic story of a woman murdered by her partner, a man with a violent criminal record she never knew about....

Open article: The $200M Product Strategy Lovable Uses To Become The Last Piece of Software You’ll Ever Need by michaelgoitein.com

The $200M Product Strategy Lovable Uses To Become The Last Piece of Software You’ll Ever Need

Gamma’s Genius Strategic Shift
Too many companies adopting AI tend to think in terms of binary, either/or options.

Either build expensive proprietary AI stacks, or connect to existing LLMs to bolt superficial AI functionality onto existing products.

Gamma discovered a third path. They built a genuine competitive moat by developing a sophisticated AI orchestration capability that no one thought could be a differentiator.

Gamma is proving you don’t have to be first-to-market or best-funded to succeed. 

You just need to make smarter strategic choices around AI integration while mastering the product-led growth basics of viral loops and community development.

Can competitors copy your best features? Yup. Who cares? Let them.

But can they replicate your entire ecosystem's interconnected success? Much harder.

Building an ecosystem requires fundamental business model and process changes most companies simply can't or won't make.

It's like trying to rebuild Amazon's delivery network in your garage. Theoretically possible, practically impossible.

While you're busy A/B testing features to optimize tiny gains, your smartest competitors are thinking differently, building enabling structures and processes, and striking key partnerships.

Which approach are you taking?

As an author and creator, I've learned the hard way how incredibly time-consuming Infographics can be to create.

When done well, they show complex concepts at a glance.

When done poorly, they overwhelm or confuse, rather than add value. 

In my latest article on Magic Patterns revolutionary AI-driven design approach, I needed to quickly sketch out the concept of "shift-left" for product teams.

This is a tale of three images.
1. 𝗜𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝟭: 𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗴𝗹𝗲'𝘀 𝗟𝗮𝘁𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗡𝗮𝗻𝗼 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗻𝗮 𝗣𝗿𝗼: Nails it out of the gate, but oddly throws in "cite" everywhere, and inexplicably places it against an 1849 gold rush-era map background
2. 𝗜𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝟮: 𝗖𝗹𝗮𝘂𝗱𝗲 "𝗙𝗶𝘅𝗲𝘀" 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗢𝘂𝘁𝗽𝘂𝘁: Anthropic's Claude is great at so many things, especially editorial feedback. But this is so comical it's embarrassing.
3. 𝗜𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝟯: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗙𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗩𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻: Bringing the first version into Affinity Photo, cleaning up the "cite" references, and adding the correct Magic Patterns logo.

This is the final version that appears in the article, linked in the comments below.

Google's Nano Banana first pass on the article infographic

The final version, taking the Nano Banana version and cleaning it up in Affinity Photo

AI is making us mentally "obese," and nobody's talking about it. The closest parallel? Walking.

In some parts of America, you literally can't do anything without getting in a car. No walking. No biking. Just cars to go anywhere and do literally everything.

And it's turned America into a hotbed of obesity, triggering a nationwide health crisis.

And the same thing is happening in slow-motion with AI right now.

When we outsource every mental task to AI, from writing a simple email to brainstorming and creative thinking, we're creating mental "suburbs" where our brain cells start to shrivel and die from lack of use.

The solution isn't avoiding AI. It's being strategic and finding balance.

Figure out the places to use AI to "drive" to destinations that would waste your time. 

But make sure you're still taking regular mental "walks" and solving problems yourself.

Our brains, like our bodies, need regular exercise to stay strong.

What's one mental task you've committed to doing without AI assistance? 

Comment below.

Failed founders obsessed with their product "Vision" spend more time perfecting their logo than understanding customer needs.

Here's a brutal quiz question that reveals if you're trapped in abstract product vision-thinking:
1. Can you name your 𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 and the 𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗰 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺 your product solves 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮? 
2. Or do you only talk about why users 𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 want your product instead?

If you're struggling with the first part, you're doing product research to “validate,” not discover. 

You're looking for confirmation, not truth.

The most dangerous phrase in startups: 
"Users just don't understand our vision yet."

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗮𝘀𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗮𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗲𝘀𝘁?

Atlassian’s $975 million acquisition of Loom happened not because of Loom’s original, official strategy. 

It happened because of the revealed strategy, overwhelmingly driven by user behavior.

Loom originally started as a set of connected developer tools. 

You could share chunks of code, do pull request reviews, really integrate collaboration for engineering teams. Video was one small part of it.

But what Atlassian ended up acquiring them for was solving the problem of meetings.

What Loom became, and what Atlassian acquired, was async video messaging updates. 

Now woven into the fabric of every Atlassian product, whether Jira, Confluence, or anything else, you can find a little video icon, record a short clip, and that gives context. You don’t have to be great at writing. You record a short Loom clip that travels with that work unit, giving people context without you having to be there.

That’s been hugely successful for Atlassian in its drive to build a suite of “connected workplace” tools. 

Listen to Chris Tottman and I discuss this and many other pivot stories in this week's "Product Strategy Decoded" conversation.

There's always a hidden strategy controlling your organization– whether you like it or not.
Whatever bold transformation move you want to make, hidden gravity will pull everything back into the same old patterns.
It's the hidden habits of daily company life.
One way out?
Reverse-engineer your current strategic choices using the Strategy Choice Cascade.

Most SaaS companies are building products for the wrong person. And with AI, they’re taking off faster in the wrong direction, leaving millions on the table because of it.

AI and ML pioneer Gong figured this out in 2016. 

Their competitors still haven't.

Subscribe to Product Strategy Decoded this week, and learn how Gong:
→ Created an entirely new category with its product
→ Spotted the strategy choice mistake killing too many products’ value ceilings
→ Unlocked 50 percentage points of hidden growth for Demandbase
→ Continuously builds compounding advantages competitors can't replicate

Today, I’m showing 1146 people why optimizing AI for "user productivity" is a huge mistake, and what to do instead. 

Read the full story for free & subscribe here:

Open article: How Gong Created a $7.25B Opportunity By Realizing Sales Software Optimized For The Wrong Person Entirely by michaelgoitein.substack.com

How Gong Created a $7.25B Opportunity By Realizing Sales Software Optimized For The Wrong Person Entirely

SWOTs are totally worthless anyway, so you may as well let 𝗚𝗮𝗺𝗺𝗮 do the heavy lifting instead of paying $$$

RIP Mckinsey.

Use these prompts to replace $500/hr consultants:

1. Go to gamma .app
2. Click on "Create with AI".
3. Paste the prompt you need:

✦ SWOT Analysis
Create a 10–12 slide deck titled ‘SWOT for [BUSINESS/PROJECT]’. Include: brief overview, goals, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats, top 5 priorities, 30-day action list.

✦ Competitor Comparison
Make a 10–12 slide deck ‘Competitor Snapshot: [INDUSTRY/REGION]’. Include: who the competitors are, price/features table, pros/cons, where we’re better/worse, and 3 moves to win in 90 days.

✦ Customer Persona
Build an 8–10 slide deck ‘Who We Serve’. Include: 2–3 personas with photo/quote, pains, goals, buying triggers, channels they use, and what message works for each.

✦ Value Proposition & Message House
Create a 8–10 slide deck ‘Why Choose [PRODUCT/BRAND]’. Include: problem in one line, promise in one line, 3 proof points, before/after example, short tagline options, and website hero copy.

✦ Go-to-Market Launch Plan
Produce a 12–14 slide deck ‘Launch Plan for [PRODUCT]’. Include: target customer, simple message, channels (email/social/partners), 4-week content calendar, small budget split, and launch checklist.

✦ Pricing Options
Create a 8–10 slide deck ‘Pricing for [PRODUCT/SERVICE]’. Include: good/better/best packages, what’s included, who each package is for, simple discount rules, and a clear recommendation.

✦ KPI Scorecard
Make a 8–10 slide deck ‘Scorecard for [TEAM/BUSINESS]’. Include: 6–8 must-have metrics, what each metric means, target vs current, how often to check, and who owns each metric.

✦ 30-60-90 Day Plan
Build a 10–12 slide deck ‘First 90 Days for [ROLE/PROJECT]’. Include: goals, quick wins, weekly rhythm, stakeholders, risks, and checklists for day 30, 60, and 90.

✦ Budget & Break-Even
Create a 8–10 slide deck ‘Simple Budget for [PROJECT/STORE/APP]’. Include: costs list, expected sales, break-even point, best/base/worst case, and money-saving ideas.

✦ Risks & Mitigations
Produce a 8–10 slide deck ‘What Could Go Wrong (and Plan B)’. Include: top risks in plain words, how likely/impactful each is (red/yellow/green), owner, and the backup plan.

In whatever you "create," what’s the “story” behind the value the person on the other side gets from it?

What benefits will your ideal customers receive from you?

How will your offer take them from darkness and despair, to light & future promise?

What’s their “hero’s journey?”

In other words, you may not need to invest in another guru, course, or certification.

Invest your time refining the "story" that helps the right people understand the transformational value you, your products, and services provide.

That’s something AI won’t easily copy anytime soon.

Your company doesn't lack a strategy. You just aren’t clear about what it is.

Leadership says, "We can’t have a strategy. Things are moving too fast."

Wrong.

Every choice your company makes IS strategy.:
 – Which customers you serve (pricing, features, support model)
 – Which problems you solve (product roadmap priorities)
 – How you position (marketing, sales, product design)

You always have a strategy. It's just hidden.

Reverse-engineering reveals it:
Look at your product's actual choices: 
 – What features exist? Who do they serve? 
 – What's intentionally missing? Who are you not serving? 
 – What does pricing signal about your target customers? 
 – What tradeoffs have you made in design and architecture? What are you optimizing for?

These choices reveal your Where to Play and How to Win.

Most teams don’t know what to do because they've never taken the time to reverse-engineer their strategy. So they push to build and release faster, much of which directly contradicts their “hidden strategy.”

Strategy isn't what leadership says in all-hands meetings; it’s hidden inside what you’re already doing.

How much more could your teams achieve if you made those choices clear and consistent?

At noon ET today, I'll be hosting noted UK VC Chris Tottman as he shares his insights into "The Art and Science of the Pivot"  - join us if you can at 17:00 UK time, at 12:00 pm noon during your lunch hour here on the East Coast, or 9 am West Coast time:

Open article: LIVE SOON: Chris Tottman - Mike Goitein - Pivot Strategies Livestream by open.substack.com

LIVE SOON: Chris Tottman - Mike Goitein - Pivot Strategies Livestream

Want to finish December with a new level of AI skills?
Come join Elena Calvillo's "AI Advent Calendar Challenge," a fun daily series of AI prompts to up-level your game with a stellar lineup of AI thought leaders.
Join us!
https://lnkd.in/eRBH-SxR

AI Product Manager | Building AI Products at WTW | Newsletter Writer Helping 1,000+ PMs Navigate AI at productreleasenotes.com

🎄 Big announcement 🎄

AI Advent Challenge is LIVE! 

300+ people already signed up.
25 days of practical AI skills.
30+ incredible contributors.

Thank you to everyone who made this possible: 
Sam Illingworth Wyndo Mitra Buwana Mike Watson Raghav Mehra Maria-Cristina Muntean Mike X Cohen, PhD Jose Antonio Morales Michael Goitein Sharyph M Nicola de Vera Dennis Berry Dinah Davis James Presbitero Cristina Oliva Patrick Camilo I. Zambrano Juan Salas-Romer Katie Barnes 🤫 Dominik Gmeiner Toni Dos Santos Karo Zieminski Benedikt Kantus Joel Salinas Frencia Anfernee Tan Dheeraj Sharma Shamim Rajani

And thanks the tools that made this possible too Lovable Supabase Cursor Resend

One door unlocks every day at midnight starting Dec 1.

Join us: https://lnkd.in/eaiK_pzp

Don't forget to support us on Product Hunt: https://lnkd.in/eMMRSEde

Who's learning AI this December? 🙋

Open article: AI Advent Calendar: Learn AI in 24 days with 3-min daily lessons | Product Hunt by producthunt.com

AI Advent Calendar: Learn AI in 24 days with 3-min daily lessons | Product Hunt

Adobe just paid a hefty price premium to acquire Semrush and integrate “Generative Engine Optimization” (“GEO”) into its products.
But the odds are against it ever seeing a dime of return on that investment.
Read the full story in this week's "Product Strategy Decoded" & subscribe here:
https://lnkd.in/e33Pnv5q

Google, Anthropic, Microsoft, and Cursor all made big moves as we wind down 2025 

See the strategic choices underlying these moves as they position for competitive advantage into the next year, and the agentic AI feature that’s already here.

Open article: This Week In The Autonomous Agent Race by michaelgoitein.substack.com

When should a startup pivot? To what, exactly?
Yesterday, I had the good fortune to speak with Notion Capital VC Chris Tottman
He laid out a set of brilliant, hard-won lessons gained over his successful career.

Listen and learn how to:
• Find problems worth solving
• Discover what's working vs. trying to prove your original idea was right
• Define the right market segment
• Reveal the strategy really driving your product's success

Read the full story & subscribe here:
https://lnkd.in/eVgNPfHN

Open video: The Art and Science of Pivots – Livestream with VC Chris Tottman on michaelgoitein.substack.com

The Art and Science of Pivots – Livestream with VC Chris Tottman

Is modern business addicted to data in the wrong ways? Roger L. Martin believes the excessive reliance on analytics in business stifles innovation by overlooking creativity and empathy. In this piece, I use examples of the iPhone and Aeron chair that succeeded despite poor data predictions, and lay out how Roger advocates for a focus on imagination solutions and community engagement over data.

Open article: Why The World’s Leading Strategist Says Data Is Killing Your Product’s Future by michaelgoitein.com

Why The World’s Leading Strategist Says Data Is Killing Your Product’s Future

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The Battle

Richard Russell

Michael Goitein

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Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Richard Russell's LinkedIn Performance

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Performance ScoreRichard Russell's LinkedIn Performance