When I joined Imperva – a cybersecurity company – I had no cybersecurity background at all. Naturally, I relied on the very talented people at the company to share their insights with me. I asked so many questions, that I was surprised anyone still wanted to talk to me. Just kidding, of course, they were all very nice and happy to help. After a while, I started feeling more comfortable in the cybersecurity world and was able to talk intelligently about my product and the market.

Feeling comfortable with making tough decisions was a different story though, and it took me a while to get there. I remember that at some point, I was debating with the CTO and Co-Founder – one of the best cybersecurity experts I know to date – whether or not we should do something. Our approaches to this specific area were completely different. Now, he is the co-founder of the company, let alone a world-known cybersecurity expert. Who am I to even say anything differently? Luckily, Amichai is a very nice person to talk to and also appreciated an intelligent discussion.

The discussion helped us clarify the many things that we do see eye-to-eye on, but left the one thing that we didn’t agree on very clear. We both tried, but none of us convinced the other person that their approach is the right one. At some point, it felt like the discussion was futile. Frustrated, I muttered, “so now what?” I didn’t know that Amichai’s response would make such a big impact on my entire professional life. He simply said: “you are the product lead, so you decide”. Very simple, very powerful, very generous of him, not at all easy to do.

Today I want to touch on a specific aspect of this challenge and give you some perspective that will hopefully help you make your decisions more confidently.

Product Is a Shared Creation

Before we get to a solution, we need to talk about the roots of why this challenge is so common. It has to do with the fact that the right way to build your product is to truly collaborate with almost everyone in the company. They all have an opinion about the product – and they should. They all want to impact the final outcome – and they should. You work very hard to hear them and keep them involved – just as you should.

The thing is that the fact that they need to be involved, doesn’t mean that they get to call the shots, or that you must adhere to everything they say. Just like Amichai told me – you are the product leader, so you need to decide.

Making tough decisions, especially when you couldn’t get a consensus, is extremely difficult. It’s not only the decision itself that is objectively hard most of the time but the process as well. Being able to tell even yourself that you disagree with the CEO, for example, is not trivial. And while acknowledging that to yourself is an important step of the way, moving from that and into actually taking the decision and moving forward seems nearly impossible.

Or at least it is until you get the point I’m about to make.

Product Thinking Is Hard

“But they read the requirements before we implemented! How come they only raise this now when the product is ready?” 

If this quote sounds familiar, you are not alone. I have seen so many frustrated product leaders facing a similar situation. It can be with your CEO or anyone in the management team, with internal and even external customers, and honestly, with anyone important enough for their opinion to matter and make you change your plans.

The thing is, that in the effort to work collaboratively and have everyone join our shared creation, we often give our stakeholders more power than they truly have. And to make it worse, the stakeholders themselves simply don’t know that that’s the case, so it’s on you to set the boundaries right.

The mistake that I often see and causes all of this, is that when you work with your stakeholders you treat them as if they were product people. You share with them as openly as possible and expect them to engage in the discussion and contribute as if they are equal partners. Partners who know how to define products. Unfortunately, as talented as they are, this is usually not the case.

While product thinking is very hard to define and explain in a few words, it is a real thing. Thinking like a product leader takes years to do well, and your stakeholders simply don’t have that experience. Letting them debate product requirements with you as if they were product managers will never work (we’ll see in a minute what will). Sending them documents and asking them for feedback is a great collaboration tool, but don’t expect them to give you their full insights this way – they simply don’t know how to do that since they usually don’t think this way.

Think about it: to imagine what the final product would look like and to be able to understand whether or not it would address the pain you are trying to solve, understand all the details of it and make sure they fit well together, etc. is an extremely difficult task. We, product people, are trained to do that, but we can’t expect others to do the same if they are not trained the same way.

Treat Them Like Customers

The good news is that you already know how to work with people who have an opinion, even a say, about the product, and are not product people. I’m talking about your customers. When you interview customers, you always need to convert what they said (e.g. “faster horses”) into what they really need or want (e.g. “to get to places faster”). Unless you are a project company, or in very rare circumstances with strategic customers, you are not going to negotiate the product requirements with them on paper. You are also not looking for their sign-off, but rather for their feedback. In discussions with your customers, it is very clear who makes the call, and you know how to give them what they really need and keep them happy without giving them control over the product.

That’s the foundation of real product collaboration. While technically the CEO can tell you what exactly they are looking to see in the product, most CEOs I know don’t want to do that, even when they tell you very explicitly what they have in mind. Instead, sharing with you the details of what they imagine is simply their way of letting you into their world. They are not product people, so that’s how they know to talk about the product. It’s feedback, an invitation for discussion (from my experience, even when it doesn’t sound like it at all), and almost never orders to be taken.

Start treating the product conversations with your stakeholders the same way you treat similar discussions with customers. You want to hear everything they say. You want to make sure you fully understand where they are coming from. You want to make sure you get what they need, and if you don’t think they need it – ask again until you are convinced or have found an alternative solution that is acceptable to both you and them. But don’t ask them to make the product decisions for you, either explicitly or implicitly. 

You are the product leader for a reason, don’t let others do your job. Even the hard parts.