Book Review - Productize – The Ultimate Guide to Turning Professional Services into Scalable Products by Eisha Tierney Armstrong
READ: 2 mins
AUTHOR: Eisha Tierney Armstrong
REVIEWER: Robert Craven
I was curious about this book, for myself and for some of my clients. I have been on several productize journeys, so I was fascinated to read more on the subject.
Quite quickly you realise that its focus is large professional service firms rather than small, independent ones. However, the principles still hold.
It is an excellent overview and covers things that will happen as you attempt to productize, if in an adult manner.
In true teacher mode, the book tells you what it is going to tell you, tells you and tells you what it has told you. They could have saved 20 or 30 pages by not being quite so repetitive.
In essence, it says three things:
Think big, start small
Follow urgent, expensive problems
Be fearless
It then drills down by identifying the key mistakes people make and how to overcome them
Mistake: starting too big
Solution: the productize pathway
Mistake: focusing on process before people
Solution: creating a product-friendly culture
Mistake: favouring core business rather than new products
Solution: align to support innovation
Mistake: developing products that don’t solve an urgent, expensive problem
Solution: define the right problem
Mistake: designing and developing in a vacuum
Solution: co-design and develop
Mistake: fear of cannibalisation hinders sales and marketing
Solution: launch boldly
Mistake: stopping at the MVP (Minimum Viable Product)
Solution: manage and iterate
It does cover its claimed topics
How to shift your culture to embrace a product-mindset
The capabilities you need to be successful and whether or not you should acquire them or grow them internally
How much money to invest in exploring and building more scalable solutions and products
How to ensure there is a viable market for your product idea
How to sequence investments in new product development
How to successfully source and work with developers and data scientists
How to inexpensively test your ideas before investing in development
How to win the hearts and minds of your sales team to ensure your new products are commercially successful
Real-Life Case Studies: featuring professional services leaders who have successfully led their organizations to create more scalable services and products
Bonus Tools, Templates & Resources: To help your team implement the tactics so you don't have to start from scratch (download the tools here).
The links and toolkits are useful.
The identification of major mistakes is useful.
This book is like a grown-up part two of Eric Ries’ Lean Start-Up (MVPs, pivots and all that jazz). Less preppy, less hyperventilating and more considered.
Would I recommend it? Yes, to anyone going down the productize route.
Does it give you the answers, templates and checklists I was hoping to see? No
Is it a useful springboard for your thinking? Yes
Will it save you money? Yes. It will get you thinking about the road ahead and what potholes are lurking there.
My biggest takeaway: “Follow urgent, expensive problems”. Blindingly obvious but you’ll hear me saying that a few times in the next month or so. It was worth the price for that one quote.