Browse by Tags
All Tags »
Program Management (RSS)
Continued from tres ... After spending the first 12 minutes of a design interview for a program/product manager role in learning more about the user, requirements, constraints and scenarios, as per the design template , you could spend the next 30 mintues
Read More...
continued from dos .. Once the requirements are gathered, constraints are taken into account and the mental model of the user is understood, you would have laid a solid foundation to start talking about key user-types and the scenarios in which the product/object
Read More...
Continued from uno .. I'll attempt to describe the notions of "mental model" and "affordances" in this quick post. Our mind constantly picks up pre-conceived notions and expectations about certain things. Mind assumes certain object to have a particular
Read More...
I've received a few notes from friends to explain the my template for answering a design question in further detail, so let's use one of the cliche interview questions to walk through my approach of answering design questions in Product/Program manager
Read More...
Three years ago, I asked myself and several of my mentors within and outside of Microsoft - "What's the closest thing to entrepreneurship at Microsoft?" The unanimous answer was - "Become a Program Manager on a product that's about to grow/explode!!"
Read More...
In spirit of the ongoing TechEd conference, I thought this would be an interesting post.. I've been to six conferences in the past year and have organized a few mini-conferences here and there in the past. I've been always fascinated to learn about people's
Read More...
As a bootstrapping entrepreneur, if you have $100, you would first give them to your lawyer, then to your accountant, and then lastly to your market researcher. Facebook launched polls recently, which enables the users to quickly and cheaply($5 basic
Read More...
If you are going to read only one book on design during your lifetime, my recommendation will be to read - The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman . This book has been instrumental in shaping some of my own approaches to design and I'm sure it
Read More...
Design has essentially become one of the key competitive advantages of the killer apps of Web 2.0. Why has design become so important - all of a sudden? Or was it always important? Scott Berkun once said that the best user interface is "no" user interface.
Read More...
Emails have become the official means of recorded conversations in corporations. At Microsoft, a typical program manager writes an average of 30-40 emails every day and reads many more. It would certainly help improve productivity, if the emails are crafted
Read More...
I religiously admire Apple for its proven ability to consistently come up with terrific designs. Desin is the sole reason as to why Apple has been able to enjoy the price premiums over competitors. Other companies that I admire for great designs include
Read More...
A bunch of my friends and readers have asked me about "the" interviews for a program management position at Microsoft. Having being involved in several program management interviews, I'll try to write about the preparation that I would recommend for anyone
Read More...
How to conduct threat modeling meetings effectively? Prepare: Make sure that the participants have had enough context about the feature/component. Have about 3 reviewers who are NOT part of the component/feature team, to get an outsider’s perspective.
Read More...
In the design section, I will share my design philosophy, learnings and tips. I recently saw a recording of a presentation with the title: Creating products that people love. I use some of these principles to design the products in Real-Time Collaboration.
Read More...
Chris Pratley (a Group Program Manager in Office) had described his personal experiences about the role of program management, almost two years ago on his blog. This post has helped a lot of new (and wannabe) program managers(including me!) at Microsoft,
Read More...
