Summary
No doubt you’ve heard of empathy mapping– the simple, yet powerful tool often employed by product teams to attain a deeper understanding of what their customers think and feel in order to deliver a better user experience. In this interactive, two-part activity, we’ll put product managers in the place of the customer, mapping the motivators, external and internal influences, and actions that make them tick. By the end of this exercise, you’ll have gained insights into who your PM is, and how you can best connect with them! Note: Part 2 of this activity will take place during the second half of the day.
Key Insights
-
•
Empathizing first with product managers, not just end users, enhances cross-team collaboration.
-
•
Product managers struggle with balancing competing priorities set by executives and stakeholder demands.
-
•
Influence without formal authority is a core challenge for product managers in driving execution.
-
•
Using empathy maps to detail what product managers see, say, do, and feel surfaces nuanced understanding.
-
•
There is often a tension between product managers and designers over roadmap inclusions and prioritization.
-
•
Categorizing features into exploratory, validation, and quick fixes helps clarify discovery and delivery workflows.
-
•
Product managers face pressure to deliver on time despite often lacking sufficient resources.
-
•
Collaborative digital tools with features like voting, highlighting, and real-time reactions foster engagement in empathy exercises.
-
•
Breaking down assumptions into direct quotes helps make empathy maps more concrete and realistic.
-
•
Synchronous activities followed by asynchronous affinity mapping help teams refine insights and prioritize improvements.
Notable Quotes
"It’s so important to not seek control, but understanding."
"Putting product managers in the place of the customer is a great first step towards collaboration."
"Managing competing priorities with product strategy execution is tricky."
"Product managers influence without formal authority, carrying a lot of pressure and accountability."
"This work does not fit our product program."
"Almost all designers have this story of wanting something prioritized and being told it’s not on the roadmap."
"Everyone is trying to get something onto the roadmap without worrying about the impact on other priorities."
"Categorizing new features into exploratory, validation, or small fixes helps everyone see what needs to be addressed differently."
"Product managers aren’t tyrants blocking doors but people under pressure with limited ability to force action."
"It’s important to capture quotes directly to make empathy assumptions more specific."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Knowledge multiplies the more it’s shared, it’s not a zero-sum game where someone loses power."
Jemma Ahmed Steve Carrod Chris Geison Dr. Shadi Janansefat Christopher NashDemocratization: Working with it, not against it [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series]
July 24, 2024
"You need sponsorship from senior leadership but also buy-in from all corners of the company to succeed."
Nina JurcicThe Design System Rollercoaster: From Enabler and Bottleneck to Catalyst for Change
October 3, 2023
"If your organization is healthy, the haters pretty quickly get marginalized when everyone else is excited about the design system."
Nathan Curtis Nalini P. Kotamraju Jack Moffett Dawn ResselDiscussion
June 9, 2016
"Measurements are always a conversation; they should not be a covenant imposed on you, especially when you’re trying something new."
Saara Kamppari-Miller Nicole Bergstrom Shashi JainKey Metrics: Comparing Three Letter Acronym Metrics That Include the Word “Key”
November 13, 2024
"The sum of parts is not always the whole — we lost sight of the mental model in our employee record feature."
Malini RaoLessons Learned from a 4-year Product Re-platforming Journey
June 9, 2021
"We are not collecting vanity analytics here, this data is doing real work informing design decisions."
Mackenzie Cockram Sara Branco Cunha Ian FranklinIntegrating Qualitative and Quantitative Research from Discovery to Live
December 16, 2022
"Slack is where most of the conversation about the content of the conference is going to be had."
Bria AlexanderOpening Remarks
June 9, 2021
"Growth boards meetings are aimed around being very honest about the health of your product."
Jackie HoLead Effectively While Preserving Team Autonomy with Growth Boards
January 8, 2024
"Design is about cultural imagination, not just problem solving."
Dan HillDesigning for the infrastructures of everyday life
June 4, 2024
Dig deeper with the Rosenbot
How did Tristan Alani first get involved in green software and sustainability at Intel?
How can UX professionals take action to decarbonize digital services if they lack dedicated climate projects?
What are effective strategies for recent grads to enter UX roles with limited professional experience?