My friend Art Petty writes Too Many Projects Chasing Too Few Resources:

Learning how to say "No" and how to say "No More" are two of the most difficult lessons for a maturing organization.

In particular, Art comments:

The firm that failed had developed such an inbred culture of selling development commitments to make sales that all sense of strategy was lost in the never-ending chase to fulfill.

It doesn't take long before selling development commitments turns into 'selling more than we can deliver'. And 'selling what we cannot deliver' isn't far behind. Like Icarus, these "anything for a sale" companies seem to fly high--but only for a while.

One point I often make is this: deals outside of your market segment are always a bad idea. But invariably someone brings up contract revenue. For enough revenue, many companies will do anything.

The issue isn't contract revenue; the issue is market revenue. Not "can you sell it?" but "can you sell it again and again?" With limited resources--and isn't that the case for all of us--you must focus your efforts on delivering complete products in markets where you can be the dominate vendor.

"I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member." -- Groucho Marx

Lately we've been renting from Enterprise to save $5. I've had two or maybe three car rentals so far--and today I received my "Enterprise Plus" membership.

Honestly, joining the elite Enterprise car rental club seems quite a non-distinction.
They said, "to activate your account online, visit enterprise.com/activate" and I got:

"It's just one more Plus that makes renting easy." -- Jim Runnels, Sr VP, Enterprise Rent-A-Car.

Yeah, right.

Product Beautiful's Paul Young, along with Pragmatic Marketing's John Milburn and others will lead Austin's first ProductCamp. ProductCamp is a collaborative, user-run event focused on Product Management and Marketing topics (see a description of the recent Silicon Valley P-Camp, if you are not familiar with BarCamp events). Paul writes,

ProductCamp Austin will happen on Saturday June 14th. Right now we are lining up sponsors and venues, and are focused on planning and execution. We need your help. No ProductCamp or BarCamp can be planned by one person. Thankfully I already have several people who have raised their hands as willing to step in and help shoulder the load, like John Milburn, Roger Cauvin and Rob Grady.

If you're in the Austin area this June, you'll definitely want to participate.

My friend Bill wrote,

In our class, you told an amusing story relating to poorly designed user interfaces. The example you used was pay-at-the-pump card readers, where the user has to interpret some convoluted diagram to insert the credit card properly, so that the mag-strip is read.

I pulled into a gas station today and sure enough the pump had the exact card reader technology you described. But, my purchase experience was not without the required dissatisfaction. I accidentally selected the wrong fuel grade. On every gas pump I use, the grade choices are listed sequentially from left-to-right from lowest to highest octane. Not this pump, this pump had the choices in the exact opposite order: far left was highest octane, instead of economy, which I wanted to purchase. I selected high octane by mistake.

I wonder sometimes if stuff like this is poor design and/or poor implementation--or if it's a trick to sell more premium gas. The left pump is always the cheapest; it's a de facto standard. And now you feel cheated. This thinking got them an extra $1 this time but you'll never return to this station so they lost a customer for lifetime.

As a serial entrepreneur, my friend David has learned a few lessons about running a company. He shares his experiences with the world of startups on his blog. In the importance of knowing your sales process, he comments,

Regardless of the type of business you have I think it's really important to understand in a reproducible way how to sell your product or service.

Before you hire the first sales person, someone with both product and sales savvy should define a repeatable sales process--or at least a straw man of one. Much of typical sales methodologies is really product management methodology: define the personas, identify their problems, and craft a clear message (ie, positioning) to help them choose your solution. Follow a process to move someone from a prospect to a satisfied client. Write the process down and that's the basis of your internal product training.

If you've ever attended sales methodology training, you know that the best sales people take this repeatable approach to selling.

"How do I get my executives on board?"

It's a fairly common issue with product managers. After taking a Pragmatic Marketing course, they can see the value of being strategic; they even have some practical techniques for implementing change. But how do they get the message to colleagues and executives?

How 'bout sending them an ebook?

Over the years I have been asked frequently for help selling the idea of product management. This ebook is one that I've wanted to write for quite a while. Download The Strategic Role of Product Management: How a market-driven focus leads companies to build products people want to buy.

The ebook explores how product management can be the focal point for product strategy, explains the difference between product management and product marketing, and shows how the role can add value in both traditional and agile environments.

Share it with your friends and colleagues. Post it on your company’s intranet. Pass it around the office. Print off a couple of copies to leave in a public area. Blog about it.

In 2008, we're going to be bringing many new tools to help sell the strategic value of product management to your executives. Keep watching this space.

The typical product manager is dealing with dozens--or hundreds--of emails every day. John Care offers some very effective techniques for dealing with emails.