"two core tenets: 1) understanding people’s desires, and 2) understanding how people react to things"

"Thinking about the ways in which your first impressions of a new app are formed helps you better understand an app’s value proposition and marketing, and what the team behind it is doing—either implicitly or explicitly—to create that kind of impression"

"most opinions of a product are formed within the first few minutes. A quick run-through gives you a sense of whether the app actually provides value, is easy to use, and feels well-crafted"

"Getting additional perspectives is one of the quickest ways to learn about what works and what doesn’t in the broader market. Read reviews. Read comments in blogs. Read tweets about this app"

"There is no shortcut to developing better product instincts besides keen and close observation."

"Great experiences doesn’t just happen by happenstance. The best designers and product thinkers know people. They understand what motivates and what delights and what intrigues."

"It just has to happen because you’re curious, over and over and over again. Because you want to learn how to build good things."

"The problem you’re trying to solve should be easy to communicate in a sentence or two and resonate with someone from your target audience. If not, consider that a big red flag."

"What typically separates successful and unsuccessful teams is not whether they do things that fail (this is guaranteed), but how well they can consistently execute."

"When exploring solutions for a particular problem, go broad before going deep. Brainstorm 10, 20, 50 solutions for the problem before getting into the mindset of picking a “winner”. The first 5 ideas will be the obvious ones. Creativity happens when you start to explore the 11th, 20th, or 50th idea."

"If you’re presenting a product plan and someone asks “have you considered trying X instead?” and your answer is “No,” that is a red flag that your exploration process was not rigorous enough."

"You should constantly be looking for ways to short-circuit vetting your hypothesis. Can you run your idea by some people on the street and see if it’s understandable?"

"Define what success metrics look like for your product before you launch. Otherwise, if you try to interpret results after they start coming in, confirmation bias will lead to a non-objective reading."

"If you find yourself constantly getting into debates with your teammates about product direction, the root cause is probably a disagreement in the way you’re measuring success. See if you can articulate your concerns in the form of a new proposal to measure success."

"Good communication is the key to a healthy team. Every member of the team should feel like they can safely express their viewpoints, even if those views are contrarian."

"One approach speaks to the value for the end user. The other approach focuses on what the company needs to do to be successful. Designers generally think and operate in the mindset of the user."

"the more senior a designer, the more frustrated they’ll be if they do not fundamentally agree with the vision or strategy of the product."

"The most direct path to a designer’s heart is to care about the details."

"What’s your one-line summary of what this app does at this stage?"

"what features or experiences will resonate with people and become successful—is about two core tenets: 1) understanding people’s desires, and 2) understanding how people react to things."

"How did this app come to your attention?"

"What’s the buzz so far?"

"What’s the experience of getting started or signing up?"

"How does this app explain itself in the first minute?"

"How easy to use was the app?"

"How did you feel while exploring the app?"

"Did the app deliver on your expectations?"

"How long did you spend using the app?"

"most opinions of a product are formed within the first few minutes. A quick run-through gives you a sense of whether the app actually provides value, is easy to use, and feels well-crafted."

"How often have you used the app? When do you tend to use it? What compels you to open it?"

"How does this app compare to other similar apps?"

"What do other people think of this app?"

"Based on all that you know, how successful do you think the app will be a year from now?"

"(And eventually, after enough time has passed), were you right in your prediction of how this app was going to do?"

"Great experiences doesn’t just happen by happenstance. The best designers and product thinkers know people. They understand what motivates and what delights and what intrigues"

"They have strong theories about why any successful product or service is successful, and why any failed product or service has failed."

"If the audience you are building for is narrowly defined (and one that you are a part of), then you may be able to rely on your intuition to guide your product decision-making. If not, then you should rely on research and data to inform your decisions."

"A product succeeds because it solves a problem for people."

"The first step in building something new is understanding what problem you want to solve, and for whom."

"why is this particular problem worth solving?”"

"Good execution is about getting to believable conclusions in the shortest amount of time possible."

"Bad execution is when you try something that fails and a) you can’t really draw lessons out of that failure that would apply to a future project"

"b) it took you a year to learn a particular lesson when a smarter path would have let you learn the same thing in 3 months."

"When exploring solutions for a particular problem, go broad before going deep."

"Use empirical evidence to help you narrow down the best idea(s) out of the ones you brainstormed."

"You should constantly be looking for ways to short-circuit vetting your hypothesis."

"Once you have clear indication of positive signal on your hypothesis, don’t assume you need to rush to ship whatever you tested right away"

"Instead, make a separate, intentional decision about what the bar is for full launch when it comes to polish and additional functionality."

"If you’re embarking on a big project involving a lot of different changes, see if you can split up the changes into smaller, independently testable milestones."

"Do a team post-mortem after every project, regardless of success or failure. What product lessons did you take away?"

"How you measure success is critical to the long-term results of your team because it’s the thing that people rally around."

"Define what success metrics look like for your product before you launch."

"For each success metric, come up with a good counter metric that would convince you that you’re not simply plugging one hole with another."

"If an important metric moves unexpectedly, whether positively or negatively, your first question should be “why?”"

"Use the Crystal Ball technique to help you pick the right ways to measure success. Ask yourself “If I could know anything in the world about how people are using my product, what would I want to know to in order to tell me whether or not my product was successful?”"

"Your goals should always be set with the best information you currently have."

"If you work on a team where you don’t understand or agree with how the team measures success, bring that up right away."

"If you find yourself constantly getting into debates with your teammates about product direction, the root cause is probably a disagreement in the way you’re measuring success."

"If you are trying to figure out whether your product has product-market fit (versus trying to optimize or scale), you’re better off goaling on retention (how many people use your product and then love it enough to come back?) rather than on engagement or of users."

"Teams that fall in love with a problem have more successful outcomes than teams that fall in love with particular solutions."

"This is because knowing that a problem is worth solving continues to be motivating even when a team doesn’t come across the right solution on the first, second, or Nth try."

"Always assume best intentions. I mean, at the end of the day, everyone wants the same thing — to build something great."

"Diversity of opinions is how you get the best results."