By Teresa Torres · producttalk.org · @ttorres on X · LinkedIn
Teresa Torres uses her annual January post to lay out Product Talk's plans for 2021, applying the same opportunity-solution methods she teaches product trios to her own business. She frames her desired outcome as increasing the number of trios that adopt a continuous discovery cadence, then maps the opportunity space across two branches: product leaders and individual contributors. She explains how she qualifies clients, refers some needs to other coaches, and built courses from her coaching curriculum. The post closes with her 2021 roadmap prioritizing scalable offerings and a progress update on her book, Continuous Discovery Habits. It is valuable as a transparent example of applying discovery thinking to running a product business.
01Key takeaways
- Start with a clear desired outcome, then translate it into something you can actually measure.
- Map opportunities in a tree before choosing solutions, and assess which branch to pursue first.
- Qualify clients on prerequisites like durable teams and outcome thinking, and refer out when they aren't ready.
- Repurpose existing curriculum into smaller, scalable products to serve more of your audience.
- Prioritize opportunities that are easier to scale in the short run when demand is about to spike.
02Key sections
- Starting with a desired outcome
- Torres sets her business goal as increasing the number of product trios working in a continuous discovery cadence. She notes this outcome is hard to measure, so it must be translated into something observable.
- Mapping the opportunity space
- She builds an opportunity solution tree with two branches: heads of product seeking discovery skills for their teams, and individual contributors wanting to adopt continuous discovery without organizational support.
- Qualifying and referring clients
- She learned that coaching teams lacking durable trios or outcome mindsets causes disruption, so she now screens prospects early and refers them to other coaches for those prerequisite needs.
- Building scalable courses
- Repurposing her coaching curriculum produced the Product Talk Academy courses and a workshop that later became a six-week virtual course, giving individual contributors and large teams cheaper entry points.
- 2021 roadmap and book update
- Torres prioritizes the easier-to-scale individual contributor offerings near term, plans to address the product leader opportunity later, and reports her book manuscript is with reviewers for a late spring or early summer release.
03From the post
“Happy New Year! I am excited to kick off 2021. For the past couple of years, I've used my January blog post to give an update on my plans for the year ahead and this year will be no different. You can find previous years’ posts here: 2019 and”
04Frameworks mentioned
Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.