Avoiding the 'Feature Factory' Trap with Partho Ghosh

Partho Ghosh is a customer-centered, data-informed product executive and GM who specializes in B2B SaaS, MarTech, product-led growth, and creating measurable product processes that lead to efficient growth and market fit. He is the VP and Product & General Manager at SecurityScoreCard, the global leader in cybersecurity ratings, response, and resilience. He also serves as an advisor for OpenView, through which he advises on product-led growth. Before working at SecurityScoreCard, Partho served as a general manager for Hootsuite. Partho holds a Bachelor’s of Business Administration, Business Management from British Columbia Institute of Technology.

Partho joins me today to explore the “feature factory” trap and how having a clear product management lifecycle can help avoid it. He emphasizes the importance of future thinking in product management decisions, even when dealing with short-term revenue goals. He outlines his philosophy on product management and the “Build, Measure, Learn” principle. Partho also highlights the value of having a data-informed mindset and offers advice to product managers seeking leadership support.

“I’ve always used ‘feature factory’ in a negative connotation, but that might be unfair if you’re a scaling start-up. Founders need revenue growth, profitability, and to make ends meet.” - Partho Ghosh

This week on Innovation Talks:

• Partho’s background as a business analyst, his transition into product management, and diving into B2B SaaS
• The challenges of testing and validating the effectiveness of a free-to-sales motion in the self-serve space
• The importance of future-thinking in product management decisions
• Navigating organizational changes and cultural shifts
• Careers as marathons and the evolving nature of the professional journey
• The need for continuous learning in product management
• Embracing generative AI and how customer expectations around AI have changed
• The transformative nature of technological advancements
• Partho’s product development process and lifecycle
• The “Build, Measure, and Learn” philosophy
• The value of rooting decisions in data and why companies need to invest in analytics capabilities
• Experimentation beyond split testing
• Overcoming challenges in measurement and learning
• Allocating resources to data analysis and promoting a data-informed mindset
• The crucial role and challenges of collaboration within a product team
  
  

Resources Mentioned:

• Miro
• Figma
• Book: Testing Business Ideas: A Field Guide for Rapid Experimentation (The Strategyzer Series) by David J. Bland and Alexander Osterwalder
  
  

Connect with Partho Ghosh:

• SecurityScorecard
• SecurityScorecard on LinkedIn
• SecurityScorecard on Instagram
• SecurityScorecard on Facebook
• SecurityScorecard on Twitter
• Partho Ghosh on LinkedIn
  
  

This Podcast is brought to you by Sopheon

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