Weekly Product Hits: Being Teachable, Playing Defense, Dogmas
Product Hits: September 29, 2025Every week, I share three great product resources from a variety of perspectives. Let's dive in! Growing a Teachable Spirit by Elaine Chao Elaine Chao, Director of Product at Adobe, draws on her martial arts training to show why humility and curiosity are core to product management. She argues that PMs who stay teachable build sharper instincts, since structured feedback loops and openness to learning reveal insights that ego might otherwise block. Playing defense by Wes Kao Wes Kao, co-founder of Maven, explains how to hold your ground when ideas are questioned. She suggests PMs share the “why” behind their choices to build credibility, and use pushback as a chance to reinforce trust and leadership. Dogmas: can unspoken truths limit innovation? by Francesca Cortesi Francesca Cortesi, founder of Prodotto Collective, warns that hidden dogmas can quietly block progress. From rules like “we never deploy on Fridays” to rigid assumptions about customers, she argues that PMs need to spot which truths create stability and which ones are holding innovation back. Behind the ScenesHey there, it’s Clement! One trap I see PMs fall into is equating the volume of decisions with the quality of decisions. We’re making calls all the time: what to build, what to cut, how to respond to feedback. But if the quality of those calls isn’t improving, then higher volume just means more mistakes… and often the same mistakes, made again and again. That’s why I keep coming back to journaling. On the surface, it feels like “extra work.” But, in practice, it creates a lightweight feedback loop for your own judgment. By writing down decisions, the context you had, and the outcomes that followed, you turn a dizzying blur of decisions into a body of work you can actually learn from! Looking back at my own notes in a past quarter, I noticed a pattern I wouldn’t have seen otherwise: I kept saying yes to small feature tweaks. Each one seemed high-value on its own, but together they crowded out time for bigger bets. Without the journal, I probably would’ve chalked up the slow progress to “bad luck” or “unexpected technical complexity,” instead of recognizing how my own decision style was shaping the long-term outcome. Ready to give it a shot? Here’s what journaling can look like in practice:
You don’t need a special tool. A doc, a notes app, or pen and paper works fine. The value is in the habit, not the format. Done consistently, journaling turns a stream of small decisions into compounding insights! With love, Let's do more together!
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Product Teacher
In-depth essays and thought-provoking reads for product managers.
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