5 Common Biases in Product Management (and 188 more on a magical linkable infographic)
https://chrisjterrell.com/
Sometimes you find something so cool that you have to share it. For example, I found “The Cognitive Bias Codex,” which is the coolest thing I have seen in a long time.
It is a list of 188 Cognitive Biases broken down so elegantly that I might spend all day letting my inner Psychologist run wild. The list breaks the biases into four categories, their subcategories, and the individual biases name. Below is a list of the four major categories and the subcategories I commonly run into as a Product Manager. If I were you, I would skim this next section and go to the link below to this fantastic page.
What we should remember
We discard specifics to form generalities.
A PM’s job can be weird as you hop from the high level and back into the weeds. It feels like I am a yo-yo as I dig into the tech specs with my development team only to hop back into the general business reasons. The challenging part of this bias is that getting your feature funded requires that you “Sell” the generalities of the feature, but to ship the feature, you have to know enough to “Execute” all the specifics.
Too much information
We notice when something changes.
Ahh, yes, this one is fun, and it usually comes out right after a release note is mailed out. Here is how it plays out. You deliver an outstanding feature, and someone notices a known bug that has been around for two years. The funny thing about the bug is that no one has mentioned it for a year and a half. Thank you, “Anchoring Effect.”
Need to act fast
We favor simple-looking options and complete information over complete ambiguous options.
Have you ever been in a meeting and thought, “I think they oversimplified this.” You then raise your hand and ask, “What about this or that.” Death stares come from all over the room, and you remember that the talk is about general strategies and not details of execution (which is hard)
Not enough meaning
We think we know what other people are thinking
I ask many seemingly dumb questions like “What problem are we trying to solve” and “Who does what, and what system do they do it in.” I am shocked at how often I misunderstand someone, or what I thought they were saying was completely different than my original assumption. Ask lots of questions. It will make your life easier, and counterintuitively people will think you are more intelligent when you ask dumb questions.
I hope you enjoy this infographic as much as I did. Here is the link.
