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Mind the Product

Product Management

Three world-class product speakers to look forward to at INDUSTRY

Guest Post

What I learned from building products in Africa

B2B product management

Artificial Intelligence (AI) & Machine Learning (ML)

Building Product Teams

Business Strategy

Data Driven Product Management

Digital Transformation

Diversity and Inclusion

Minimum Viable Product

OKRs

Prioritisation

Product Design

Product Research

Product Development Process

Product Ethics

Product Discovery

Product Leadership

Product Management Career

Product Strategy

Stakeholder Management

🌎 <a href="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/world-product-day/" style="color:#FFFFFF;text-decoration:underline;">Happy World Product Day!</a> Be sure to celebrate product, yourself, and your peers today! 🎉

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I've been in the digital industry for over 10 years and have worked across small and large charities, as well as my own freelance projects. I am now Director of Digital at the sector leading creative agency William Joseph. 

Having been at Cancer Research UK for the last four years, I have been able to work on high volume, high profile campaigns such as Race for Life, Dryathlon and the much-quoted #nomakeupselfie. 

In that time I helped drive forward the charity’s digital product and marketing capabilities to be some of the most respected and successful in the sector. 

I'm always excited to work with other organisations, share expertise and swap cat gifs. Give me a shout!

Director of Digital

James Gadsby Peet

In this #mtpcon London keynote, Kate O&#8217;Neill, founder of <a href="http://www.koinsights.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">KO Insights</a>, considers the question: How can humanity prepare for an increasingly machine, tech and data-driven future?
<h4>Key Points</h4>
<ul>
<li>We need to prepare society for an increasingly tech and data-driven future</li>
<li>We must build products that create meaningful human experiences now and in the future</li>
<li>To avoid the unintended consequences of our decisions, we must ask ourselves difficult questions throughout the product design process</li>
</ul>
Kate begins by explaining that, as robots become commonplace, we need to think about how we design products so that they can be kind, thoughtful and useful. This, she explains, will require intentional choices from product managers and constant questioning of how we can we prepare humanity for an increasingly tech and data-driven future.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-18007 aligncenter" src="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-1024x683.jpg" alt="Kate O'Neill talks at mtpcon London" width="1024" height="683" srcset="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-300x200.jpg 300w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />
In addition, she explains, this work must be done with an understanding that while the physical and digital worlds connect through the data captured in human experiences, most of these experiences are curated by businesses and are designed to meet business objectives. This is a truth we have to accept because business is &#8211; and will continue to be &#8211; the only way products reach the mass market.
As a result, we need to align business objectives to human outcomes if we’re going to create a purposeful, meaningful human experiences at scale.
<h2>Meaning is What Matters, Innovation is What Will Matter</h2>
Next, Kate focuses on the word &#8220;meaning&#8221; and its importance to product managers.
As humans, she says, we tend to seek meaning in everything we do. In fact, we focus on it and puzzle over it regularly.
She describes the many different layers to meaning and what they can give us when we create experiences.
She suggests using these ideas as questions:
<ul>
<li>What matters?</li>
<li>What is going to matter?</li>
</ul>
These two truths, posed as questions, can help us to interrogate and assess the experiences we’re putting out into the world.
<h2>Experience at Scale is Culture</h2>
Kate also discusses how, with the new technologies at our disposal, the decisions we make with our products will have far greater consequences than we currently have to consider.
In fact, she claims that as we make our choices about how tools and technologies will operate in the future, we impact culture.
To demonstrate, she uses <a href="https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&amp;node=16008589011" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Amazon Go</a> stores as an example. These stores have been built in such a way that people can’t help others get their groceries from the shelves. This she says, is a good example of how our choices impact culture &#8211; in this case, the Amazon Go model can have an impact on how helpful society is going to be as a whole.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-18006 size-large" src="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-2019-1024x683.jpg" alt="Kate O'Neill talks at mtpcon London 2019" width="1024" height="683" srcset="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-2019-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-2019-300x200.jpg 300w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-2019-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-talks-at-mtpcon-London-2019.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />
<h2>Designing Integrated Human Experiences</h2>
To start, we need to step away from terms like user experience, customer experience, patient experience, and guest experience, because we are all of these things. Instead, we need to think about all the contexts that someone will interact with our products and what will be significant. This will help us to create more integrated human experiences.
The next step is to consider how the experiences we create are algorithmically optimised and automated and have some sense of <a href="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/5-machine-learning-lessons-for-product-managers/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">machine learning</a>. We therefore need to ask ourselves how can we create meaningful automated integrated human experiences.
Kate shares some guidelines:
<ol>
<li>Don’t just automate the menial &#8211; automate the meaningful</li>
<li>Automate empathy</li>
<li>Use human data respectfully</li>
<li>Reinvest gains from automation into humanity and human experiences</li>
</ol>
And a few questions you can ask to avoid unintended consequences:
<ul>
<li>How will this impact culture at scale?</li>
<li>How will this impact brand at scale?</li>
<li>What is the purpose of the experience we’re rolling out?</li>
<li>What will happen if this product is successful beyond our wildest dreams?</li>
</ul>
Another good place to start is to use the <a href="https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/?menu=1300">UN’s Sustainable Development Goals</a> as a way to set your strategic visions. There are plenty of business opportunities which can help to address these most important challenges for humanity. In fact, if you’re not using them, you’re probably not future-focused enough.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-18008" src="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-on-stage-at-mtpcon-London-1024x683.jpg" alt="Kate O'Neill on stage at mtpcon London" width="1024" height="683" srcset="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-on-stage-at-mtpcon-London-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-on-stage-at-mtpcon-London-300x200.jpg 300w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-on-stage-at-mtpcon-London-768x512.jpg 768w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-on-stage-at-mtpcon-London.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />
<h2>Diverse Perspectives Will Make Inclusive Experiences</h2>
In conclusion, Kate explains, if we keep asking ourselves what matters and what will matter, with the right people in the room, then we will build more meaningful products that make the world a better place. Our aim should be the best future for the most people possible.
To download a copy of Kate&#8217;s keynote slides visit <a href="http://www.koinsights.com/mtp-download/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">www.koinsights.com/mtp-download</a>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-18010" src="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-sketchnotes-form-mtpcon-London-1024x724.jpg" alt="Kate O'Neill sketchnotes form mtpcon London" width="1024" height="724" srcset="https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-sketchnotes-form-mtpcon-London-1024x724.jpg 1024w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-sketchnotes-form-mtpcon-London-300x212.jpg 300w, https://www.mindtheproduct.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Kate-ONeill-sketchnotes-form-mtpcon-London-768x543.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />
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core/freeform

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How to keep your head about generative AI (when everyone is losing theirs) by Claire Woodcock

Designing Meaningful Human Experiences by Kate O’Neill

James Gadsby Peet