PMF doesn't exist

Product-market fit doesn't exist.

It's a myth we tell ourselves to feel like we're on the right track.

“Agile” suffered the same fate (at least there's the agile manifesto that exists). Started as a working philosophy, ended up a bingo word. Everyone says they have PMF. No one can show you where it lives. They just point to a vibe. Some traction. A few good months. A round that closed fast.

“We've got it!” Based on what? Revenue? Retention? NPS? Survey? Gut feeling?

The phrase has become a catch-all. Founders claim it when growth feels easier than usual. Investors expect it before writing a cheque. But there's no standard. No scoreboard. Every product is different. Every market reacts in its own way. What looks like PMF for one company might be a dead end for another.

Product-market fit isn't something you find. It's something you feel.

And sometimes, you just hope you're right.

Feedback Timing

Feedback delayed is feedback diluted.

After two weeks, the lesson goes cold. Details fade. Emotions disappear. What could've been a clear moment becomes a blur.

You try to explain what went wrong. Or what went right. But the context's gone. The person nods but doesn't feel it. They can't replay the moment in their head. The energy's moved on.

Feedback works when it's fast.
“In that meeting just now…” hits different than “Remember that thing two weeks ago?” One feels sharp. The other feels vague. Fresh feedback still has signal in it. Wait too long, and all you're left with is noise.

Don't hold it back. Say “great job” when the win is fresh.

If something was worth noticing, it's worth saying. Right now. Say it while the moment's still alive.

Prompted Vision

That gut feeling - that AI-generated art doesn't feel like yours - comes from a shift in how we define creativity, not a lack of it. But creativity has never been about tools.

Photographers don't build lenses. Filmmakers don't engineer cameras. Designers don't invent Figma. Yet no one questions whether their work is “theirs.” Because their fingerprints are all over it - what they chose to include, exclude, highlight, or distort. Intent is the signature.

AI doesn't change that. The interface got smarter. You're choosing the vibe, the story, the style, the framing. That's direction. That's creation.

If anything, AI just exposed how addicted we were to the romantic struggle of the process.​ But real creative work is about judgment, not just labour. You made the call. You made the thing.

It's yours.

Or is it?

Sketches to Magic

Yeah, everyone's talking about ChatGPT image generation online - and I get it. It's addictive and pretty entertaining.

One of the cooler ways to use it is by turning a rough sketch into something way more polished.

Here's one of my early, messy drawings I made for the “Cultivate and Cut” post. I always meant to come back and clean it up but never got around to it. So I asked ChatGPT to turn it into an illustration - and honestly, the quality blew me away.

Here's my (ugly) original drawing:

A morning run. Half-marathon with over 700 m of elevation. Three hours on the legs.

That's not just training - that's mental conditioning. This was another brick in the UTA50 wall. Quiet work. Honest effort. A long session that burns the calves and builds the mindset.

Pace doesn't matter when the elevation looks like a mountain range. What matters is showing up. What matters is stacking these efforts week after week.

You don't finish UTA50 on race day. You finish it here. In the sweat. In the silence. In the rain. In the Sunday slogs when no one's watching.

Make It Clear

Product Managers wait for clarity that never arrives.

They expect the strategy doc to have the answers. But nothing lands. Just more PowerPoint slides.

Because the higher up you go, the blurrier it gets. Goals get loftier. Language gets vaguer. No one wants to be wrong. So they delay, they decorate confusion with buzzwords. It feels smart but it isn't clear.

The best Product Managers don't wait. They start shaping. They turn fuzzy goals into concrete next steps. They don't chase alignment. They chase decisions. ​They poke holes (even when it creates discomfort). They write the draft no one asked for. They map the fog, not run from it.

Because anyone can follow a plan. But great Product Managers can make one. They stop asking “What's the direction?” and start saying “Here's what I'm seeing - poke holes in it”

Takeaways: From Jira Junkies to Profit Prophets

📘 Most product teams don't understand revenue. They know user needs, but not what closes a deal. They talk to customers, but rarely prospects. That's a big gap. Product decisions often ignore willingness to pay, sales pressure, and retention blockers - because they're seen as “someone else's job.”
📘 They moved from slow waterfall to fast Agile. But fast doesn't mean right. Shipping the wrong thing quickly just piles up tech debt and wastes money... read more

I had to....sorry, not sorry #ghibli

Quiet Leadership

Change doesn't come from a reorg or a new title on a slide.

It comes from the person who says, “This isn't good enough,” and then does something about it. Quietly. Consistently. Without waiting for permission. That's what standards are - choices made over and over, even when they're inconvenient, invisible, or unpopular.

The real power isn't in setting high standards. It's in holding them when no one's watching. When shortcuts are easier. When mediocrity is the norm. That's where most people cave. They look around, see no one else pushing, and assume it's not worth the fight.

But it is.

Every time someone sticks to their standard, it makes space for someone else to do the same. Not with big declarations, but with small acts of defiance against the average.

The more people who hold the line, the easier it becomes to draw a new one. Holding the line isn't easy - but a product management coach can support you in leading with consistency.

Stop Taking Orders. Start Shaping Work

Some tech teams think their job starts when the requirements arrive.

But that mindset turns them into delivery machines - waiting for Jira tickets like orders at a café. The real value isn't in ticking off tasks. It's in shaping them. Working with product managers, not for them.

Because PMs aren't there to write task lists. They're commercial thinkers. They're shaping strategy, pushing customer insight, and holding the big picture. They don't need followers. They need partners.

Do less: waiting for answers.
Do more: collaborating to understand the “why.”

That's how you build better products - and better teams.

Takeaways: Superhuman's secret to success

📘 The early Superhuman team did something most founders would find wild: they ignored most customer feedback. Not because it wasn't useful - but because most users weren't the right users. To find product-market fit, you need to make something some people really love. Not something everyone just kind of likes. This means identifying your "very disappointed" cohort - the people who would be devastated if your product disappeared - and doubling dow... read more

Went for a 15km run over the weekend and couldn't resist snapping a photo - Sydney really is a beautiful place.

Validation Comes After Launch

You can't validate a product with opinions.
People love to be nice. They'll tell you what you want to hear. “I'd buy that.” “Sounds awesome.” “I'd totally use it.” They're not lying to be cruel. They're trying to be supportive. But support doesn't equal commitment.
The second you ask for money, everything changes.
That's the gap most early teams fall into. They build confidence through conversation, then get blindsided when no one converts. The t... read more

Increasing Capacity by 37signals

📘 You don't need more people to do more work. Most teams slow down as they grow. Speed and capacity come from clarity, cohesion, and trust - not headcount. A smaller, sharper team gets more done with less.
📘 37signals runs 4 SaaS products with 60 people. Not long ago, they were at 80, and everything moved slower. Managing a larger team created more overhead, more layers, more drag. Back at 60, they're shipping more than ever. Two new products are... read more

Ditch Annual Reviews

Yearly performance reviews aren't good. You have probably seen neglected and outdated goals in performance reviews in your career. They become irrelevant pretty quickly. Worse, they do more harm than good.

The best teams ditch the annual review cycle. Instead, they focus on:

• Continuous feedback
• Small, actionable coaching
• Growth over grades
• Space for trial, error and mastery

Master small hills to conquer the peak

While preparing for UTA50 (total elevation 2.1km 😱) and doing some hill training, I looked at the elevation profile and got an idea for an illustration.
From this...

Accountability

Messy teams don't mean broken teams.

They're just growing. Growth kicks off the “storming” phase - overlaps, confusion, delays. Everyone's working hard, but everything feels slow.

That's not a motivation problem. It's an ownership problem.

When no one's clearly accountable, things fall between the cracks. Work stalls. Friction builds. Blame starts to creep in. But assign clear ownership - name, scope, outcome - and everything changes. Now someone's driving. Now someone's finishing.

Ownership creates motion. Shared responsibility sounds nice, but it rarely works. When everyone owns something, no one owns anything.

So make it visible. Write it down. Who owns what. Why it matters. When it's due.

That's how work moves forward. Not with good intentions. With clear accountability.

Make Feedback Obvious

People think they're not getting feedback.

But they are - they just don't recognise it.

A simple way to fix this? Make it obvious. Instead of letting feedback blend into daily conversations, label it: “Here's some feedback for you.”

That small shift makes a big difference.

From draft to finished

The point isn't to get it right. It's to get it moving. You shape, share, and sharpen through feedback. That's how the rough idea turns into something worth showing.
Start with a mess. End with a star.

Feedback That Builds

Feedback lands best when the walls are down.

But too often, it does the opposite. It raises shields. Because even when intentions are good, the words feel sharp. The tone feels off. And the brain - wired for survival, not nuance - reads threat where you meant support.

It doesn't matter how thoughtful or constructive the feedback is. If the other person is in defence mode, they won't hear a word of it. They'll hear judgment. They'll hear risk. They'll hear “you're not good enough.” That's why intention isn't enough. Clarity is what cuts through.

So be clear.

​Not in a vague, corporate tone. In plain language. “You're doing well. I want to help you do even better.” Or, “This is something I wish someone told me earlier in my career - I think it might help.” You're not correcting.

Feedback delivered too late becomes irrelevant or awkward. Deliver it while the moment's fresh and the actions are remembered. But always with context. Always with care.

Because the goal of feedback isn't to win an argument. It's to build someone up without them feeling torn down.

If you're trying to improve how feedback lands, a product management coach can help you practise framing it in a way that actually builds trust.

Frame it right, and feedback becomes a shield. Not a weapon.