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Product Thinking

What is Product Thinking?

Product thinking is a mindset that focuses on the holistic value a product delivers: understanding the problems users face, the business context, and how design decisions contribute to solving those problems while achieving business objectives. It extends beyond features and aesthetics to the complete product experience and strategy.

Use it when: you need to align design decisions with business outcomes, prioritise what to build, or avoid building features that don't create real value.

Copy/paste template

  • Why does this product exist? [one sentence]
  • What user problem does this solve? [specific, evidence-based]
  • How does it create value for the business? [revenue, retention, efficiency]
  • How will we measure success? [outcome metric, not output]
  • Is this the most efficient way to deliver that value? [yes/no + rationale]

Why Product Thinking matters

  • Prevents feature bloat and "solution in search of a problem" by starting with value.
  • Improves prioritisation by giving a clear framework for what to build first.
  • Aligns design, product, and business around the same outcomes.
  • Reduces risk of building things users don't need or that don't support business goals.
  • Helps teams speak the language of business and secure stakeholder buy-in.

What a good Product Thinking approach includes

Checklist

  • [ ] Starts with why (purpose) before what (features) or how (implementation).
  • [ ] Ties decisions to user problems and business outcomes, not opinions.
  • [ ] Defines success metrics (outcomes) rather than only completion of work.
  • [ ] Considers end-to-end user journey and product lifecycle.
  • [ ] Balances user needs and business constraints (cost, feasibility).

Common formats

  • Value proposition canvas: map user pains/gains to product features and value.
  • Impact mapping / OKRs: connect business goals to user actions and design work.

Examples

Example (the realistic one)

A team is asked to "add a chatbot". Product thinking reframes: "What problem are we solving? Support load, discovery, or something else?" They discover the real issue is users abandoning checkout. They prioritise fixing checkout friction and measure success by completion rate, not chatbot usage. The chatbot idea is deprioritised until there's evidence it would move that metric.

Common pitfalls

  • Feature-led decisions: building because stakeholders asked for it, without a clear problem or outcome. → Do this instead: insist on "what problem does this solve?" and "how will we measure success?" before committing.
  • Ignoring business context: designing in a vacuum. → Do this instead: involve business and tech early; understand revenue model, costs, and constraints.
  • Measuring output not outcome: celebrating shipped features instead of impact. → Do this instead: define and track outcome metrics (activation, retention, conversion) and tie work to them.
  • Short-term only: optimising for the next quarter at the expense of product coherence. → Do this instead: connect day-to-day decisions to a clear product vision and strategy.
  • Product thinking vs design thinking: Product thinking emphasises product value, business context, and why the product should exist; design thinking emphasises the process of solving user problems and innovation. Use both: design thinking for how to solve, product thinking for what to solve and why it matters to the business.
  • Product thinking vs feature delivery: Feature delivery focuses on building and shipping; product thinking focuses on whether what you're building creates value and aligns with strategy.

Next step

If you're defining what to build and why, use the value proposition and problem statement templates next. If you're prioritising, read MVP and user stories.

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