deanpeters/product-manager-skills

Create an initial, assumption-based persona profile that synthesizes available user research, market data, and stakeholder knowledge into a working hypothesis about your target user. Use this to align teams early in product development, guide initial design decisions, and identify gaps in understanding that require...

Guide product managers through creating a customer journey map by asking adaptive questions about the actor (persona), scenario/goal, journey phases, actions/emotions, and opportunities for improvement. Use this to visualize the end-to-end customer experience, identify pain points, and create a shared mental model...

Determine whether your SaaS business model is fundamentally viable and capital-efficient. Use this to calculate unit economics, assess profitability, manage cash runway, and decide when to scale vs. optimize. Essential for fundraising, board reporting, and making smart investment trade-offs.

Guide product managers through creating a user story map by asking adaptive questions about the system, users, workflow, and priorities—then generating a two-dimensional map with backbone (activities), user tasks, and release slices. Use this to move from flat backlogs to visual story maps that communicate the big...

Guide product managers through creating Jeff Gothelf's Lean UX Canvas (v2) —a one-page facilitation tool that frames work around a business problem to solve , not a solution to implement . Use this to align cross-functional teams around core assumptions, craft testable hypotheses, and ensure learning happens every...

Quick reference for any SaaS finance metric without deep teaching. Use this when you need a fast formula lookup, benchmark check, or decision framework reminder. For detailed explanations, calculations, and examples, see the related deep-dive skills.

Provide the canonical facilitation pattern for interactive skills: one step at a time, with clear progress, adaptive recommendations at decision points, and predictable interruption handling.

Guide product managers through calculating Total Addressable Market (TAM), Serviceable Available Market (SAM), and Serviceable Obtainable Market (SOM) for a product idea by asking adaptive, contextually relevant questions. Use this to build defensible market size estimates backed by real-world citations, economic...

Assess whether your product work is "AI-first" (using AI to automate existing tasks faster) or "AI-shaped" (fundamentally redesigning how product teams operate around AI capabilities). Use this to evaluate your readiness across 5 essential PM competencies for 2026 , identify gaps, and get concrete recommendations on...

Conduct a systematic analysis of macro-environmental factors—Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental, and Legal—that could impact your product or project. Use this to identify external opportunities and threats, inform strategic planning, assess market entry risks, and make data-driven decisions...

Create a visionary press release following Amazon's "Working Backwards" methodology to define and communicate a product or feature before building it. Use this to align stakeholders on the customer value proposition, clarify the problem being solved, and test if the product story resonates—treating the press release...

Evaluate and propose AI product solutions using a structured canvas that assesses business outcomes, customer outcomes, problem framing, solution hypotheses, positioning, risks, and value justification. Use this to build a comprehensive, defensible recommendation for stakeholders and decision-makers—especially when...

Guide product managers through discovering and articulating product positioning by asking adaptive questions about target customers, unmet needs, product category, benefits, and competitive differentiation. Use this to align stakeholders on strategic positioning before writing PRDs, launch plans, or marketing...

Guide product managers through selecting the right Proof of Life (PoL) probe type (of 5 flavors) based on their hypothesis, risk, and available resources. Use this when you need to eliminate a specific risk or test a narrow hypothesis, but aren't sure which validation method to use. This interactive skill ensures you...

Create or update PM skills without chaos. This workflow turns rough notes, workshop content, or half-baked prompt dumps into compliant skills/ /SKILL.md assets that actually pass validation and belong in this repo.

Guide product managers through evaluating whether to scale, test, or kill an acquisition channel based on unit economics (CAC, LTV, payback), customer quality (retention, NRR), and scalability (magic number, volume potential). Use this to make data-driven go-to-market decisions and optimize channel mix for sustainable...

Craft a clear, empathetic End-of-Life (EOL) message that communicates product or feature discontinuation, explains the rationale, addresses customer impact, provides transition support, and positions the replacement solution. Use this to maintain customer trust during difficult transitions and reduce churn by...

Define and document a Proof of Life (PoL) probe —a lightweight, disposable validation artifact designed to surface harsh truths before expensive development. Use this when you need to eliminate a specific risk or test a narrow hypothesis without building production-quality software . PoL probes are reconnaissance...

Structure the first 90 days of a VP or CPO transition as a diagnostic process, not an execution sprint. The single most common failure in senior product leadership transitions is acting before understanding — changing structures, replacing people, or announcing strategy before building the evidence base that makes...

Defines the two-axis mental model that distinguishes Director-level thinking from PM thinking: Altitude (how wide you zoom out) and Horizon (how far ahead you look). Use this to understand what actually changes in the transition, diagnose which transition zone is creating friction, and apply the Cascading Context Map...

Guide Directors and senior product leaders through the specific challenges of the transition to VP or CPO using adaptive questions and targeted coaching. Diagnoses where you are in the journey and delivers practical, lived-experience coaching calibrated to your situation — not generic executive advice.

Guide PMs and Directors through the specific challenges of the PM-to-Director transition using adaptive questions and targeted coaching. Diagnoses where you are in the journey and delivers practical, war-story-backed guidance calibrated to your situation — not generic leadership advice.