Anne T. Griffin

Got a tough product management question? I’m here to help. In the Dear Melissa segment of the Product Thinking podcast, I tackle your biggest challenges—whether it’s figuring out prioritization, aligning your team’s strategy, or navigating the complexities of scaling. If there’s something you’re stuck on, submit your questions at DearMelissa.com and I’ll share practical advice to help you move forward. Need a faster answer? Leave me a voicemail—I’ll make sure it gets top priority. #dearmelissa #askmelissa #productmanagement #productleaders #productstrategy

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Reflecting on some recent advising sessions, something I don't see talked about as much is how critical it is to have an incredibly strong, unified* Design leadership team in order to build an even stronger design team and product. Why this is so critical 👇 What I’ve seen happen when you DON’T have that unified Design leadership team: 1. Massive gaps in the user experience – Let’s start with the obvious one. When Design leaders are staying neatly in their corners and not communicating, the experience degrades pretty quickly. Especially where the "seams" of their teams/org are. We've all seen (and let's be real…probably have been guilty of at times) the navigation structure that clearly shows the org chart vs. what users actually need. This can happen way too quickly without that unified team. 2. A lack of Design’s ability to influence product direction — The best Design leadership teams work together, pushing each other, to have a unified perspective of what the big things are to tackle in the user experience that leverages the unique expertise of the Design functions, all the way from it being grounded in research, to it having a compelling narrative. When they have that unified perspective and are all consistently sharing that perspective, it is so much easier for cross-functional partners to understand and buy-in on it. 3. Design works against Design — When Design leaders don't have a shared perspective on what is important (both in the user experience and the culture), don't have the right level of visibility into each other's work, or even worse, when they don't have mutual respect for each other, it leads to the leaders (mostly) inadvertently working against the progress of the other leaders/teams vs. together toward a unified vision. 4. A limit to the flexibility and scalability of the Design team – To build great experiences at scale, having the flexibility of shifting people to focus on different parts of the product is critical. When the culture and processes are dramatically, instead of it being exciting for that person to focus on a new space, it is incredibly disorienting, slows everything down, and can quickly lead to burnout. *A note on when I say "unified". I don't mean at all that they agree on everything. In fact, the opposite. They push each other the most, early and often. However, they have shared respect, cultivated by their leader, and shared responsibility around aligning within a timely manner. THEN they support each other in any way they can with hurdles they may each face (e.g. cross-functional buy-in or team-wide communication). ——— Is this interesting? Let me know if you want me to share more on how exactly you can cultivate this strong design leadership team –OR– if you want more personalized advice around this, set up some time with me here: https://lnkd.in/g-vyymtW

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When you're collaborating with other team members during creating a feature, it should never be about your point of view winning. You are not the user or customer, unless you are writing the checks. It should be about alignment, user value, and customer value. Facilitation over creation.

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The title may appear intimidating, but the core message is actually very encouraging and exciting. We are entering an era of creators, whether we refer to ourselves as designers, engineers, or product managers. By mastering the power of AI, we can unlock a new level of autonomy in our ideation and creativity.

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🔥Hot Take for PMs: Please don't hand me a solution to a problem. Instead, focus on detailing the problem and help me understand the why. We will ideate and find a solution together. Next week, in our first episode of ⚫️Bounce, Claire and I continue to unpack the PD + PM working relationship. Buckle up. Subscribe today - links in comments 👇

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Have you ever been frustrated when managing stakeholders? If so, you are not alone. On The Intentional Product Manager Podcast episode 5 I chat with Bruce McCarthy and Melissa Appel co-authors of Aligned: Stakeholder Management for Product Leaders to figure out how to have less frustration and more impact. In this episode, you'll learn: 💡 Key Highlights: * Challenges in stakeholder management: Knowing when to say “yes” and “no” * Building rapport: Why understanding stakeholders is as important as knowing your customers * Communicating effectively: Strengthening relationships between product and sales team * Navigating difficult personalities: The surprising benefits of "mining for conflict" to foster alignment * Positioning for promotion: Building executive relationships and earning a seat at the table * Finding alignment: Mastering the "meeting before the meeting" for better outcomes 📖 Learn more about my guest’s incredible book Aligned: Stakeholder Management for Product Leaders and gain strategies to thrive in your career. 🎧 Listen now and level up! Podcast: https://lnkd.in/edMV_zb9 Youtube: https://lnkd.in/eJSMi6Aa

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I have a lot of empathy for the situation many UXRs find themselves in. They were told to collaborate, facilitate, "democratize", share, up-level, and invest emotional energy in helping teams get better. ...and then were the first to be let go during layoffs (often with public statements that took a not-so-thinly-veiled jabs at glue people, etc.) If you're currently hiring, I strongly suggest considering hiring a skilled UXR, especially given the complex nature of AI. There's a good chance they have a multi-disciplinary background and are the perfect person to help you unravel tough problems.

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Too many product people have been misinformed about what to focus on in your first 30 days in a new role. In a genuine attempt to add value early on, they end up creating a less-than-ideal first impression with their peers & stakeholders. For example, I‘ve heard advice that it is useful to look through user feedback and summarize it for your new team. Early on, when you have very limited context, this is *usually* a bad idea if no one has asked you to do it. There will be plenty of time to send user feedback summaries & takeaways & assign action items afterwards, but it is important to understand this general framework of what to focus on & what to avoid in your first 30 days: https://lnkd.in/gJKHHC-X

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📢 Shameless, excited plug coming! 📢 The Alpha Cohort of Manager Foundations begins next week, and I bet you or someone you know would benefit from joining us. Please share this with your networks or intro me to someone you think should know about it 💕 For: 🌟 Aspiring Managers in UX – inclusive of all disciplines 🌟 🌟 Folks stepping into Management for the first time 🌟 🌟 New-ish Managers seeking to firm up their foundations 🌟 Walk away with new tools to: 🚀 Create your Manager Profile 🚀 Lead with more Confidence 🚀 Delegate Effectively with Ease 🚀 Give Feedback that builds up 🚀 Design Weekly Systems to Scale It's a lot of value packed into four live discussions with a cohort of peers, a comprehensive Figjam with all these tools and more from me. Did I mention I ADORE that I get to work with ya'll to help Leaders in Design RISE to the level of their ambitions with more ease?! Let's do this. Link in bio, or DM with any Qs!

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Iterative design, parallel design, and competitive testing are three methods that improve UX quality by exploring and testing multiple design ideas; using them together is more effective than relying on a single approach Great article by Therese B. Fessenden: https://lnkd.in/geCb8sQN

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Teams thrive when leadership creates safe spaces for curiosity, authenticity, and pushing boundaries. In my career, I've prioritized fostering environments where designers can experiment, grow, and drive innovation through authenticity. For me, authenticity is not just important—it's essential. What defines your approach? What values shape how you show up? #DesignLeadership #Authenticity #OpentoWork

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Wrote a quick blog post about ways to define what a product is based on the mental model people might hold. https://lnkd.in/eAB5msSm

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Coining ‘enshittification’ is a good first step towards righting the ship. Now we can accurately describe the issue

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Andrew Hogan is spot on with this post. When functionality commodifies, the competitive landscape shifts to value. When value equalizes, the competitive landscape shifts to product design. And when product design converges, the only competitive arena left is emotion. It’s a progression every company and every industry goes through. You can see it in tech with Google competing on functionality, Amazon on value, and Apple on product design. What he’s suggesting here is that emotion become the only place left to go in a world where engineering is easily accomplished via AI, costs of production and distribution move to near-zero, and UI converges to known visual and interactive paradigms. A theory that feels 100% right to me. Personally I’m looking forward to it as I suspect — or at least hope — it will be a world where technology is working in service of humans more than the other way around. But we’ll see if it turns out that way. Heck, I remember when we still thought social media would bring us all together. 😳

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✨ Hot Take: If Hallmark can have Boss’s Day, why not an Org Designers Day? ✨ Think about it—org design leaders are shaping the future of work. They’re not just tweaking org charts; they’re reimagining how companies operate, how teams collaborate, and how culture thrives in an ever-changing world. This role isn’t just “important”; it’s becoming indispensable as businesses face complex challenges like hybrid work, AI integration, and rapid scaling. If Boss’s Day can exist, surely we can carve out a day to celebrate the visionaries who design the organizations of tomorrow. What do you think—should we make Org Designers Day a thing? Who’s with me? 💪 Drop your thoughts (or ideas for how we should celebrate) below 👇 #OrgDesign #FutureOfWork #Leadership

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Creative Resilience: 8 Strategies to Help You Thrive During Transitions

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If you are building a tech product that involves addressing things like harassment, discrimination, or mental health (at minimum), you *need to understand what trauma-informed means*. You need to consider this in your product development and deployment. This is a non-negotiable simply to mitigate the risk of doing deep harm to people. And no, having had an HR job does not qualify you as a trauma expert. This is a critical and specialized skill set.

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When people talk about the advancement of AI and how it's a revolutionary technology I can't help but scoff. Any technology built off the labor of bilked people is neither advanced nor revolutionary. It's just the continuation of a long tradition of colonialism, classism and racism and white supremacy. The fact is, the "ghost work," that currently is the standard of the AI industry is a choice not a necessity. We do not have to power AI with stolen content or slavery. Companies who claim things like - meritocracy, safety, and trust - are really doing the opposite when they insist on devaluing the labor of "ghost workers." If AI was so smart, so revolutionary, so advanced then why do we use archaic, outdated and unilaterally wrong-side-of-history ways to power it? Riddle me that.

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