About Andy Jagoe

Andy is the founder of Venturegrit and has 15 years of experience founding, funding, and leading venture funded startups. More about Andy's background. You can also find Andy on LinkedIn, Google+ and @andyjagoe on Twitter.

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Do You know Who’s Killing Your Word of Mouth?

Word of MouthThere are some products people can’t stop talking about. There are other products that no one notices. They are invisible.

Why is that?

People talk about Apple’s products for months before they’re launched. They even speculate on unannounced products that Apple might create.

When Apple launches a new phone, people stand in line at midnight to be the first to get it.

Samsung is Apple’s biggest competitor for mobile phones. When Samsung launches a new phone, no one notices unless they buy an ad during the Superbowl.

Why is that?

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5 Things Lady Gaga Can Teach Us About Creating a Remarkable Product

Have you ever worked for months on a product that achieved no success?

I know I have. And it’s incredibly frustrating.

What does it take to really succeed?

To build a product that is truly remarkable?

A product with raving fans?

A product with 25,000,000 Twitter followers and 50,000,000 Facebook fans?

As the most followed person on Twitter…

…with more than twice the number of followers as Oprah and 50% more followers than the president of the United States…

Lady Gaga can tell you.

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The Ultimate Guide to Product Manager Interview Questions

Great product managers score off the charts in listening, learning, leading, analyzing, anticipating and re-imagining. Among other things.

How do you interview for that?

Get it wrong and your new hire might be shifting your business into neutral. Or worse yet, reverse.

Problem is, there are no standard best practices for interviewing product managers.

You might have developed your own approach. But is it coordinated with the rest of the interview team? Or does each interviewer ask his or her personal favorite questions?

Are you sure your team is covering all the key areas with enough depth?

Or are you rolling the dice?

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Warning: Don’t Hire a Product Manager Without These Key Leadership Skills

Steve Jobs said that “no matter how smart you are, to be successful you need a team of great people“.

Do you surround yourself with great people?

The difference between a good hire and a great hire usually boils down to leadership.

Jack Welch said “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” Growing others is what great product managers do.

Are you hiring leaders? Here is an interview framework to help you know—with highlights of the most important product management leadership skills.

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What Everybody Ought To Know About The Product Manager Case Interview

What does it take to be the best?

The best product strategist? The best product designer? The best technical innovator? The best product manager?

Malcolm Gladwell would tell you it takes 10,000 hours of deliberate practice.

Problem is, no one tells you their “hours” in an interview. You have to figure out a candidate’s skills for yourself.

In product management, that’s far from easy. There’s no github code archive or design portfolio to look at. And how much of the candidate’s last product success was skill?

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Do Your Product Manager Interview Questions Always Get The Real Story?

Okay, show of hands.

Who else is tired of resumes that overstate accomplishments?

And as if overstatements aren’t bad enough—don’t forget about the blatant lies found on the resumes of some senior executives.

With 4.3 million results on Google for lying on resumes, it would seem that this is an epidemic.

As a hiring manager, are you protecting yourself?
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Do Your Product Manager Interviews Miss These Critical Analytical Skills?

You’ve always heard that you should hire the smartest product managers you can.

Some even say you should only hire people that are smarter than you.

But what does all this really mean?

Should you be trying to give candidates a verbal IQ test? Or should you be testing more practical problem solving?

What are the right questions to ask?

It is true, of course … you should hire the smartest product managers you can. And doing that well starts with a purpose-built interview.

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Give Me 3 Minutes and I’ll Make You a Better Interviewer

Ever notice that some people are better at getting a job than actually doing it?

These are the candidates who excel at interviewing, presentation and polish.

With their exceptional sales and communication skills, they present slick resumes and seem to say all the right things.

But when you hire them, they don’t produce. Not even a little. And sometimes you need to fire them.

How do you protect yourself against this?

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7 Warning Signs That Your Hiring Process Sucks

Admit it … you’ve wondered.

You’re hiring steadily, and it seems like you do what other companies do, but you’re just not getting results. Incoming resumes are at a trickle, the last offer you extended was turned down, and you’re having management issues with several new hires.

And you can’t help wondering …

Do you just need to be patient, and wait for the right candidates?

Or could it be possible that, in reality, your hiring process really sucks, and no one wants to say anything—or knows any better?

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The George S. Patton Guide to Winning the Talent War

Franklin D. Roosevelt called George S. Patton America’s “greatest fighting general.”

Hitler called Patton “the most dangerous man [the Allies] have.”

Though controversial, Patton achieved some astonishing and unsurpassed achievements in his day.

If you want to win the talent war…when sometimes it feels like it’s just impossible to compete…then look at Patton to see how he did things no one else thought could be done.

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