Here at the Review, we're always on the lookout for people who are doing things a little differently. Whether it's why you shouldn't worry so much about regrettable attrition, the case for building minimum lovable products instead of MVPs, the argument that soldiers and chefs make the best PMs, or the charge to put price before product, we're always on the hunt for the pieces of advice that stand out and swim upstream against the currents of conventional thinking in tech.

Today's article will hopefully do just that. In product circles, you've likely heard the mantra "Product Managers are the CEOs of their product." The crux of this idea is that PMs need to be outcome-driven — taking a 30,000-foot view, rather than simply focusing on shipping software. But Tyler Hogge (VP of Product at Divvy) is quick to add a caveat here: "If your PMs aren't responsible for hitting revenue goals and their own P&L, calling them the product's CEO is nothing more than a bumper-sticker slogan."

This VP is Doing Things Differently in the Product Org — Here’s His Playbook

When it came to building out his own product org, Hogge borrowed from his previous career as a sales leader to rethink some assumptions. We first stumbled upon his playbook after he fired off a series of tweets back in 2019, he outlined his plan in a way that really caught our attention. Here's a quick overview:

• PMs own actual revenue number for products — sometimes jointly with the revenue team — which means revenue and product teams are much more tightly aligned.
• PMs have a variable compensation incentive tied to business outcomes (e.g. sales, revenue, ramp rate, contribution margin, CAC).
• PMs sell — they join sales calls, give demos, and often travel to onsite client visits.
• Product jointly with revenue owns the onboarding and signup for all new companies, and exclusively owns the signup and onboarding for all customers 0-20 employees (so sales can focus on larger deals). PMs have new customers and ramping spend goals tied to a monthly quota.
• PMs lead product reviews every two weeks, which are treated as a board meeting with the exec team and other key stakeholders.

When we sat down with Hogge, we wanted to get the inside scoop on what prompted this shift, and how each piece of this plan connects back to his overarching mission to build the most tightly aligned revenue and product teams in the world. It was also an opportunity for him to dive more deeply into addressing some of the "But how does this actually work?" questions — the ones where the answers don't easily fit into 280 characters.

You may not port over every piece of his framework over to your own product org — but we’re certain it will get you thinking.

Thanks, as always, for reading and sharing!

-The Review editors

Resources worth sharing: 

• We may not be working out of an office, but if imposter syndrome seems to have followed you home, here are twelve quick-hit tips for working through it (in 280 characters or less!) from Review favorite Dr. Emily Anhalt.
• There's a lot of content out there about starting out in your career. That's why we loved this article from HBR on reimagining your second act.
• One entrepreneur and Duke professor's take on a startup founder's most important job.
• Stripe Press sourced a list of books their authors can't put down this summer — check out their wide-ranging must-reads.
• The "Are we in a bubble?" questions always swirl around the tech industry. (For a fun throwback, check out First Round's own Josh Kopelman's blog about this back in 2007). In a new post, Shopify's Alex Danco frames that persistent question as he examines rolling funds.

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