Why Leaders Shouldn’t Eat Last
Even if you haven't read the book Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek, you might have seen the title. And if you are a product leader, chances are you believe in servant leadership or the fact that you should prioritize your team’s happiness, health, and motivation above your own.
This is all too common of a scenario—many managers cut back on their own training and development, preferring to allocate the time or budget to their team instead.
If this is you, I appreciate your thoughtfulness (and hopefully your team does, too). But I must respectfully tell you to cut it out. Neglecting your own professional development doesn't help anyone in the long run.
Here’s a hypothetical example from my book, STRONG.
Imagine that you own a soap-making company. On your own, you can make 15 bars of beautifully handcrafted soap each day. You hire two employees who are not quite as skilled or efficient as you, so they each make five bars a day. This is not bad—you’re now producing a total of 25 bars a day or 350 bars over a two-week period. You could carry on in this manner indefinitely and maybe it would be “good enough.”
But what if you took some time to train your employees and teach them some of your tricks? On the day you conduct the training, everyone’s productivity would go down. Let’s say you could only produce six bars that day and each of your employees could produce three. But after the training, with their new skills, your employees can now each produce ten bars each day.
And even if you aren’t quite as productive yourself (perhaps you need to do quality control, handle invoices, or manage some other part of the business), you are still able to produce ten bars each day. Within a two-week period (including the day of training), you’d be able to produce 402 bars. That’s a 15% improvement in production! And let’s not forget that you may have freed up some time for yourself to further invest in your business.
The soap bar empire illustrates how quickly professional development can pay off
To explore this example further, see Chapter 1 of STRONG, “Your Role in This Game.”
As a product leader, your own output (plus your ability to explain core concepts and train and coach others) and that of your team is not quite as easy to measure as bars of soap. But you can imagine that the same concept applies. Taking just a little time to invest in your own development can have a substantial impact on your team’s performance.
Product leaders who develop themselves personally, maintain an active network in order to think outside the box and learn from others, and are willing to try out new things can create a successful team and develop each person in the best possible way.
What does this look like in practice? Here are a few ideas for professional development for product leaders.
Attend product leadership events like the ones Mind the Product is organizing. I’m curating their Hamburg Event, which will take place in September 2021.
Find a handful of fellow product leaders you trust (maybe at such an event) and share your struggles and questions with them. If they’re open to it, maybe you can commit to a regular cadence of conversations.
Start or join a local product leadership community.
Read a book specialized in (product) leadership. Of course, I’d love for you to check out my book, STRONG, or of any of the ones listed here.
Get yourself a product coach (learn more about my group coaching packages here) or attend a workshop that is specialized in product leadership.