Book Review - Productize – The Ultimate Guide to Turning Professional Services into Scalable Products by Eisha Tierney Armstrong

READ: 2 mins

AUTHOR: Eisha Tierney Armstrong

REVIEWER: Robert Craven

I was curious about this book, for myself and for some of my clients. I have been on several productize journeys, so I was fascinated to read more on the subject.

Quite quickly you realise that its focus is large professional service firms rather than small, independent ones. However, the principles still hold.

It is an excellent overview and covers things that will happen as you attempt to productize, if in an adult manner.

In true teacher mode, the book tells you what it is going to tell you, tells you and tells you what it has told you. They could have saved 20 or 30 pages by not being quite so repetitive.

In essence, it says three things:

  • Think big, start small

  • Follow urgent, expensive problems

  • Be fearless

It then drills down by identifying the key mistakes people make and how to overcome them

  • Mistake: starting too big

  • Solution: the productize pathway

  • Mistake: focusing on process before people

  • Solution: creating a product-friendly culture

  • Mistake: favouring core business rather than new products

  • Solution: align to support innovation

  • Mistake: developing products that don’t solve an urgent, expensive problem

  • Solution: define the right problem

  • Mistake: designing and developing in a vacuum

  • Solution: co-design and develop

  • Mistake: fear of cannibalisation hinders sales and marketing

  • Solution: launch boldly

  • Mistake: stopping at the MVP (Minimum Viable Product)

  • Solution: manage and iterate

It does cover its claimed topics

  • How to shift your culture to embrace a product-mindset

  • The capabilities you need to be successful and whether or not you should acquire them or grow them internally

  • How much money to invest in exploring and building more scalable solutions and products

  • How to ensure there is a viable market for your product idea

  • How to sequence investments in new product development

  • How to successfully source and work with developers and data scientists

  • How to inexpensively test your ideas before investing in development

  • How to win the hearts and minds of your sales team to ensure your new products are commercially successful

  • Real-Life Case Studies: featuring professional services leaders who have successfully led their organizations to create more scalable services and products

  • Bonus Tools, Templates & Resources: To help your team implement the tactics so you don't have to start from scratch (download the tools here).

The links and toolkits are useful.

The identification of major mistakes is useful.

This book is like a grown-up part two of Eric Ries’ Lean Start-Up (MVPs, pivots and all that jazz). Less preppy, less hyperventilating and more considered.

Would I recommend it? Yes, to anyone going down the productize route.

Does it give you the answers, templates and checklists I was hoping to see? No

Is it a useful springboard for your thinking? Yes

Will it save you money? Yes. It will get you thinking about the road ahead and what potholes are lurking there.

My biggest takeaway: “Follow urgent, expensive problems”. Blindingly obvious but you’ll hear me saying that a few times in the next month or so. It was worth the price for that one quote.

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