Connect, share and be inspired by a community of people who understand exactly what you're dealing with.
Being a Chief Product Officer (or similar) can sometimes feel like a lonely gig. You may not have many peers to learn from and share stories with (in NZ there were less than 160 of you in 2023) and there is widespread confusion about what you do!
Which is why I created CPO Connect!
CPO Connect is for anyone who;
We meet online every 2 weeks to discuss a range of topics related to Product Leadership. Drop in as often as you can.
If this sounds like you then we'd love to hear from you!
(it's free!)
You're all busy, so all drop-in sessions are recorded.
You won't be able to view any of the recordings below until you are approved as a member. Email tokes@andrewtokeley.com if you're a member being denied!
What happens if the promise of products like Lovable, to ultimately remove the need for engineers, comes true? Do we all become Product Managers? And if everyone is, is no-one?
Great conversation about how we're using tools like Lovable now and what we expect to see in the future.
Melissa Firth has been working with a couple of companies recently working on product packaging. She's keen to share her approach and some learnings. Which is great, cause we want to hear it!
Great group today with some shared stories of how we've approached starting in a new job. Building trust, developing relationships, learning, sharing and lots more - get stuck in!
Making the most of having Vidya Dinamani back in Wellington for a while - you may have heard Vidya speak at last year's Product Aotearoa Conference, read her book Groundwork: Get Better at Making Better Products or tuned in to her podcast, Product Rebels - she is full of amazing insights and a lovely human :)
Following a great thread on our Product Aotearoa Slack, we dropped in to talk about the importance (or lack) of the names product people are given.
We've often read that being a CPO is a great training ground for becoming a CEO, but in NZ it's a fairly rare occurrence. But they do exist and today we're super fortunate to have Simona Turin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/simonaturin) join us to discuss her journey to becoming the recently appointed CEO of academyEX after spending almost 2 years as AskNicely's Chief Product and Experience Officer.
We're super lucky to have Sandra Davey (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandra-davey) join us in this session to discuss what's happening in the Australian product market. Sandra's product career began in the 90's and since then has been a PM, product leader, board director, board chair and since 2015 has worked as an organisational facilitator, coach and consultant at Organa, a collective of likeminded Australian business leaders.
A great discussion on how product teams are enabled, motivated and structured - lots of good challenges and different ways of thinking about this topic!
Another Question and Experiences session. Today our questions are posed by Hannah and me and we're talking about building a product practice and communicating with boards.
This session is all about showcasing how product, and other functions, are represented in different company org charts. Who reports to who, what roles have been defined, what's working, not working...
Thank you Lydia, Tana, Tim and Matt for sharing how you do things where you work :)
Question and Experiences sessions are all about posing a question to the group and, rather than recieving advice, you get other people's experiences dealing with similar issues.
Today we're exploring Handling Uncertainty (Matt), Getting (Engineering) S@1T Done (Lydia) and Communicating Roadmaps (Shane).