More Post-Job Musings

I woke with my head full of questions about the abrupt canceling of my product, trying to make sense of it. Since none of us were given exit interviews, this will serve as my thoughts as to why I’m now unemployed.

It was, and still is, a great product. None of the problems cited during our dismissal meeting were insurmountable. Either they were simply given to us to make us feel better about losing our jobs, or they reflected a profound lack of understanding of the product’s abilities on the part of upper management. Both of these options are concerning.

Had I had it to do over again, I would have insisted to be included in all strategic decisions on the product. When my former company was purchased, essentially no executives came with the deal to help guide it. All decisions were made at company headquarters by those who had not been “in the trenches” and perhaps did not truly understand the market. I’d been there for two years at the time of acquisition. I’d seen what the product could do. I’d witnessed people light up as they saw what it could do. I knew it was unrealistic to consider this the “mini-OpenView” that the executives envisioned.

Somewhere down the line, long before the layoff, upper management withdrew support for the product. We were spun off, in hindsight perhaps not to gain more independence but more to be “given enough rope to hang ourselves.” It might have provided a convenient excuse to kill the product.

The only way the product was being sold was through demos. This became the “high touch” sales process – another cited flaw. So why was this the only way to learn about the product? It never appeared on the company website in any prominent form. At the old company, a staff of just two marketing people got the product more recognition than the whole entire marketing department at my last company. The simple act of asking a few prominent websites to link back to us generated more marketing buzz than 90% of what the company ever did for us. It seems the company didn’t understand the market and didn’t care to understand it.

As time went on, I was not asked my opinion about many decisions. I soldiered on, hoping for the best, but in hindsight I should have been pushier. Though I was a newly-minted manager, I had a perspective unmatched in the company. The “Black Monday” meeting where the product was killed was an all-company meeting of managers. If I was there, I might have changed their minds.

As product manager, I know I would’ve turned the product around. Of that I am confident. No one asked for my ideas, and it was too late when I thought to volunteer. If the product’s braintrust had been invited to a few-day retreat to hash out how to correct the course, things might have been different.

I saw the iceberg looming yet placed too much faith in the captain’s ability to steer.

Of course, its all water under the bridge now (to use another waterlogged cliche). I don’t have illusions of reviving this product, the way I did before. I don’t think the company even considered selling it off, which is unfortunate because it leaves our existing customers in the lurch.

It is said that failure is a better teacher than success. If so, I must be getting pretty wise. For whatever reasons, we simply did not have what it takes to make this product successful. For a product once deemed “the future of the company,” it has been an inglorious end.