Leadership Elephant

It turns out that most negotiations are over even before they begin. The team that has spent the most time planning for the negotiation, doing their homework, and collecting the data that they'll need is the one that's going to walk away from the table with the best deal. Wouldn't you want that team to be your team? Planning is what happens before you sit down at the negotiating table. There are no negotiating tactics or tricks at play here. It's just a matter of you doing your homework.

At the heart of what it means to be a product manager lies the ability to market your product. No matter if you are trying to get people inside of your company to provide you with the resources or funding that your product needs in order to get out the door or if it's customers that you are after, you've got to be able to paint a picture of your product that makes people want it.

The job of a product manager is made even more difficult by the simple fact that it really does not come with any clear instructions on how to do it correctly. As product managers we are constantly searching for ways to become better. One of the things that every product manager quickly realizes is that their career success is very closely tied to the financial success of their product.

Congratulations - you are an IT manager and you've been given a budget to work with. Oh, oh, now what? Oh, and if you're going to want any money next year, you had better learn how to ask for more money. This budget stuff can be tricky. The fact that we talk about budgets using a vocabulary that most IT managers probably don't have (or at least don't use every day) makes it just a bit harder.

When you find yourself in a leadership position, you'll want to make the most of it. This means that you want to be viewed as being both powerful and effective. In order to make this happen, you need to have a good understanding of what leadership is really all about.