Jocelyn Mangan, SVP of Product
Creativity Inc. has some great lessons for all teams who value creative work and working together with empathy, even though it was based around experiences in the movie business (Pixar).
Setting the Table: There are few people who “get it” like Former OpenTable board member and Union Square Hospitality Group founder Danny Meyer does. His view of his own company easily translates to all – companies are their people. His insights into this and how he hires, manages and develops people are inspiring.
Inspired: How to Create Products Customers Love is a foundational product book by someone who has lived it and is a great teacher – Marty Cagan. It’s one I like to re-read from time to time.
The Hard Thing about Hard Things is a recent read of mine, but one I come back to often. Great stories and tips on how to handle many hard things in business – hiring, firing, choosing what to work on, recovering when things are tough.
Elizabeth Casey, VP of Restaurant Product
The Product Manager’s Desk Reference has been a super helpful resource to me over the years. It’s a great book for new product managers, in that it covers just about everything you need to know about developing and launching products. It’s also a helpful reference for experienced product managers.
Corey Reese, Director of Consumer Product
Neal Gabler’s Walt Disney provides an inspiring look at the archetypical product entrepreneur. It describes Walt’s attempts to recruit his creative “product” team, the Nine Old Men, and the excruciating detail with which they executed their creative vision. During the production of Bambi, the team wasn’t satisfied with the initial animations of deer, so the creative team built a small zoo at the studio with a pair of fawns to study their movements first hand.
Miles Skorpen, Senior Product Manager
I work on our loyalty program, so Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational and John Paulos’ Innumeracy are quick- & must-read books. They help me understand why our diners make the decisions they do, how small incentive changes can swing behavior, and what these quirks in human psychology mean for the products we build.
Throughout my career in product management The Elements of Scrum has always been at my desk. It is an efficient and concise book, serving as a focused introductory guide to the role of a product manager.
