Great PMs know that prioritization is messy. It’s iterative. It’s human. And it’s deeply contextual.
Joe Fields
In product management, few rituals feel more structured, and more misleading, than the act of scoring opportunities. RICE, MoSCoW, weighted matrices: these frameworks promise clarity, objectivity, and alignment. But in practice, they often become performance art. A few tweaks to the weights, a couple of optimistic ratings, and suddenly the roadmap reflects what someone wanted all along.
This post isn’t about how to fill out a spreadsheet. It’s about what great product managers actually do when deciding what to build. It’s about the messy, human, strategic work of prioritization, where customer-led discovery, organizational momentum, and market timing matter far more than any numeric score. If you’ve ever felt that your framework was telling you the wrong story, you’re not alone. Let’s explore what it really takes to make smart, confident product bets.
Great PMs don’t begin with solutions, they begin with problems. And not just any problems, but those surfaced through rigorous, customer-led Product Discovery. This means conducting interviews, watching users struggle with your product, and immersing yourself in their workflows until patterns emerge.
It’s not enough to collect feature requests. You need to understand which problems are symptoms and which are root causes. That’s the essence of solving problems, not just building solutions. The best PMs develop an intuitive sense for what matters by staying close to user reality. This is where user research becomes a strategic asset, not a checkbox.
It’s not enough to collect feature requests. You need to understand which problems are symptoms and which are root causes. That’s the essence of solving problems, not just building solutions. The best PMs develop an intuitive sense for what matters by staying close to user reality. This is where user research becomes a strategic asset, not a checkbox.
“Fall in love with the problem, not the solution.” — Ash Maurya , author of Running Lean
Not every good idea deserves a place on your roadmap. The most impactful opportunities are those that reinforce your product’s core thesis. In Product Management, strategic coherence means choosing to do fewer things better, not chasing parity with competitors or reacting to the loudest customer.
This often requires saying no to ideas that are technically feasible or even customer-requested. If they dilute your strategic position, they’re distractions. Prioritization is not just about deciding what to build, it’s about deciding what not to build.
“The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.” — Michael Porter , Harvard Business School
Scoring frameworks rarely capture the full cost of building something. They might factor in engineering effort, but what about design bandwidth, QA cycles, customer support training, sales enablement, and ongoing maintenance?
Every decision to build is also a decision not to build something else. Opportunity cost is real, and often invisible in traditional frameworks. Great PMs think in terms of tradeoffs, not just scores.
“The biggest product management challenge is resource alignment... Having a deep backlog of well-prioritized projects is key to operating an efficient team.” — Ethan Hollinshead , Senior PM at Strava
Some opportunities look great on paper but are doomed in practice. Maybe they require skillsets your team doesn’t have, or cultural shifts your organization isn’t ready for. Maybe they’re technically feasible but lack internal excitement or executive support.
The best theoretical opportunity means nothing if your team can’t execute it well. Great PMs assess not just what could be built, but what should be built given the current organizational momentum.
“Each environment has its own unique culture, communication style, and energy… and sometimes, if you have the wrong fit, you can’t leverage the whole.” — Kareen Zahr (Walsh) , Strategic Momentum Podcast
Timing matters. Sometimes the market opens a window that won’t stay open long. In those moments, speed beats perfection. Other times, being second with better execution is the smarter play.
Prioritization isn’t static, it’s responsive. Great PMs understand when to move fast and when to wait. They read the competitive landscape and adjust their bets accordingly.
“The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.” — Mark Zuckerberg
Risk isn’t just about probability, it’s about impact. What’s the blast radius if this fails? Can you reverse the decision? Will you learn something valuable even if it doesn’t work?
Some bets are worth taking because they accelerate learning. Others could erode customer trust in ways that take years to rebuild. Great PMs weigh risk not just in terms of failure, but in terms of resilience and insight.
Not all customers are created equal. Building for users who can barely afford your product versus those who’d pay 10x for specific capabilities requires different strategies.
Understanding lifetime value, acquisition costs, and expansion potential by segment reveals which opportunities actually drive the business. Prioritization must be grounded in customer economics, not just customer volume.
“By analysing Customer Lifetime Value in conjunction with other key metrics, such as Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC), Product Managers can gain valuable insights into the overall health of the business, identifying which customer segments are the most valuable and why.” — The PM Repo
The most effective PMs don’t let metrics make decisions for them. They use data to test and refine their convictions, not to outsource judgment.
Prioritization is ultimately about pattern recognition, strategic intuition, and understanding the unique context of your product and market. Frameworks can support that process, but they can’t replace it.
“Without data, you’re just another person with an opinion.” — W. Edwards Deming
Product Management is not a spreadsheet sport. It’s a craft that blends customer empathy, strategic clarity, and organizational awareness. The scorecard might help you organize your thoughts, but it won’t tell you what to build.
Great PMs know that prioritization is messy. It’s iterative. It’s human. And it’s deeply contextual. They embrace that complexity, stay close to their users, and make decisions that reflect both vision and reality.
So next time you’re tempted to tweak a scoring framework to justify a roadmap item, pause. Ask yourself: are you solving a real problem? Are you building something that matters? Are you making a bet worth taking?
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