About Product Beautiful
Product Beautiful is a blog about Product Management and Marketing created by Paul Young. Product Beautiful readers are people who love products and services, can’t stand to leave a problem undiscovered, and appreciate products that are well thought out.
About the Author
I started Product Beautiful because in my career I have seen many examples of products and services that should never have gone to market. Products that were built because the CEO liked the idea, or a Development team redirected at the last minute to build a new feature because a large customer screamed loud enough. These tactical and emotional decisions can kill the potential of a company because they ignore the customer.
Fortunately I have also been able to be a part of some great teams which have enabled me to learn, observe, and hone the process of bringing products to the Market.
I completed my undergrad work at The University of Texas at Austin, and received a B.S. in Radio-Television-Film. I decided that I didn’t want to go to L.A. and make my career in film, so I taught myself programming and caught on with a local network management service provider called NetSolve.
NetSolve was acquired by Cisco Systems in 2004. I worked in various Product Management and Marketing roles for Cisco’s Security and WAN managed services for the next several years before leaving to become Director of Product Management at a startup in Austin working on network based audio, video, and entertainment products for homes and businesses.
Early in my career, a manager sent me to Pragmatic Marketing’s Practical Product Management (with Requirements) training, who I credit with giving me the tools to understand the “right way” to do Product Management. I highly recommend this training to anyone interested in becoming a Product Manager, or for existing PM’s who want to polish their skills.
Today I travel and talk to customers trying to discover the next big thing for my little company.
When I’m not working, you can find me running, playing basketball, or going to a movie at the Alamo Drafthouse with my wonderful wife Mandy.
