Making Better Bets: A Field Guide to Product Strategy with Andrew Skotzko

“Be more strategic” is advice every product leader has heard. But knowing what to actually DO? That's the hard part. Join us for an early look at *The Strategy Cycle*, the new book from product leadership coach Andrew Skotzko, which is a practical guide to turning a messy set of research, goals, stakeholder opinions, and competitive pressure into a real product strategy. Andrew frames strategy as a theory of winning, expressed through a cycle of bets. Plans, roadmaps, and goal lists all have their place, but a real strategy gives them direction and makes planning season suck a lot less. Mind the Product founder Martin Eriksson says the book shows you what to do on Monday morning—and “what to do in week 7 when the strategy is quietly falling apart.” Andrew will walk through the two halves of the cycle: Craft the strategy. Start with a two-page strategy sketch, distill what’s really going on in your market, name the challenge that matters most, and define why customers will choose you and keep choosing you. Then turn that into a portfolio of bets with a clear line between what’s in and what’s out. Live the strategy. Crafting the strategy is only about 40% of the work. The rest is deploying it, keeping it alive when shiny new things start arriving in week two, and evolving it as you learn.