For those immersed in the Silicon Valley ethos of tech, winning is growth, making something cool, and making money, in roughly that order.
There are approximately seven gillion podcasts, videos, and blog posts that contain some dude (let’s face it, almost always a dude) explaining how "venture-backable" businesses work, and countless descriptions of the tactics platforms like Amazon, Uber, and Facebook used to dominate both their competition and their allies in the obviously highest goal of becoming market autocracies. AND YOU SHOULD TOO!
Product people are by definition at the heart of tech strategy. The PM's job is often described with the classic 3-Circle Diagram of Business, Engineering, and UX. We are supposed to be finding the way to optimize all three. But the push for growth, which gets portrayed as natural and unquestionable, has led to the abandonment of good principles for all three areas in various ways.
We're starting to have a kind of reckoning with our collective behaviour, though probably not soon enough. In the social media world, we're learning the real consequences for literal democracy, mental health, and privacy. In general, tech has accelerated our race to exploit natural resources, has widened inequality, and created a depressing layer of surveilled low-income work.
In 2017, Marty Cagan proposed an updated risk matrix for Product solutions that included Desirability (Do people want it?), Feasibility (Can we build it?), Viability (Does this support our business goals?), and Usability (Can people understand the solution?). Teresa Torres, author of Continuous Discovery Habits, proposes another risk, Ethics (Ethicality?) - "Is there potential harm?" Including ethics as a risk is a step in the right direction, but other than in industries where compliance has a voice in product decisions, how much is this risk explored?
What if we had a kind of Hippocratic Oath for Product Managers?
What if we as PMs actually bore some responsibility to society for our actions? (I mean, what if corporations’ legal and social obligations were enforced? is probably the real question, but this is a thought experiment).
At the Integrity Institute, where Trust & Safety professionals come together to advance the protection of the social internet, our members sign the Integrity Oath:
Be Selfless
Put the public interest first.
Do your work for the right reasons. Do not chase status or glory for its own sake.
Be Honest
Make sure to tell the truth about your work and its implications.
Be Constructive
Give credit where it is due. Lead with alternatives and new approaches rather than only pointing out flaws. Work well with others.
Be Conscious
Integrity workers have access to immensely powerful systems. We work in the public trust. Use this power responsibly.
Be Protective
Remember that your first job is to protect the public, especially the weakest amongst them.
This is a stressful job. Often, it involves taking a stand for what's right, instead of what's easy. We must look after each other. Protect your fellow integrity people, keep them safe, make sure they have the support they need to thrive.
Be Fair
Do not use your position to favor one group above others. Do not allow any partisanship to affect your work, except for being a partisan for the practice of integrity.
Do not focus on one company when the dynamic you are describing is common to the industry as a whole.
Be Kind
Be a good person. Be nice. Care about others.
The Product Oath
Imagine that product people took a similar vow. Perhaps it would include things like:
Look to the long-term health of the business and the people it serves, not just ways to grow quickly
Consider the effects of what you choose to build on the ecosystem, the communities around customers, and people in the supply chain, not just customers and investors.
Support the people you work with across disciplines to raise important considerations for sustainability, both of our business sustainability and that of living systems
Consider the implications of your product on people who are marginalized, don't limit your research or personas to people who have power and status
Don't build without participation and collaboration with people who use your products and services.
Don’t be an a**hole. (I mean, seriously, guys)
I am sure there will be pushback and objections to this idea. For one thing, we know that PMs have "all of the responsibility and none of the authority."
Can product people actually hold true to principles in the face of fearsome CEOs, marketers, salespeople, engineers, or whoever else we might believe will never let us make choices that are ethically sound without also being like, "AND it will help us grow?"
And maybe even more scary, can we maintain ethical boundaries when people roll their eyes and imply that we simply must be weak-minded, lifestyle-business approving, un-rockstar hacks if we don't think it's worth it to set aside our morality to win?
If we want to live in a world that isn't a trailer fire in the next 20 years, we have to start considering the possibility that standing up for something isn't just 'right,' it's a step towards creating solutions and solving problems in just the ways product people love and value. Work backwards from the world you want to live in and you'll probably find that PM ethics is on the roadmap.
*Venn Diagram by Martin Eriksson, Skeleton photo by Tara Winstead, glassholes from KnowYourMeme