The Documentation Paradox: Why Great Product Ops Gets Ignored
- S6E78
- 10:07
- March 25th 2026
Three product operations leaders expose the uncomfortable truth behind product ops failures — and it's not what you think.
Jennifer Bronson has spent years building documentation and Notion spaces teams asked for — then never used. The fix? Treat product ops like a product. Build with your users, not for them.
Karin Cross-Smith reframes everything with one brilliant metaphor: driving a car. You don't think about starting the engine or reversing the driveway — you just get to the coffee shop. That's what great PLM should feel like. Invisible, frictionless, essential.
Amanda Herbert adds the final piece: sometimes it's not a skill gap at all. When teams consistently underperform, the problem is often the system they're operating in — not the people.
Key takeaways:
• Stop building for PMs. Build with them.
• The best governance is the kind nobody notices.
• Training completion rates mean nothing. Measure behaviour change.
• If the system is blocking the behaviours you want, no process fixes it.
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