EP 123 - The Book "Aligned" with Bruce McCarthy and Melissa Appel
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Have you ever wished you had one book to learn from early in your career, and avoid many mistakes? We found one of those for product professionals, and this episode is all about that!

“Aligned: Stakeholder Management for Product Leaders” by Bruce McCarthy and Melissa Appel is a must read for every product person. It will help you understand the intricacies of stakeholder management, and put into action a plan to build a healthy relationship with your stakeholders, one that you need to nurture and grow in order to be successful in your job.On our first episode of 2025 we had the pleasure to meet with Bruce, Founder at Product Culture, and Melissa, Executive Product Management Coach at Product Culture, co-authors of the book.

In the episode, Bruce and Melissa shared with us how they each got to Product Management and eventually to write Aligned, who the book is for, how they approached writing it, and so much more!

Join Matt and Moshe as they learn from Bruce and Melissa:

• The challenges product people have with stakeholders, such as saying no, cultural and language differences, remote environments, etc
• Tools to establish rapport with stakeholders, such as socializing, 1-on-1s, discovery interviews, mirroring, etc
• The biggest thing that will help you grow your career in product
• How to get stakeholders involved in ways that will get their buy-ins
• The book’s structure, weaved into it a story with examples on how to use the listed tools
• Some of the tools in the book, such as the Stakeholders Canvas
• Can stakeholders benefit from reading the book?
• Tools they love using as product professionals
• And so much more…

**Connect with Bruce and Melissa:Bruce’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brucemccarthy/ Melissa’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melappel/ Aligned book’s resources: Alignedthebook.com Product Culture: Productculture.com 

Connect with Matt and Moshe on LinkedIn:
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• Matt Green: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattgreenanalytics 
• Moshe Mikanovsky: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikanovsky

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Note: any views mentioned in the podcast are the sole views of our hosts and guests, and do not represent the products mentioned in any way.**
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