Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Vlad Bugay's avatar

Probably the best chapter so far, thank you! I can literally feel anxiety through it and I can only imagine what it was to make all those bold calls you and the team had to make with all the external pressure and uncertainty of late 90s. Great time and memories.

Are you going to write something about Office 2007 and the ribbon? It must be a great story too and thriller as well. I still remember myself asking people around what is the most used command in the Office UX. Almost everyone was shocked with the reality :-)

Expand full comment
Rahul Prasad's avatar

Great chapter. Echo comments below that this is one of the best so far. It's interesting to read that platforms / systems were technology driven and apps were scenario driven. In retrospect, were the transplanted tech-driven discussions the right approach for Office at the time?

After switching to product management in my post-MSFT career and working at large companies in the Valley, I've found these companies to be very allergic to tech driven strategies, esp coming from the PM organization. Everything must "start with the end user" or "work backwards from the use cases". This helps prioritize investments to maximize user value but can also be short sighted when it comes to making deep investments in durable strategic technology.

Expand full comment
14 more comments...

No posts