Are you ready for what’s ahead?

I started 2024 with a mission.

To practice what I call Lean Leverage and share my journey with you.

Lean Leverage. It’s what happens when you remove the inessential to deliver maximum outcomes while respecting people. And I’ve been pursuing it all year. I’ve had plenty of ups and downs. And I’ve documented them here every week.

After 52 weekly articles, it’s time to reflect.

I sat down to collect the best lessons I’ve learned. And share how I plan to capitalize on them in 2025.

Medium helped me curate these lessons. They chose 14 of my posts this year to include in their selective Boost Program. I am thankful for this rare distinction. And I am using these chosen articles to highlight 6 learnings I will take into next year. You can steal these learnings for yourself below.

Let’s dive in, shall we?

1: Artificial intelligence is here. Are we ready for it?

Artificial General Intelligence is upon us. Especially if you believe what OpenAI touts with its new o3 model.

It is quite impressive (and expensive). But we aren’t ready for it. We’ve proven that with pre-AGI models.

Most organizations I work with are experimenting with AI. And they expect miracles from ChatGPI and other LLMs. But they provide their people scant guidance on how to harness its power.

Product teams get told to, “Use AI to become more efficient.” So, team members rush to jump on the AI bandwagon. They too often default to using it to do their work and thinking for them, handing over the reins to it. I’ve seen many choose to copy and paste its output. This is dangerous and foolish. AI is guiding the human instead of the other way around.

When it comes to AI generative work, keeping humans in the mix is more important than ever as we enter 2025. AI is certainly proving to be intelligent, but it’s still artificial. It lacks the human touch. It lacks taste. It lacks judgment.

We are in the midst of an AI infiltration of the workplace. The articles below show how product teams can remain relevant.

2: Plans and deadlines still suck for achieving product success, yet they remain in vogue.

Attempting to control the uncontrollable is a pattern that just won’t die.

Predictable, upfront planning and imposed deadlines are stubborn corporate habits. I’ve been trying to tame the beast for 20 years. But too often in this pursuit, I find myself taking one step forward and two steps back. My career has taken several sidesteps and backslides as a result. Many would rather cuddle up in a warm, illusion-of-control blanket.

Despite the continued setbacks, I plan to keep up the good fight in 2025 and make forward progress.

Why? Because, in product work, early learning and evidence from action trump predictive control. My experiences prove it. By planning less and learning more, I’ve seen teams thrive. They deliver more value in less time, for less money, and for less effort.

But I’m still learning the best way to help others see the light. Throughout next year, I’ll keep experimenting and continue sharing what I learn along the way.

In the meantime, you can find the lessons I’ve built so far on this important topic in the three articles below.

3: Empowered teams who thirst for outcomes (not output) reign supreme.

Output fixation is a bad habit that doesn’t go down easy.

But focusing on the end customer and user outcomes proves far superior. I have found it to ease my path to achieving the desired product impact. Yet, it remains elusive in product teams.

Most teams today operate in organizational systems that reward outputs, not outcomes.

Many product teams find they are far removed from their customers and users. They aren’t empowered. Too often, they are stuck in a silo, isolated from user needs. They build widgets according to spec without purpose. Most know their ticketing system better than their user.

Here’s the irony. Organizations form these silos to drive efficiency. But in reality, they have built up tremendous amounts of waste. Product flow has slowed to a trickle. And in many organizations I work with, it has stalled out and reached a state of emergency. They are grasping at a quick fix, but none exists.

Yet, hope is not lost. I’ve written four articles this year on breaking the most common silos that impede product teams. You will find 25 years of wisdom in these articles. Steal a lesson from them you can use today.

Meanwhile, in 2025, I’ll keep helping organizations break down silos to improve value flow. And you’ll see more articles about my continued journey and lessons learned.

4: Scrum is suffering and barely hanging on.

Scrum (along with Agile) has suffered a massive (deadly) hit in 2024.

It has crumbled under the weight of:

Easy certification.
Surface level changes.
Silver bullet sales tactics.
Beginners posing as experts.
Misapplication of core principles.

I’ve written at length this year about ways to save Scrum from its demise. Most of my advice centers around getting back to the basics of what drives lean flow. I’ll continue to amplify this narrative in 2025 as I aim to educate and reverse the train wreck of today’s Scrum.

You can find two of my key articles on saving Scrum below.

5: Embracing change is more crucial than ever.

Change is upon us more than ever in 2025.

AI (and potentially AGI) infiltrating the workplace.
Lagging organizations facing reinvention or irrelevance.
The threat of individuals using AI to compete with incumbents.

We must prepare ourselves for change in 2025—perhaps greater than any we have seen in our lifetime. As such, embracing shifting contexts will continue to be a topic I write about.

You can find my go-to recipe for adapting to meet changing conditions below.

Don’t Neglect the 3 Critical Ingredients of Every Successful Change

6: Enabling leadership remains a linchpin for your product’s success.

Many still focus on improving teams when they should focus on improving leadership.

In product, command and control is not a winning strategy. Managers attempt to control amidst the darkness of the unknown. But leaders create the conditions for navigating and lighting a path through it. When you can’t see the clear next step, you need action and evidence to guide you. Leaders build empowered teams who can chart a path to a goal based on real-time learning.

2025 will bring a continued focus from me to build leaders in organizations. It is our best path to enable empowered product teams. I’ll share my journey and learnings along the way.

Get my thoughts on the crucial role of leadership in these two 2024 articles below.

That’s it. 2024 is a wrap. And I can’t wait to see what 2025 brings.

I wish you a Happy New Year! Keep an eye out for weekly posts next year on my relentless pursuit of Lean Leverage.

➡️ Sign up for weekly insights like this on getting back to the fundamentals that underpin unstoppable product teams. Join a community of like-minded professionals committed to achieving outcomes sooner.

Coach Lankford

Todd Lankford unlocks Lean Leverage in organizations to cultivate powerful, engaged product teams who maximize outcomes and impact.

His articles share his experiences and learnings along the way. Join the mailing list to get them in your inbox.

Blogs

6 Product Management Lessons from 2024 I Aim to Exploit in 2025