The Art of Product

Product management is about more than backlogs, sprint planning, and shipping features. It's about leading teams, making difficult decisions, and creating lasting value, often without direct authority. Roadmaps and frameworks can help, but they aren't enough. What you need is strategic thinking. In The Art of Product: Ancient Strategy for Modern Product Leaders, Dutch DeVries draws on the enduring wisdom of two of history's greatest military strategists, Sun Tzu and Wu Qi, to reveal principles that remain remarkably relevant to today's product organizations. Rather than forcing ancient philosophy into modern business clichés, he translates timeless strategic concepts into practical frameworks for leading product teams. You'll discover how to:Reframe your real enemy (it's rarely your competitor) Lead cross-functional teams without direct authority Build high-performing teams without sacrificing integrity Make decisions that prioritize long-term value over short-term metrics Replace reactive tactics with strategic thinking Drawing on three decades of experience in technology, product leadership, and strategic intelligence, DeVries offers a perspective for everyone from first-time Product Managers to experienced product executives. Whether you're struggling with competing stakeholder demands, feature-factory culture, or organizational dysfunction, this book will help you see your challenges through a fundamentally different lens. The technologies have changed over the past 2,500 years. The principles of effective leadership have not. The Art of Product shows how ancient strategy can help today's product leaders think beyond tactics and lead with purpose.