Customer Success Playbook S3 E37 - Matt LeMay - From Feature Factory to Business Driver

We kick off this powerhouse three-part series with Matt LeMay, author of Impact First Product Teams. In this episode, we challenge the default mindset of "shipping features" and dig into how product teams can align closely with business-level outcomes. Matt lays down his number one tip for product leaders: set goals that are both high impact and high specificity. Prepare to rethink everything you thought you knew about prioritizing work.

Detailed Analysis: Episode 37 sets the foundation for what it truly means to run a high-impact product team. Matt LeMay debunks the myth that asking leadership what they expect is the best starting point. Instead, he argues that teams must own the understanding of their value, crafting goals that tie directly to revenue, growth, or customer success metrics. The formula? Set ambitious, specific, and time-bound objectives. But here comes the twist: doing this invites the Eye of Sauron (yes, that Lord of the Rings reference was glorious). High visibility comes with accountability.

Matt doesn't just stop at theory. He discusses how real teams can move from doing busy work to delivering business value by asking the right internal questions and being brave enough to commit to uncomfortable levels of accountability. Product leaders, take note: if your team is just shipping features, you may already be obsolete.

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Check out https://funnelstory.ai/ for more details about Funnelstory. You can also check out our full video review of the product on YouTube at https://youtu.be/4jChYZBVz2Y.

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Transcript

Kevin Metzger: 0:05

Customer success.

Roman Trebon: 0:10

Hi everyone, and welcome to the Customer Success Playbook podcast, where we bring you actionable insights for modern product and customer success teams. I'm your host, Roman Trevon. Joined with me as always as my co-host Kevin Metzger. Kevin, happy Monday. How you doing

Kevin Metzger: 0:26

today? Happy Monday. Doing well. Excited for, uh, March Madness coming up. How about you? March

Roman Trebon: 0:32

Madness. And, and, and we got a great guest lined up today, Kevin. I'm super excited to talk to our guests. You wanna tell our audience who we have on the show?

Kevin Metzger: 0:39

Yeah. We are thrilled to have Matt lame author of Impact First Product Teams on the show today. Matt is an experienced product leader and consultant who helps teams focus on the business value of their work. Matt, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for having me,

Roman Trebon: 0:55

Matt. Well, let's jump right into it. Uh, first off, congrats on the new book. Uh, I know it just came out. Thank and our audience, you haven't checked it out yet. I read Matt's book. I'm a huge fan and so definitely go run out and get it, Matt. Thank you. But Matt, the number one tip, so that's our show on Monday, our number one tip. So yeah, what's your number one tip, Matt? For product teams who wanna ensure they're truly focused on the business impact of their work

Matt LeMay: 1:19

set goals that are high impact and high specificity. I'll tell you a bit about what I mean by both of those things. High impact goals are no more than one step away from the goals that the business at large cares about the most. So if the business is focused on revenue, see if you can focus your team's goal on revenue. If the business is focused on growth, see if you can focus your team on growth. Find a way to tell the story of the work your team is doing in terms that connect directly to what the business cares about the most. So that's the high impact piece. The high specificity piece is to actually set targets that are specific and time bound. So not just saying, we'll deliver some revenue at some point or some profits at some point, but rather we will deliver this much by this particular point in time. Doing so is scary and challenging. You are committing to a target outside of your control, but when you know what? Amount of something you're actually aiming for. You can decide what work is worth pursuing and what work is not worth pursuing. A lot of teams spend a lot of time and effort on things that honestly stand no chance at delivering the degree of impact that the business expects from that team. And the best way to make sure you avoid that is to be crystal clear about what exactly the business expects from your team.

Kevin Metzger: 4:07

So Matt, how do you suggest coming up with that very specific goal when you're kind of driving in? So if you don't have an idea of how you're gonna get there, if you don't like, what are you throwing darts at a dartboard or what

Matt LeMay: 4:25

it is? I mean, in a sense, yes. I think putting different options out there and talking through with your team, which one feels right, is a really good place to start. Many teams I work with start by saying, well, let's go ask leadership what they expect from us. And I, I don't think that's necessarily the best approach because your team. Understands its work likely better than anybody else does. And if you go to leadership and say, well, how much impact should we have? A, you might not like the answer you get, and B, it doesn't necessarily demonstrate to leadership that you understand or appreciate the impact that your team could or should have. So in a lot of cases, it just starts with the question. What would this team need to deliver for everybody on it to feel really good about the work they've done? At the end of the quarter, the end of the year, the CEO comes to you and says. What did your team accomplish this year? What's the answer you would give that would leave you feeling really confident and really proud of the accomplishments that your team has made? Because in a lot of cases, the information is out there, it's just not out there all in one place at once. Right? Folks on teams tend to have a, a pretty good sense of broadly what might be expected of them. But they don't always make the time to have that conversation directly and to say, how can we articulate that directly and clearly, rather than saying, oh, well we have a slide deck somewhere that says somewhere what we're supposed to do.

Roman Trebon: 5:56

Talk about this isn't always easy. It sounds easy, right? Why wouldn't you wanna build product that has an impact? Right? But you have a great line in the book that says, right? Uh, if you, if you, if you sign up for these big high impact goals that you, you'll sometimes get that eye of Sarah, Sarah on, right? From Lord of the Rings. Right? I love that line. Can casting this menacing stare on this work, so, oh, yes. I, I love that line, but, but how do you, how, as a product leader, how do you get your team to, to really get focused on these do for maybe being a low impact team that does a lot, that doesn't really have an impact to really focusing on, on work that actually has an impact to the business? I.

Matt LeMay: 6:34

I mean, that's a great question. I think being as clear as you can from a leadership perspective about what you expect from teams about what is expected at the team of teams level or even at the company level. Again, I. Communicating that information clearly and directly, not burying it in a cascade of sort of tangentially aligned, but increasingly disconnected, yet always defensible goals, which is what a lot of organizations do. And I think just making it clear to folks, look, you work for a company. And all of our fates are aligned with the success of that company. If the company does well, that's good for us. If the company doesn't do well, that's not good for us. So let's work together to really understand what the company needs to understand why the company has chosen to make an investment in this team. Product teams are generally non-negligible expenses to a business and figure out how we're gonna deliver that together. I think you say, Matt, it's a lot easier to be a low impact team at times, right? It's easy. Oh, it's much more fun to be a low impact team. Are you kidding? Do whatever you want. I mean, I've worked with so many teams who complain, we're just given a list of features to build. It's not fair. But the second they're actually asked to be accountable for impact, being accountable for delivering features doesn't sound so bad anymore.'cause so long that they delivered those features, they could say, well, we did what you told us to do. It's not our problem. Uh, but unfortunately. I think we've seen in the market over the last couple years. Even if you do build those features, if your team is not delivering success for the business on its own terms, it is your problem.

Roman Trebon: 8:15

As we typically do, Kevin, we get into one big tip and we're already one big, and we're already on other tips, and Matt's sharing more insight around the book that that tends to happen with us. But Matt, this is awesome. Uh, thanks for that number one tip. You're gonna come back on Wednesday, right? You're gonna, we're gonna return and we're gonna talk about our one big question where we're gonna dive deeper into what impact really means across different business models. So for our audience, don't miss the episode. Make sure you subscribe like the show. So when Wednesday's episode comes out, you'll get a notification. You'll know it's, uh. It's there. Make sure to check out Matt's book. Impact First product teams define success. Do work that matters. Be indispensable. It's on Amazon, it's on his website. We'll have all this information in our show notes. Matt will come back Wednesday. Looking forward to it. Until then, Kevin, keep on playing.