What are your core product principles?

This question is asking you to communicate the fundamental guiding principles that you bear in mind when developing or managing a product. Your core product principles can be a reflection of your personal values and beliefs, and they govern your approach and decisions related to product development, management or marketing. This question aims to translate your fundamental approaches and commitment related to your job and how you handle complex issues or challenges in the product development lifecycle.

Some key points to keep in mind when answering this question:

• Highlight principles that reflect your understanding of good product management such as user-centric design, clear communication or data-driven decision-making.
• Provide examples from your experience to illustrate how you've applied these principles.
• Discuss why these principles are important to you, what they've helped you achieve, and how they've influenced your product decisions.

One of my core product principles is that the product should solve a genuine problem. I believe that a successful product must be rooted in answering a real need or problem for the customer. In my previous role as a product manager at XYZ software, we were developing a project management tool. I steered my team to focus on the challenges faced by project managers and develop solutions for those specific issues rather than just building a tool with extensive features. This approach helped us to gain significant market share quickly because our product resonated with the target audience.

Another principle I adhere to is continuous improvement and iteration. Launching the product is not the end but only the beginning of the journey. By continuously gathering feedback, and monitoring product usage and market trends, we can keep improving the product and ensure it remains valuable and relevant to the customers.

My core product principles revolve around a 'Customer-first' approach. For any product, it's crucial to deeply understand the customers, their needs and wants. So, I always prioritize spending time with customers, whether through formal interviews, or observing how they use our existing products. This first-hand interaction enables me to gain insights that push for finding user-focused solutions, rather than being purely technology or design-driven.

Another important product principle for me is 'simplifying the complex'. Making a complex product easy to use is a challenge that I truly enjoy. This approach was put into practice while I was working on a tech product at XYZ company, where the technology behind the product was highly complicated. However, we were able to deliver a simple and intuitive user interface that won us commendations from our customers. Therefore, whatever the inherent complexity of the product, I believe in designing interfaces that are easily navigable and understandable by the users.