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On Saturday, April 12th, the Toronto Product Management Association (TPMA) community was fortunate to host Rosemary King to run a half-day workshop at the Schulich Business School. The focus? Tackling one of the most challenging parts of our craft: building effective product strategy.
King brings a wealth of experience—from working at 10-person startups to 10,000+ employee companies, consulting and freelancing, and most recently leading product at Illumin and building Mind the Product’s business (now acquired by Pendo). Her impressive track record set the stage for a hands-on, insightful workshop that blended theory with real-world practice. One of her core philosophies: “Those who do, should teach.”
King deliberately replaced laptops with pens and paper, encouraging participants to get ideas down quickly and clearly. Through a series of timed exercises, she demonstrated how speed can help us bypass overthinking and unlock clarity. The session was a powerful reminder that strategy is about direction, discovery, and clear communication.
King opened the session by highlighting how a vague or unclear definition of product strategy can lead to a rocky start. She made it clear what product strategy is not:
As King puts it: “Product strategy is how you work towards your organization’s goal.” The key word is how—and that’s where research, critical thinking, and informed decision-making come into play. There are many paths to reach a goal, and choosing the right one requires intentional strategy.
Before the pandemic, the product world was laser-focused on growth. Now, the priorities have shifted: save money, make money. This change demands that product managers get smarter about managing risk, aligning teams, and prioritizing effectively. Strategy is no longer just about long-term plans—it’s about navigating change while staying clear on why this, why now.
King emphasized that strategy is about setting the right parameters so you know you're moving in the right direction. Constraints—like team capacity, budget, and technical feasibility—are always present. A strong strategy identifies and embraces these constraints, pairs them with opportunities, and guides decision-making based on what will drive the most impact.
Ultimately, building a product strategy means knowing when to say no, when to advocate strongly, and when to guide the conversation on what to build, how to position it, and how to stand out in the market.
Nothing about a product exists in a vacuum—markets shift, technology evolves, and people change. That’s why product managers operate in a world of constant flux. A solid strategy brief is your launchpad as it helps you map out the what, who, and why—highlighting gaps, areas of confidence, and where discovery is needed.
Don’t stress about perfection. As King puts it, the point isn’t the document itself—it’s the thought process and data that went into the creation of it. King also highlights the point of not reinventing the wheel, the use of frameworks or leaning into AI to assist in writing them is extremely beneficial. PMs do not have to stick with a traditional doc; they are encouraged to use tools like FigJam or Miro to visualize their strategy and bring it to life. It is recommended to keep project strategy documents under 3 pages. Clear, concise strategy earns trust—and gets buy-in.
King led a hands-on exercise where PMs had to distill their product’s what/who/why in record time. Why now? It was tough—but that’s the point. If we can’t explain our product clearly, we can’t lead effectively.
Sometimes, the feedback and data from clients is crystal clear—leaving no doubt about what product or feature needs to be built. That’s the ideal scenario most product managers hope for: evidence-driven direction.
But other times, especially in sales-driven organizations, the push comes from the top. Someone with influence says, “We’ve got to build this thing,” and that alone sets the direction. In these cases, be cautious—it could be a vanity project.
Ask yourself:
When your certainty is low, your strategy brief becomes a discovery doc. Ask:
AI can help find patterns, but it won’t do the strategy. That’s still on us.
The overlap between product and marketing was another gem from the workshop.
A strong one-liner—crafted from a clear value proposition—can do wonders for scaled marketing and internal alignment.
“You are the product strategy” (Rosemary King). It’s not just a document or a slide deck—it’s the mindset, discipline, and clarity you bring to every decision. Whether you're aligning stakeholders, running experiments, or crafting the product narrative, your role is to ensure the right decisions are made, for the right reasons, at the right time.
A sincere thank you to Rosemary King for leading an insightful workshop and sharing invaluable lessons with the TPMA community. To dive deeper into product management topics or access event recordings, visit the TPMA website.
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On Saturday, April 12th, the Toronto Product Management Association (TPMA) community was fortunate to host Rosemary King to run a half-day workshop at the Schulich Business School. The focus? Tackling one of the most challenging parts of our craft: building effective product strategy.
King brings a wealth of experience—from working at 10-person startups to 10,000+ employee companies, consulting and freelancing, and most recently leading product at Illumin and building Mind the Product’s business (now acquired by Pendo). Her impressive track record set the stage for a hands-on, insightful workshop that blended theory with real-world practice. One of her core philosophies: “Those who do, should teach.”
King deliberately replaced laptops with pens and paper, encouraging participants to get ideas down quickly and clearly. Through a series of timed exercises, she demonstrated how speed can help us bypass overthinking and unlock clarity. The session was a powerful reminder that strategy is about direction, discovery, and clear communication.
King opened the session by highlighting how a vague or unclear definition of product strategy can lead to a rocky start. She made it clear what product strategy is not:
As King puts it: “Product strategy is how you work towards your organization’s goal.” The key word is how—and that’s where research, critical thinking, and informed decision-making come into play. There are many paths to reach a goal, and choosing the right one requires intentional strategy.
Before the pandemic, the product world was laser-focused on growth. Now, the priorities have shifted: save money, make money. This change demands that product managers get smarter about managing risk, aligning teams, and prioritizing effectively. Strategy is no longer just about long-term plans—it’s about navigating change while staying clear on why this, why now.
King emphasized that strategy is about setting the right parameters so you know you're moving in the right direction. Constraints—like team capacity, budget, and technical feasibility—are always present. A strong strategy identifies and embraces these constraints, pairs them with opportunities, and guides decision-making based on what will drive the most impact.
Ultimately, building a product strategy means knowing when to say no, when to advocate strongly, and when to guide the conversation on what to build, how to position it, and how to stand out in the market.
Nothing about a product exists in a vacuum—markets shift, technology evolves, and people change. That’s why product managers operate in a world of constant flux. A solid strategy brief is your launchpad as it helps you map out the what, who, and why—highlighting gaps, areas of confidence, and where discovery is needed.
Don’t stress about perfection. As King puts it, the point isn’t the document itself—it’s the thought process and data that went into the creation of it. King also highlights the point of not reinventing the wheel, the use of frameworks or leaning into AI to assist in writing them is extremely beneficial. PMs do not have to stick with a traditional doc; they are encouraged to use tools like FigJam or Miro to visualize their strategy and bring it to life. It is recommended to keep project strategy documents under 3 pages. Clear, concise strategy earns trust—and gets buy-in.
King led a hands-on exercise where PMs had to distill their product’s what/who/why in record time. Why now? It was tough—but that’s the point. If we can’t explain our product clearly, we can’t lead effectively.
Sometimes, the feedback and data from clients is crystal clear—leaving no doubt about what product or feature needs to be built. That’s the ideal scenario most product managers hope for: evidence-driven direction.
But other times, especially in sales-driven organizations, the push comes from the top. Someone with influence says, “We’ve got to build this thing,” and that alone sets the direction. In these cases, be cautious—it could be a vanity project.
Ask yourself:
When your certainty is low, your strategy brief becomes a discovery doc. Ask:
AI can help find patterns, but it won’t do the strategy. That’s still on us.
The overlap between product and marketing was another gem from the workshop.
A strong one-liner—crafted from a clear value proposition—can do wonders for scaled marketing and internal alignment.
“You are the product strategy” (Rosemary King). It’s not just a document or a slide deck—it’s the mindset, discipline, and clarity you bring to every decision. Whether you're aligning stakeholders, running experiments, or crafting the product narrative, your role is to ensure the right decisions are made, for the right reasons, at the right time.
A sincere thank you to Rosemary King for leading an insightful workshop and sharing invaluable lessons with the TPMA community. To dive deeper into product management topics or access event recordings, visit the TPMA website.
Toronto Product Management Association (TPMA) is a community focused on development, growth and networking of Product professionals in the Greater Toronto Area.
