Need someone to lead product management at your software company? I build high-craft software and the teams that build it. I'm looking for my next opportunity. Check out my resume and get in touch.

This is the blog of Adam Kalsey. Unusual depth and complexity. Rich, full body with a hint of nutty earthiness.

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Retainer offer

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A week ago I wrote that consultants who blog (including me) don’t get direct business from their weblog readers. It has occurred to me that I’ve never actually asked for business from my readers. One of the first things a salesmen learns is to ask for the sale, but I’ve never done that. So as something of an experiment, I’m going to make an offer that is exclusively open to you, my weblog readers.

The first 50 people who contact me will get can sign up for a retainer program that is normally only open to my past clients. For $100 a month, you’ll get two hours of consulting with a guaranteed minimum turnaround time of 2 business days. What sort of consulting? Just about anything Web related that you want.

  • Perl, ASP, or PHP development
  • Movable Type customization
  • Site design
  • Server management
  • Marketing
  • Product analysis
  • Lots of other things; just ask

Need more help than that? For $500 a month, you can get a full day of my undivided attention. I’ll spend a day every month on your site adding features, updating content, improving the design, standing on my head, or doing whatever else you want.

Think of me as a Web expert for hire. Retainers are billed monthly on six-month subscriptions.

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Think Systems, not Symptoms
Dec 15: Piecemeal process creation frustrates teams and slows work. Stop patching problems and start solving systems. Adopting a systems thinking approach helps you design processes that are efficient, aligned with goals, and truly add value.
Your Policies Aren’t Your Culture
Dec 13: Policies guide behavior, but culture is the lived norms and values of your team. Policies reflect culture -- they don’t define it. Netflix’s parental leave shift didn’t change its culture of freedom and responsibility. It clarified how to live it.
Lighten Your Process Burden
Dec 7: Everyone hates oppressive processes, but somehow we keep managing to create them.
Product Add-Ons Are An Expansion Myth
Dec 1: Add-ons can enhance your product’s appeal but won’t drive significant market growth. To expand your customer base, focus on developing standalone products.
Protecting your Product Soul when the Same Product meets New People.
Nov 23: Expand into new markets while preserving your product’s core value. Discover how to adapt and grow without losing your product’s soul.
Building the Next Big Thing: A Framework for Your Second Product
Nov 19: You need a first product sooner than you think. Here's a framework for helping you identify a winner.
A Framework for Scaling product teams
Oct 9: The people, processes, and systems that make up a product organization change radically as you go through the stages of a company. This framework will guide that scaling.

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