Top Product Development books recommended by experts

At MentorCruise, we are all about making the most out of the experience of others. As part of that, we've connected and asked dozens of experts and professionals about their favourite Product Development books – and here are the answers.

Table of Contents

Fundamentals of Product Development

Understanding the concepts of Product Development starts with understanding the fundamentals. On your way to mastery, it's crucial for you to understand how certain concepts were derived, and why things work like they do. Starting with these resources is the best way to do so.

Product Design and Development

Covering contemporary design and development issues, such as identifying customer needs, design for manufacturing, prototyping and industrial design, this text presents a set of step-by-step product development methodologies aimed at bringing together the marketing, design and manufacturing functions of an enterprise.

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Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER "Sprint offers a transformative formula for testing ideas that works whether you're at a startup or a large organization. Within five days, you'll move from idea to prototype to decision, saving you and your team countless hours and countless dollars. ...

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Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products

How do successful companies create products people can't put down? Why do some products capture widespread attention while others flop? What makes us engage with certain products out of sheer habit? Is there a pattern underlying how technologies hook us? ...

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The Mom Test: How to Talk to Customers and Learn If Your Business is a Good Idea when Everyone is Lying to You

The Mom Test is a quick, practical guide that will save you time, money, and heartbreak. They say you shouldn't ask your mom whether your business is a good idea, because she loves you and will lie to you. This is technically true, but it misses the point. You shouldn't ask anyone if your business is a good idea. ...

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Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want

The authors of the international bestseller Business Model Generation explain how to create value propositions customers can’t resist Value Proposition Design helps you tackle the core challenge of every business — creating compelling products and services customers want to buy. ...

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The Lean Startup

The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses is a book by Eric Ries describing his proposed lean startup strategy for startup companies.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Additional Product Development Reading

These books are not required for you to learn Product Development, but they are highly recommended for you to deepen your knowledge.

INSPIRED: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love

How do today's most successful tech companies—Amazon, Google, Facebook, Netflix, Tesla—define, design and develop the products that have earned the love of literally billions of people around the world? Perhaps surprisingly, they do it very differently than the vast majority of tech companies. ...

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Escaping the Build Trap: How Effective Product Management Creates Real Value

To stay competitive in today’s market, organizations need to adopt a culture of customer-centric practices that focus on outcomes rather than outputs. ...

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This list is curated by MentorCruise and can include Amazon affiliate links. Have any other suggestions? Add here.

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👋 Hello, I'm Juliette! I am a Principal Design Leader at Moderna driving our software for individualized cancer treatment, supply chain, and manufacturing. Prior to this, I spent 8 years as a Design Manager at Microsoft where I brought version-0 emerging technology products to life (Mixed Reality, Computer Vision, Large …

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With over 17+ years of expertise in product development, I am specialized in the developing of multi-tier, client-server, event-driven, and distributed applications. Over the past few years, I have worked on technology transformational projects for renowned organizations such as Volkswagen, SAP Labs, Transamerica, and AMEX. My core expertise includes: - …

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Across my 16+ years in product management at Google, Microsoft, and assorted venture-backed startups, I've had the privilege of receiving mentorship from luminaries including Paul Graham, Sam Altman, and Kai Fu Lee. I know not everyone gets these mentorship opportunities, so I am here to share my experience with a …

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After 2 decades in Tech, leading software engineering teams at both Google, Microsoft, and studying coaching at Stanford, I would love to give back to the community, and spread my mentorship and coaching help to more engineers. Transforming someone's career and helping others unlock their true potentials, has been one …

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Senior Product Manager Technical with 10 years of experience in product development, statistical and financial analysis, and 4 years of hands-on programming experience in data mining, processing, analysis, and visualization (Python, Web API, SQL, Django, REST API, React.js). I was born and educated in Russia and began my career as …

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I mentor Product Managers at all stages. Whether you're transitioning into product for the first time or feeling stuck in your current role. My approach blends practical career navigation with deep expertise in design, data, UX and product. I also bring firsthand experience balancing a high-performance career while managing a …

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