Top Product Management 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 Management books – and here are the answers.

Table of Contents

Fundamentals of Product Management

Understanding the concepts of Product Management 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.

The Experience Economy: Work is Theatre & Every Business a Stage

The Experience Economy marks the debut of an insightful, highly original, and yet eminently practical approach for companies to script and stage compelling experiences. In doing so, all workers become actors, intentionally creating specific effects for their customers.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Product Management For Dummies

It offers plain-English explanations of the product life cycle, market research, competitive analysis, market and pricing strategy, product roadmaps, the people skills it takes to effectively influence and negotiate, and so much more.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Product Roadmaps Relaunched

Product Roadmaps Relaunched offers a great overview of the importance of product roadmaps, their relationship to product managers and product strategy, their significance as a communication tool, and the ways that they've changed and evolved over the years.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

The Lean Product Playbook: How to Innovate with Minimum Viable Products and Rapid Customer Feedback

This book helps improve your chances of building successful products through clear, step-by-step guidance and advice. The Lean Startup movement has contributed new and valuable ideas about product development and has generated lots of excitement. However, many companies have yet to successfully adopt Lean thinking.

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The Product Manager's Survival Guide: Everything You Need to Know to Succeed as a Product Manager

The world of business is moving at breakneck speed. More is being demanded of everyone--with fewer resources than ever. In no profession is this more apparent than Product Management. Written by one of today's leading Product Management thought-leaders, Steven Haines, The Product Manager's Survival Guide provides best practices, practical on-the-job advice, and a step-by-step blueprint for suc…

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Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products

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? Nir Eyal answers these questions (and many more) by explaining the Hook Model—a four-step process embedded into the products of many successful companies to subtly encourage customer behavior. Through consecu…

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Additional Product Management Reading

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

Empowered: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Products

Most people think it’s because these companies are somehow able to find and attract a level of talent that makes this innovation possible. But the real advantage these companies have is not so much who they hire, but rather how they enable their people to work together to solve hard problems and create extraordinary products. As legendary Silicon Valley coach--and coach to the founders of seve…

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Product-Led Growth: How to Build a Product That Sells Itself

Product-led growth is about building a product that is so good that opting to pay for it after a free trial period is over/ upgrading from freemium to a premium model is a no-brainer. The product-led growth approach switches up the traditional sales cycle.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration

Creativity, Inc. is a manual for anyone who strives for originality and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation—into the meetings, postmortems, and “Braintrust” sessions where some of the most successful films in history are made.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

The Lean Startup

Lean startup is an approach to building new businesses based on the belief that entrepreneurs must investigate, experiment, test and iterate as they develop products. The concept of Lean startup originated in the early 2000s and evolved into a methodology around 2010.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

The Design of Everyday Things

The Design of Everyday Things is a best-selling book by cognitive scientist and usability engineer Donald Norman about how design serves as the communication between object and user, and how to optimize that conduit of communication in order to make the experience of using the object pleasurable.

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

Decode and Conquer: Answers to Product Management Interviews

"Decode and Conquer is a fascinating book about how to succeed in product management interviews, especially case questions. It's essential reading for anyone trying to succeed in a competitive product management job market."

Recommended by the experts and mentors at MentorCruise

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

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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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Sunny Zhu refers to herself as the bridge between people and data and as a “statistics geek”. She has been engaged in a broad range of analytical works across diversified industries to empower companies to turn data insights into solid business decisions. Working for a decade in data analytics, she …

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I'm an entrepreneurial AI-first Product & UX Leader and a global mentor for the VC firm and accelerator, 500 Global. I run workshops and mentor startups across USA, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Mexico and Japan. I have 15+ years of experience driving products from concept to successful launch. I combine technical …

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Who am I? I have 12 years hands-on expertise in building and managing innovative fintech and AI solutions. Currently, at Mastercard I'm a Technical co-founder of a portfolio of six fintech products, driving their end-to-end lifecycle from ideation to global market launch. Currently leading six teams totalling 110 team members. …

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Hi, I'm Eric in Seattle! Do you need help achieving success in your career or startup? Let's collaborate! My mentorship approach is personalized, practical, hands-on, and creative. I will show you how to create opportunities for yourself and help you execute, so you can achieve your career goals as quickly …

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