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Panel discussion: How to make the perfect product: from features to understanding the business
Doing the Right Things – The Most Pressing Issues in Business and Product Management
What makes your product truly exceptional? It starts with validating ideas, understanding customer needs, and identifying opportunities. We have prepared questions that trouble most companies, so join us in asking:
- Are you focusing on what your company really needs?
- Are you clear about who your key customer is?
- Can you say NO and remain effective?
- Are you not just driven by customer wishes?
We will discuss how to do the right things and achieve business success. Key topics of this discussion include:
- Strategy and how it helps with prioritization and communication – how to stay on track and effectively manage your team and stakeholders.
- Discovery process – how to distinguish ideas from solutions and focus on what will bring real value.
- Tips and tricks for prioritization, personal stories, and mistakes – what has worked and what hasn’t?
- The art of saying NO – how to properly evaluate who holds the budget and is the key decision-maker.
- How to verify if we are doing the right things – methods and tools to help you stay on the right path.
- When it’s important to focus more on how we do things – and when to focus on the outcomes instead.
- Inspiration for you – recommendations on what to read, watch, and try to stay informed and keep pushing your products forward.
Guests: Javier Bargas-Avila, Martin Tříska, Jan Ráž, Ondra Bumbálek, Tom Kratochvíl
Panel moderators: Jiří Tůma, Šimon Vlachynský
Dr. Javier Bargas-Avila, PhD
Javier is a User Experience (Research) manager with more than 20 years of experience in the field. He is passionate about building effective research organizations that scale and deliver critical user insights that help teams develop successful products that delight users. He is a trusted manager with a proven track record of career development and coaching.
Javier is currently leading the UX Research organization for Google Play. Before that, he built a UX research organization for Google Cloud Platform that focused on developing processes, programs, methods, and tools that help researchers conduct high-quality research, and he built and led UX research teams working on Google’s brand advertiser products and YouTube. Before joining Google, he built and managed the HCI research lab at the University of Basel.
Jan Raz
Jan, Senior Product Director B2B at Mews, oversees and manages the development and expansion of Revenue and Business Intelligence products for the hospitality sector. With 14 years of product management experience spanning startups to multinational corporations, Jan combines industry expertise with a passion for golf and travel.
Tomáš Kratochvíl
Tom has over 15 years of experience in the global software industry, having worked with companies like AVG Technologies, Y Soft, and GoodData. Throughout his career, he has consistently operated at the intersection of business and technology, contributing as both an individual contributor and a leader, building new teams or transforming them. Tomas has worked on business and solution analysis for eCommerce and M&A projects, product management, product marketing, and sales engineering. Most recently, he led the Technical Sales & Solutions team. Over time, he has learned that while each role is important, true success depends on fostering strong collaboration between business and technical teams.
Martin Tříska
Martin is the Senior Vice President of Product Management at Emplifi, a global leader in social marketing and customer experience platforms. With over a decade of experience in product management and leadership, Martin has spearheaded product innovation, leading teams across multiple continents. He has played a critical role in integrating acquired companies, driving product vision, and enhancing user experiences. His career includes significant roles at Socialbakers (leading to acquisition by Emplifi), Ataccama, and IBM, focusing on B2B software in data quality, big data innovations, and business intelligence areas. Martin holds a Master’s degree in Software Engineering from the Czech Technical University in Prague and has studied at prestigious institutions across the globe.
Ondřej Bumbálek
Ondřej is an experienced marketing professional with over 15 years of expertise in product management, customer acquisition, retention, and monetization. He has held leadership roles in prominent companies such as AVG Technologies, Avira, Kiwi.com, and STUDENT AGENCY. Throughout his career, he has focused on developing global marketing strategies, managing CRM campaigns, and overseeing commercial partnerships. Currently, he leads marketing at the Czech IT company Nekorporát, which specializes in no-code applications, digitization, and process automation for businesses.
Jiří Tůma
Jiri is a product manager for almost 15 years. While he started in B2C (AVG), he calls B2B his second “home” (Y Soft, GoodData, Dataweps / acq. by Heureka). He now helps AppSec teams efficiently secure apps with Invicti. In his spare time, he caters to his dearest “products”: family, nature (garden), and music.
Šimon Vlachynský
Šimon has been working as a Scrum Master since 2014, having started his career at the Czech internet leader Seznam.cz. Over time, he has built his way to an international presence and now works as a team lead scrum master at Jamf Software.
His expertise includes working with traditional agile frameworks, implementing change at various levels within the organization, and defining goals for both teams and at the product level. The product sphere is particularly close to Simon’s heart, as evidenced by his strong contribution to supporting product roles and co-authoring our Product Academy.
Simon is a fan of the human touch, constructive feedback and likes when work and decisions have real meaning. His professionalism and ability to lead teams to perform at a level that delivers value is a great asset to our clients.