The best products are made when a single highly competent person has complete control over the direction of the product. The problem is that's also how the wor

The best products are made when a single highly competent person has complete control over the direction of the product. The problem is that's also how the worst products are made. Mediocre products are made through more democratic decision making processes. If you think you can identity people with good taste, and incentive them properly to make the product better, and give them control to act on their taste, then you should do that. But you probably can't. One of the pieces is probably missing. Maybe you can't measure product quality very well. Or maybe you don't have good taste for people with good taste. Or maybe you don't have the authority to give someone control over the product. The article gets at what I just called taste for good taste. It doesn't make sense to create a product manager role if you can't fill it with someone who has good taste concerning the product. Often, companies will get the PM roll wrong on multiple fronts: bad taste, and no ownership. At that point you've just hired on another voice adding noise to product discussions.