Sherlock Holmes, well known for his prowess for making detailed observations, identifying patterns and solving mysteries has a friend in Dr Watson who helps him through this process.

Incredibly smart as Sherlock Holmes is, he still tends to make the occasional mistake and jump to conclusions quickly. The presence of Watson in the vicinity forces him to articulate his deduction process and say it out loud to him. And this allows him to slow down and not jump to conclusions immediately and take the time to notice any flaws that he might have in his thinking.

Product Managers are a little like Sherlock Holmes, in the sense that they make detailed observations of how customers behave, identify patterns and solve problems.

And we too, tend to jump to conclusions quickly and overlook possible flaws in our thought processes.

While we can't all afford to have a Watson, we can find the equivalent in writing down our thinking and sharing it with our peers. This could be in the form of PRDs, presentations or simple notes on a Google doc, or perhaps even a simple conversation with a peer.

This will help us notice the flaws that could be and prevents us from jumping to conclusions quickly.

We could all do with a Watson.