This is the weekly newsletter for People people who think like Product people. If you think traditional HR practices are stale and out of touch, you have found your People🤘

Learn how product principles and design thinking can transform your People function into a growth driver… all in the time it takes to drink your morning coffee☕

Whether you’re a PX newbie or already a pro, here you’ll find actionable tools and tactics to get full leadership buy-in and make an impact from day 1 🚀

P.S …mine’s a Cortado with oat if you’re buying 😉

Read time: 4-6 minutes

Hey Reader 👋🏻

For someone who’s built a reputation (and a business) around product thinking, I have to admit something uncomfortable:

I don’t always follow through on it in my own business.

Oh the shame. 🙈

I ask a lot of People teams.

Adopt a product mindset.
Shift your operating model.
Stop defaulting to traditional HR practices.

That’s no small ask.

And yet, even I’m susceptible to slipping back into familiar patterns like activity over impact, outputs over outcomes.

So if nothing else, consider this permission to give yourself a break when you fall back too.

Recently, I had a chance to pause and reset. And in doing so, I reintroduced one product practice that has fundamentally sharpened how I focus on outcomes over outputs.

A roadmap isn't a strategy

One thing I see over and over again holding People teams back from making real strategic impact is this:

An inability to confidently articulate the value their work will create.

It’s often hidden behind endlessly expanding roadmaps. Lots of plans. Lots of initiatives. Lots of activity.

Most People teams (and I’m guilty too) are very good at building comprehensive to-do lists - tasks, projects, deliverables - then plotting them onto a timeline and calling it strategy.

But a roadmap isn’t a strategy.

It’s a sequence of activity.

Strategy is a hypothesis about value.

When People teams communicate in outputs instead of outcomes, they invite challenge on the strategic value of their work. It’s easy to dismiss work that feels purely functional.

And a to-do list with no clear connection to value creation will always feel functional - no matter how busy or complex it is.

The result?

Weak buy-in for work that feels important.
Shrinking budgets alongside expanding roadmaps.
Initiatives that drift or bloat.
OKRs that feel performative rather than directional.
Teams stuck in reactive cycles.

And eventually…

People teams who feel undervalued, under-appreciated, and burned out - despite working incredibly hard.

I’ve felt a version of this myself recently.

A long list of things to get done. Carefully sequenced. Sensible. Logical.

And goals and OKRs that, if I’m honest, felt connected to work… but not clearly connected to value.

Truthfully, I’ve always struggled with OKRs. I could tie them to activity. I could tie them to delivery. But tying them to meaningful outcomes beyond the work itself? That’s always felt harder than it should.

In the last few weeks, that changed.

I tried something different - inspired by a product artefact popularised by the Amazon product team - and it has completely shifted how I communicate the value of the work I intend to do.

For the first time in nearly eight years of attempting to write OKRs, they feel relevant. And genuinely aligned to impact.

PRFAQs (and why People Teams should use them)

I’m talking about PRFAQs.

Some of you may have come across them. Like many product practices born in tech, they’ve spread across product organisations over the years.

But they’re rarely used inside People teams. I think that’s a mistake.

So what is a PRFAQ (apart from being oddly satisfying to say 😆)?

At its simplest, it’s an internal press release written from the future - supported by a set of FAQs.

You write a 1–2 page press release as if the product, feature, or initiative has already been built and successfully launched.

It describes:

• What changed
• What impact was created
• What measurable shifts occurred
• Why it mattered

The FAQs then answer the hard stakeholder questions before they’re even asked.

It’s not a plan. It’s not a roadmap. It’s a clarity document.

It forces you to articulate what success would actually look like (in concrete, outcome-led terms) before you start building.

I used a PRFAQ at SapienX this week to define what would be true three months from now if we were successful in embedding our new Community Lead (welcome, Tash Bristowe 👋).

On day one, instead of reviewing a task list or a backlog, we aligned around a future-state press release.

What would have changed?
What measurable impact would exist?
What would members be saying?

From that document, the OKRs almost wrote themselves - directly tied to the value we wanted to create.

Tash wasn’t onboarding into activity. She was onboarding into outcomes. And she was creating meaningful value almost immediately.

Naturally, I then had the thought: I wish I’d used this when I was a Head of People.

I’ve also started using PRFAQs as a post-facilitation artefact.

A couple of weeks ago I spent the day with the BBC’s PX Design team, helping them rethink and redesign their ways of working — shifting toward a more product-led operating model. Awesome team and a thoroughly enjoyable day!

Instead of following up with a summary deck, I wrote a PRFAQ imagining it was 90 days later and the new operating model was successfully embedded.

What had changed?
What friction had reduced?
What measurable impact was visible?

It was an incredibly powerful way to consolidate what we had co-designed in the room - turning abstract concepts into a tangible future state anchored in impact, not just process.

Now, think about the last time one of your People initiatives got blocked.

The exec team didn’t see the value.
The budget was questioned.
The project was sidelined.

Remember how that felt.

Now imagine a different scenario.

Before you even step into the budget conversation, you’ve written a PRFAQ.

The value is crystal clear.
The impact is concrete.
You’ve given voice to the employees affected.
You’ve described measurable shifts.
You’ve pre-empted the tough questions - and answered them.

Two days before the meeting, you share it. Calmly. Confidently.

Now you’re walking into that room.

How do you feel?

You aren't walking into the room seeking permission to do work.

You are walking in confident and crystal clear on the value the work will create.
Who it's for.
What will change.
By when.

That level of clarity changes power dynamics.

Before your next major People Initiative, try this:

1. Write the press release first.​
Write 1–2 pages as if it’s 90 days in the future and the initiative has been a success.
Describe what changed. For whom. What measurable impact exists.

2. Be specific about outcomes.​
Include real shifts. Behaviours, metrics, sentiment, business impact.
If it sounds vague, it probably is.

3. Add 5–8 hard FAQs.​
Why are we doing this?
What problem does it solve?
How will we measure success?
What risks exist?
What happens if we don’t do it?

Answer them honestly. That's the point here.

4. Extract your OKRs from the press release.​
Your Objectives should reflect the meaningful change described.
Your Key Results should be the measurable proof points already written into the future story.

If you can’t write the press release yet, you’re probably not ready to launch the initiative.

But you now know where the gaps are, so you can do the work to close them. Then draft the press release again until you feel super confident about presenting it.

You care about the impact of your work. That’s why you’re taking the time to read this.

What I’ve lacked in the past - and what I see lacking in many People teams - isn’t care or ambition.

It’s structure.

Structure that turns good intent into real impact.

So give PRFAQs a try.

Write the future.
Make it concrete.
Make it measurable.
Make it compelling.

And then go and build it.

You got this - and I got you 👊🏻

OK, that’s a wrap for this week.

Grab your coffee and open up your inbox same time next week for more insights, tips, and resource flags on how to smash HR silos, add strategic value and turn your People function into a growth driver 🚀

With love,

Luke ✌🏻

P.S, Looking for community? Come join your people in the PX Product Community 🤘🏻Learn and grow, feel inspired, find support and connect with likeminded People people. Your people. Come join us → 💜

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