3D chess is a tired metaphor that will lead you in the wrong direction. Instead, you want to play fractal chess: increase the layers of game that you're playing, not simply the complexity.

For Product Managers, the core dilemma – one I see many fresh PMs struggle with – is how to allocate your time. You only have 40 (ha!) hours in a working week, so what should you do with them?

In The Four-Hour Work Week Tim Ferriss tells a story about a Mexican fisherman and an American businessman. Not many people know that there is actually a second half to this fable. I was lucky enough to hear it from a wandering shaman in a Berlin nightclub, and with his permission I have reproduced it here.

If you’ve worked as a product manager in the last few years, I bet you’ve seen the diagram above. But the second row – the super happy wonderful example we should try to emulate – annoys me a lot.