How Great Chief Product Officers Create Alignment, Not Just Roadmaps With Bruce McCarthy
What really makes a great CPO? It’s not domain expertise. It’s not crafting the perfect product strategy deck. According to Bruce McCarthy, founder of Product Culture and veteran product leader, it’s all about cross-functional influence. In this episode of the Product Founder podcast, Bruce joins Amir Rezaei to share war stories, CPO pitfalls, and how alignment beats strategy every time.
The Real Role of the CPO: Alignment Across Functions
Many see the CPO as the person who decides what to build. But Bruce challenges that view:
“CPOs aren’t just roadmap machines. They’re cross-functional influencers. Their job is to drive alignment around product vision across every department.”
Bruce’s early inspiration came from John Wang, his former VP of Product, who walked the halls of his company with a notepad, sitting down with teammates from marketing, support, and finance to ask, “What do you think?” He wasn’t demanding approval, he was building buy-in.
That level of soft power is what separates operational CPOs from transformational ones.
Most CPOs Fail Because They Don’t Try to Align
“They assume marketing will pick up the roadmap once it’s done. Or that support will figure out how to handle feature changes. That’s a failure.”
Bruce sees CPOs fall into traps when they silo themselves:
- They assume they have authority because they “own product.”
- They fail to involve exec peers early enough.
- They get ignored because they present finished plans instead of building plans with others.
Pro tip: Don’t ask for approval. Ask for input before the plan exists.
Why Most OKRs Are Broken (And How to Fix Them)
One of the biggest levers for alignment? Shared OKRs.
“Marketing and product often have completely opposing OKRs. One is optimizing installs, the other wants better retention. You’re creating tension by design.”
Common traps:
- Department-specific OKRs that misalign teams.
- Incentives that pit teams against each other.
- Too many layers of OKRs that drown everyone in busywork.
Bruce shares examples where:
- Marketing had a lead-gen goal.
- Product wanted to narrow ICP for retention.
- Support had a goal to file more bugs (while engineering had a goal to close fewer).
His fix?
- Set OKRs across departments, not within them.
- Use engagement, retention, or revenue as shared goals.
- Track health metrics separately not everything needs an OKR.
Example shared OKR: “Improve user onboarding NPS from 35 → 60”
- Marketing improves educational content
- Product improves UX
- Support closes first-response loops faster
Influence > Strategy: The Skill Most CPOs Lack
If Bruce could hire just one skill in a new CPO, it wouldn’t be strategy.
“It’s two-way communication. Someone who can listen deeply and ask the right questions to get people aligned.”
Too often, CPOs come from:
- Technical backgrounds with limited soft skills
- Industry expertise that reinforces assumptions
- Strategic roles without stakeholder buy-in
The best CPOs?
- Ask more than they tell
- Make others feel seen, not overruled
- Use storytelling to create movement
Bonus: A strong listener gets up to speed faster in a new domain than an expert learns influence.
Domain Knowledge is Overrated
“Most hiring managers are obsessed with finding a CPO who knows the industry. That just gives you stale assumptions.”
Bruce argues for fresh eyes. A new CPO can:
- Ask the dumb questions no one else dares to
- Spot legacy constraints that no longer apply
- Challenge the status quo more effectively
While you need someone who can learn fast, domain expertise shouldn’t come at the cost of critical thinking.
From Early Stage to Enterprise: How the CPO Role Evolves
In early stage startups:
- Founders usually play the CPO role.
- Strategy = gut instinct + early customer signals.
- Execution is more hands-on.
As companies scale:
- CPOs must manage onboarding, recruiting, process.
- Product Ops becomes essential for repeatability.
- Collaboration with the board, CEO, and CFO becomes critical.
“At scale, a CPO must run a repeatable org. That includes hiring systems, onboarding, and interfaces with finance and the board.”
Don’t just scale the team scale how the team learns and grows.
The CPO Studio: Bruce’s Coaching Community
At the end of the episode, Bruce invites CPOs and aspiring heads of product to join CPO Studio:
- Peer-to-peer coaching in curated groups
- Monthly roundtables with experts like Rich Mironov and Christina Wodtke
- Real-world problem-solving (not just theory)
Also check out his “One Thing on Product” nano-letter:
- Weekly email, < 1 scroll on mobile
- Bite-size product leadership insight
- Sign up at ProductCulture.com
Want more insights like this? Subscribe to the Product Founder podcast and get weekly interviews with product leaders, founders, and creators who are building legendary products.
Enjoyed this post? You might also like some of our other deep dives with top product thinkers:
1) Why being in the FAANG won’t prepare you to have your own startup | Jacob Bank
2) The part of product discovery no one talks about | Busra Coskuner
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