How to avoid major problems as a PM

Victor Cheng mentioned in his newsletter that in life, most major problems start as minor issues that grow because they’re left unaddressed.

• Major relationship issues often escalate from small misunderstandings that fester.

• Major health issues usually stem from small concerns that were ignored.

• Major financial issues tend to grow from early misuse or unchecked habits.

  
  

I believe this pattern is just as true in product management.

As a PM, major problems often arise from a series of small, compounding decisions that seem harmless in the moment but snowball over time.

• Major execution failures usually begin with minor process inefficiencies.

• Major strategic missteps often start with a shallow understanding of the problem space.

• Major UX issues are often the result of small usability flaws stacking up.

Like in life, the key to avoiding major product problems is resolving the small ones early. That’s because minor issues are typically easier and cheaper to fix. The real danger is that they seem inconsequential and are easy to ignore—until they aren’t.

If you only act when the consequences are obvious, you’ll constantly find yourself reacting to fires instead of designing solutions.

Over time, I’ve adopted four steps to help me catch and correct issues early:

1. Anticipate the ripple effects.

   Before making a call, I ask: Does this reinforce an existing issue or open a new one?

2. Pressure test assumptions.

   I check my thinking with peers, cross-functional partners, or my manager.

3. Plan around tradeoffs.

   If we can’t solve something now, I log it, communicate the decision, and revisit it in the roadmap.

4. Follow through.

   I track minor issues until they’re resolved to prevent small cracks from growing over time.

This approach has helped me stay proactive and build better products with fewer surprises down the road.

What about you? How do you prevent small issues from turning into big ones?