Why product coaching is a startup’s best investment
- Vicky Pike
- Jun 30
- 5 min read
In the fast-paced world of tech startups, product decisions can make or break a company. Whether you're pre-seed or post-MVP, the pressure to grow, deliver, and impress investors can drive founders to hire a product manager earlier than they should.
But hiring too soon can do more harm than good. Instead of rushing to fill the gap, more founders recognise a smarter alternative: product coaching, a go-to resource to enhance decision-making, resilience, and leadership during periods of high growth.
The risk of hiring a product manager too early
Product leadership without a foundation is risky
Premature hiring, especially in product leadership, can misfire if the founder hasn't nailed a clear vision or strategy. "Hiring a product leader too early can be a waste of resources and even counterproductive," notes a Forbes Business Council article.
Why vision and product–market fit must come first
Mind the Product puts it even more directly: founders should not hire a product manager until after they've achieved product–market fit. Until then, the founder is best placed to own product direction and discovery work. Otherwise, they risk hiring someone into a vacuum without the necessary foundations to succeed.
Why product coaching is a smarter first step
Coaching creates space for better decisions
Product coaching offers founders something that hiring can't: structured time to think. Coaching isn't about giving you answers; it's about helping you ask better questions. It's a space for:
Testing whether your product thinking is driven by evidence or assumption
Prioritising what truly matters versus what feels urgent
Understanding your decision-making patterns and blind spots
Reflecting on product strategy without the noise of operational chaos
This clarity becomes a competitive advantage, especially before you bring others into the product function.
What top VCs are saying about coaching for founders
Leading VCs, such as Seedcamp, are now publicly encouraging founders to invest in coaching early, particularly to strengthen product leadership and emotional clarity. Andy Budd (Seedcamp Venture Partner) puts it:
"As startups grow, the challenges shift from solving specific problems to scaling yourself as a leader… That's why I'm such a strong advocate of founders investing in coaching."
This growing endorsement reflects a shift: coaching is no longer just a personal development tool; it's fast becoming a strategic lever for product-led founders.
Founders are the first product leaders
Early-stage strategy needs founder ownership
A 2023 study on early-stage software startups found that the rush to build and scale often leads to "accumulated debt in product strategy", not just in code (Giardino et al., 2023). Startups benefit most when founders lead discovery and validation efforts before formalising product roles.
And then, it's not just execution; it's mindset, too. Coaching helps founders:
Frame decisions around feasibility, viability, and desirability
Navigate emotional highs and lows with more resilience
Focus on real user problems instead of chasing shiny features
Develop product principles that future hires can align with
What product coaching looks like in practice
You're a founder who's trying to prep for a funding pitch while fielding Slack messages from engineers and responding to a frustrated customer. The team is pushing to build a new onboarding flow, but churn is rising, and no one's quite sure why.
Through coaching, you realise the uncertainty doesn't lie in the feature; it lies in the assumptions about user behaviour. Together, we unpack the root problem, design a discovery interview sprint, and build a lightweight test. Suddenly, the focus shifts from building to learning and the clarity that follows saves weeks of engineering time.
Coaching doesn't push you to do more; it helps you do what matters most.
Signs you’re not ready to hire a product manager
But what if you're unsure if coaching is the best first step?
Five signs coaching will deliver more ROI
You can't clearly articulate your product vision in one sentence
Your roadmap is driven by customer noise, not insight
You haven't validated the core problem with enough users
You're unsure what kind of PM you even need
You're hiring to "take the pressure off" without defining the job
If two or more of these sound familiar, product coaching will yield a higher return and lower risk than an early hire.
Tools & frameworks you might explore through coaching
Coaching isn't a free-form conversation. It's structured, rigorous, and tailored to your goals. Some of the practical tools that may come into play include:
Assumption Mapping – making hidden beliefs explicit to reduce risk
Desirability, Feasibility, Viability Triads – for prioritising product bets
Decision Coaching – separating data from emotion, intuition from fear
Values Alignment – clarifying founder principles that guide product culture
Vision-to-Action Planning – turning big ideas into structured OKRs
These tools don't come pre-packaged, they're introduced when relevant and always shaped to fit the unique context of your startup.
Testimonials from founders and senior leaders
Product coaching isn't just about insight, it's about impact. Here's what founders and senior leaders have said after working with me:
"Vicky's coaching has been very influential in pushing me through uncomfortable places. She really cares about her clients… I learned even more about myself. I truly appreciate her, and you will too!"
— Senior IT Manager, FTSE 100 Retailer
"I really enjoyed my coaching journey with Vicky. She helped me not only find meaningful answers but more often than not ask the right questions in the first place."
— Founder and CEO, Tech-for-Good Startup
"The biggest impact has been helping me take a step back from my hectic job, reflect, and be a more intentional leader."
— Head of Product, UK Charity
These experiences reflect that successful leadership, whether in startups or larger organisations, requires space for reflection, clarity, and intentional decision-making. As research shows, startups often fail not because of weak ideas but because of decisions made in confusion, isolation, or haste (Giardino et al., 2017). Coaching creates that strategic thinking space that is especially vital for founders navigating rapid growth and product risk.
The True Cost of Hiring vs. Coaching
Coaching is 3% of the cost, 100% of the impact
Hiring a mid-level product manager in the UK typically starts at £60,000–£85,000 per year, and a senior or Head of Product hire can easily reach £100,000+. That's before equity, recruitment fees, onboarding time, and the risk of misalignment kick in.
By contrast, a structured coaching engagement with me starts at just £1,600. That's less than 3% of the cost of hire while also providing the strategic groundwork that ensures any future product hire will succeed, not stumble.
Build a Product Function with Intention
Coaching gives you clarity before you scale
The temptation to hire quickly is understandable. But startups don't succeed by moving fast alone; they succeed by moving forward with clarity. And clarity is exactly what coaching delivers.
Before you hand over your product, invest in your ability to lead it. Product coaching doesn't slow you down; it sharpens your focus, expands your thinking, and prepares you to build something and someone worth scaling.
Ready to lead your product with confidence?
If you're an early-stage founder navigating big decisions, competing priorities, or messy product feedback, coaching could be your smartest next move. I offer a focused product coaching package explicitly designed for startups who want strategic clarity before scaling their team.
Book a free 30-minute clarity call
If you're weighing up your next product move and want some thinking space, let's have a conversation and see if coaching can support you.
