Kacam.net

Product design

定一个北极星指标

拿收入当北极星,团队会去做什么?

Copy the prompt, then pick a model. It plays the interviewer and asks you through it scene by scene instead of handing you the answer.

On a phone with the app installed, the system opens the app directly. Links cannot open external apps inside WeChat — open it in a browser first.

The copied text ends with the answer key the model grades you against. Don't read it yourself first — working it out on your own is the point.

这一份是这批题的地基:不会定「怎么算成功」的人,做别的题时会一直在讨论方案而没有判据。

它会让你先给三个候选,然后对每一个追同一组问题。如果你把「收入」或者「DAU」列进候选,它不会直接否掉,而是问两句让你自己看出问题。

第三幕最狠:假设全公司的奖金都挂在这个指标上,一个只想让它好看的人会怎么做? 答不出两种刷法,就说明这个指标还没想透 —— 而你的护栏指标恰恰是从这两种刷法里长出来的。

★★★★☆ · about 40 min · Tests: 北极星的三个条件、为什么不是收入、和护栏成对、怎么拆到团队

What this one tests

Metric design Trade-offs and costs

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Notes from people who did this one

Nobody has written yet. After you run it, say what came out of the conversation — which scene stumped you, which conclusion you changed afterwards.

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How to use this

There is no model answer here — but there are definite wrong answers. Only three things make a case hold up, and every prompt's answer key carries a "common wrong answers" section that is more useful than the checklist itself.

The three things that make it hold up

  1. You can say whose problem this is and what it is — **with evidence** (not "I think users would want it")
  2. You can say what success looks like — **and what that number is today** (no baseline, no acceptance criteria)
  3. You can name the cost and what you gave up — **the hardest one to fake**, which is why every prompt hunts for it

How to start

  1. Pick a question, open it, copy the prompt.
  2. Paste it into a brand-new conversation — not one where you already discussed it.
  3. Say nothing. Wait for its first question.

Four commands you can call out at any time

  • 跳过 move to the next scene now
  • 提示 give a direction, not the answer
  • 直说吧 spell this point out in full, then keep pressing on the trade-offs
  • 复盘 jump to the wrap-up and print the review card

Three traps

  • Don't rush to a solution. More than half the lost points here come from designing before asking — especially describing features before defining what success means.
  • Expect to be pushed for numbers. "It'll perform better", "users will like it" get cut off: which metric, what is it today, and when do you look?
  • When it starts praising you, point it back to rule five — feeling validated crowds out noticing what you missed.

Start with the north star metric; it underpins everything else. Then pick by what's on your plate: a backlog you can't order → prioritisation; nobody using it or retention sliding → retention and onboarding; need to price something → pricing. Save the experiment review for later, and keep redoing the one about turning a one-line request into a spec — it's the closest to daily work.