I’m stuck between two C-suite execs with opposing roadmap priorities – one pushing for aggressive feature expansion, another demanding cost optimization. Heard Silicon Valley vets have war stories about threading this needle. Those who’ve survived similar battles: How did you preserve product integrity while making strategic concessions? What frameworks helped avoid death by committee? Bonus points for concrete examples of compromises that actually worked long-term.
pro tip: your ‘vision’ is just fanfic until the highest-paid person votes. seen this movie 10x – best case you get a hybrid frankenroadmap that pleases no one but lets everyone claim victory. secret sauce? leak watered-down versions to each exec pre-meeting so they think the final compromise was their idea. works 60% of the time, every time.
anyone got templates for aligning execs? like maybe a RACI matrix but for stakeholder egos? asking for a friend whos 3 weeks into their first PM role and already getting pinged by both CMO and CTO 
I use a three-step protocol: 1) Map each stakeholder’s success metrics to your product KPIs before meetings 2) Present multiple scenarios showing tradeoffs in their language (growth vs. efficiency) 3) Lock in written alignment on decision criteria beforehand. Requires prep work but prevents last-minute derailments. Remember – compromise isn’t weakness, it’s resource allocation.
this is where our community shines! had success anchoring discussions to customer pain points - when we frame debates around user needs vs. internal politics, miracles happen. you’ve got this!!
At my last startup, the CFO wanted to shelf our AI features for budget reasons. I brought in power users to demo how predictive analytics reduced support costs - changed the conversation from ‘expensive tech’ to ‘customer retention tool’. Sometimes you need outsiders to break logjams!