Steven Sinofsky pictured at the launch of Windows 8 in Shanghai in October 2012
Steven Sinofsky, Microsoft’s former president of Windows, has launched a new blog entitled Learning by Shipping, offering his thoughts and perspectives on product development and management, and the process of bringing new products to market.
Sinofsky left Microsoft back in November, mere weeks after the release of Windows 8 – a product that he played a crucial role in developing. At the time, rumours abounded that Sinofsky was forced out and that he had clashed with Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. However, the particulars of his abrupt departure are unlikely to be cleared up in Learning by Shipping as Sinofsky claims he will not use the blog to discuss “specifics or the past regarding Microsoft”.
He has previously written posts on his product development work at Microsoft – particularly Office 2007, Windows 7 and Windows 8 – both for company blogs and intranet services. Learning by Shipping is expected to continue in this vein.
Sinofsky describes the blog as being something of an experiment and, while he’s uncertain as to how often he will write posts, he guarantees that they will be free of snark and ad hoc criticisms – and he expects the same from the blog’s commenters.
Sinofsky is also set to begin teaching product development at Harvard Business School this spring, and intends to get back to writing having previously co-authored a book with Marco Iansiti called One Strategy: Organization, Planning, and Decision Making.
