Your Next Product Idea Won’t Come From a Meeting

Some of my best product ideas didn’t come from brainstorms, whiteboards, or strategy decks.

They came from airports.From hotels.From cafés in cities I didn’t know very well.

Not because travel is magical or romantic—but because it forces you into observation mode.

When you’re moving, waiting, navigating unfamiliar systems, you stop operating on autopilot. You notice things. And noticing things is where good product thinking starts.

Travel turns you into a user again

At work, especially in senior roles, it’s dangerously easy to stop being a user.

You sit in meetings.You review dashboards.You talk about customers instead of being one.

Travel breaks that pattern.

Suddenly, you are:

• Late

• Confused

• Tired

• Slightly stressed

• Dependent on systems you didn’t design

You feel every friction point in your body before you can intellectualize it.

The check-in flow that asks the same question twice.The hotel light switch that needs instructions.The café ordering system that assumes local knowledge.

These aren’t abstract UX issues. They’re lived experiences.

And lived experiences stick.

Airports are brutal product audits

Airports are one of the harshest environments for products and services.

High stress.Low patience.Massive scale.Zero forgiveness.

Everything gets tested:

• Signage

• Information hierarchy

• Accessibility

• Error recovery

• Edge cases

When design is good, you barely notice it.When it’s bad, you notice everything.

I’ve had more insights about onboarding, wayfinding, and system resilience standing in airport corridors than in weeks of roadmap discussions.

Why?

Because airports don’t care about your intent.They only care about outcomes.

You either get people where they need to go—or you don’t.

That clarity is refreshing.

Hotels teach you about invisible value

Hotels are fascinating because the best ones feel effortless.

You don’t think:“Wow, this process was well designed.”

You think:“This just works.”

The door opens.The room makes sense.The lighting feels right.The noise is controlled.The essentials are obvious.

Great hotels understand something many products forget:Value is often the absence of friction, not the presence of features.

It’s not about adding more.It’s about removing the unnecessary.

Every time I stay somewhere that just feels right, I ask myself:

• What did they remove?

• What did they simplify?

• What assumptions did they challenge?

Those questions translate directly into better product decisions.

Cafés are micro-labs for behavior

Cafés are small, human, and incredibly revealing.

Watch how people:

• Choose where to sit

• Interact with menus

• Ask questions

• Avoid asking questions

• Work around constraints

You see real behavior, not stated preferences.

People don’t read.They scan.They hesitate.They copy others.They look for reassurance.

Sound familiar?

Most products fail not because they lack features, but because they misread human behavior. Cafés make those misreads visible in real time.

No usability lab required. Just attention.

Travel sharpens your taste for good design

When you move between places, contrasts become obvious.

You start noticing:

• When typography helps vs. confuses

• When flows feel natural vs. forced

• When systems respect your time—or waste it

Your tolerance for bad design drops.

And that’s a good thing.

Because once you’ve experienced clarity, you struggle to accept mediocrity—both as a user and as a product leader.

Travel calibrates your standards.

Inspiration doesn’t arrive on demand

One of the biggest myths in product work is that good ideas appear on command.

They don’t.

They show up when:

• Your mind has space

• You’re exposed to new contexts

• You’re not trying too hard

Airports, hotel lobbies, cafés—these are liminal spaces. In-between moments. Your brain connects dots precisely because it’s not being forced to.

That’s why the best insights often arrive when you’re not “working.”

They arrive when you’re paying attention.

The real lesson

Travel doesn’t make you smarter.

It makes you more observant.

And observation is the raw material of great products.

You don’t need more meetings.You don’t need more frameworks.You don’t even need more data.

Sometimes, you just need to:

• Move through the world

• Feel friction firsthand

• Notice what works—and why

Inspiration comes from unexpected places.

Often with a boarding pass in your hand and a coffee getting cold next to your laptop.