The Product Podcast

In this talk, Byron Jones, Product Manager at Optimizely, talks about the different experimentation cultures and the seven habits involved in them. He also shares a hack to get your idea funded; frame it as an experiment. He dives into the importance of an experimentation culture in a company and how to build it. Social Links: Find out more about Product School here Follow our Podcast on TikTok he...

Tyler gives an introduction to our cognitive biases and the psychology of decision making (drawing heavily from Thinking Fast & Slow) to help frame a set of practical tips and tricks for making your arguments as persuasive as possible. Being effective as a Product Manager requires influence without authority - convincing a broad portfolio of stakeholders to work together on a shared vision. So...

The journey to becoming a Product Manager is often unconventional, but it becomes all you focus when you determine it is for you. Jon discusses the two most common paths, MBA and startups, while also exploring alternate opportunities that have proven equally as successful. He includes real world examples that will focus on the unique benefits of each option. Everyone's path is unique, and the...

Joining a company as a new product hire is an exciting opportunity to kickstart or fuel your product career. How you establish yourself, as a role/function in your company will play a huge role in determining your success as a Product Manager. Ramping up to start owning the company goals and building a product is an incredible trajectory. In this talk, Harbani Malhotra talks about the attempts to...

A Product Manager is often referred to as the CEO of the product; Ahmad Weshahy, Product Manager at Google, talks about a different view on this analogy and why it might not be the most accurate description. This talk provides a brief summary of what the overall job entails for those who aren’t very familiar with it, a typical day in the life of a Product Manager, and the importance of balancing w...

Ashwini Lahane, Product Manager at Amazon, talks about transitioning into Product Manager roles and taking it a notch up by thinking like a marketer. She discusses the importance of marketing tactics for Product Managers and the traits of a good Product Manager. She also shares her insight on how Product Management and Product Marketing fit together. Social Links: Find out more about Product Schoo...

How to build great roadmaps? Great roadmaps require right trade-offs, right prioritization, strong execution rigger and above all success metrics. A strong roadmap is your channel to success. Sudha talks about how there is no one size that fits all, but there are certain techniques that can help you get there. Social Links: Find out more about Product School here Follow our Podcast on TikTok here...

Every company is different. Every team is different. Every Product Manager is different. In Carly Robinson's two years working at Slack as a Software Engineer building features for Enterprise Grid, she's had the opportunity to work with several Product Managers with distinct styles and varying levels of experience. Her talk explores challenges her team encountered working on high impact,...

Whether you are the first Product Manager at a fast growing consumer startup or one of many Product Managers at a big internet company, the time eventually comes where every Product Leader is forced to ask "How are we going to make money with this thing?". In this talk, Rahul shares his insights on the right mental models to use to help you attack the problem. He uses examples from his c...

Machine Learning, ML, is a powerful tool for creating dynamic, personalized experiences. But a truly useful ML-based product cannot be created without the right UX and insightful human intervention to avoid embarrassing mistakes. Power of your product is not the Machine Learning model but how thoughtful you were in creating value and making every interaction useful. While building Smart Replies in...

A Product Manager is often referred to as the CEO of the product; Ahmad will talk about a different view on this analogy and why it might not be the most accurate description. The talk provides a brief summary of what the overall job entails for those who aren’t very familiar with it, a typical day in the life of a Product Manager, and the importance of balancing what a Product Manager must achiev...

What do machine learning products need? Devdatta Gangal from Uber talks about Machine Learning (ML) and how it has gone from research and engineering to consumer products. He discusses the role of a Product Manager in building ML-powered consumer products and shared his experiences. He also explains how there is no playbook for a Machine Learning Product Manager. The main questions he tackles are...

It is often said that a great idea is worthless without polished execution. In this talk, Akshay explains some tactics for executing your ideas within an organization. This could be as simple as a new feature that you want to build, or something as complex as a total priority shift. As a Product Manager, you don't have the luxury of authority for forcing a team to do something. In many cases,...

To be successful, IoT products require a new breed of Product Manager capable of managing an end-to-end solution from a business and technical perspective. Daniel discusses why IoT products are a big opportunity for Product Managers, and also points out the complexities involved in building IoT products. Daniel introduces the building blocks of the IoT technology stack from a Product Management pe...

Groundbreaking technologies like neural-net algorithms, along with the ability to run much more powerful computation, started a new era in Machine Learning. We're now able to use Machine Learning for products in ways we could only dream about and companies from all around the world are starting to seize the opportunity. Ronnie Falcon from Google talks about the role of Machine Learning in the...

How do some Product Managers drive innovation while others get mired in the day to day? The answer cuts to the core of product management: prioritization. Alexander Lovell, Director of Product Management at Salesforce, will talk about how to be a true Product Leader by separating the urgent from the important, balancing today's demands against tomorrow's goals, and realizing nothing is i...

Travis Corrigan discusses what it’s like having Apple showcase your app to the world during their Keynote presentations. From initial meetings to launch and press events, this candid talk gives a behind-the-scenes look at the entire process. Social Links: Find out more about Product School here Follow our Podcast on TikTok here Follow Product School on LinkedIn here

E-commerce is not just for retailers anymore. While business-to-consumer, B2C, e-commerce gets most of the attention, growing at 10%+ per year, business-to-business, B2B, e-commerce isn’t far behind at 7%+ growth per year. Across both, Product Managers play a critical role in defining the next generation of e-commerce experiences for consumers and businesses to increase sales/conversion, build loy...

Making good decisions is a Product Manager's secret weapon. Every day a Product Manager makes macro and micro decisions that enable their teams to design and build. It is uniquely their job because Product Managers tend to have the most context in a company. Learn frameworks of how to make good decisions and examples of how Jennifer has done this at XO Group's The Knot. Social Links: Fin...

Product Management in the Gaming industry; what’s so different about it? Join us for a walkthrough of the rise of social and mobile free-to-play gaming and the evolution of the Product Management role within it. At the crossroads of creativity and business, this key role has reshaped video game development and redefined corporate cultures by forcing entertainment companies to adapt to the millenni...

Curious about what companies are looking for when hiring Product Managers? Companies may have different approaches as to what they place more emphasis on. However, there are some fundamental core values & skill sets that are clearly evaluated when talking to prospective candidates. Angeli talks through some core skill sets a Product Manager is evaluated on and how to assess your own skill set...

The quicker you ramp up in a new project or new company, the sooner you will own your product. While this is true, it is important to build the right foundations during your onboarding period to set yourself up for success. Putting in the effort and time investment up front will pay dividends throughout your tenure. Listen to Alice Liang, from Lenda, for 5 things that you should never miss when yo...

Product Management is hard to define and many people often give vague analogies, like the "CEO of the product". When you're making a big career change, you need to know the cold, hard truth of what the role is and whether you'd enjoy and succeed at it. Zerzar tackles some of the biggest myths about Product Management and helps clarify whether it would be the right transition fo...

This talk is aimed at job seekers, and is completely focused on 1) how to get a higher number of first-round interviews for product management roles 2) how to succeed in those interviews. Matthew Du Pont discusses the key elements, such as, how to get informational interviews with people who you’re not socially connected with, how to turn those informational interviews into invitations to apply to...

For those of us that have switched jobs before, we know how essential the first month can be. The crucial on-boarding process is where you begin creating relationships, understanding the internal jargon and workings of the company, all while figuring out the scope of your role and how you can make an impact. This talk focuses how to effectively onboard as a product manager. Apart from my own takea...