People of Productboard

What does it take to grow into product leadership in the age of AI, and help shape how product managers work in the future? This episode explores exactly that.

We sit down with Dominik Ilichman, Senior Product Manager at Productboard, for an honest and inspiring conversation about career growth, AI-first product development, and the evolving partnership between product, design, and engineering.

With a background in law, experience at Meta, and now a key role in shaping Productboard Spark, Dominik shares his unique journey into product management and what he’s learning while building in one of the fastest-changing areas of tech.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• How Dominik went from law to product management
• How AI tools like Spark, Cursor, and Claude Code are changing the way he works
• Why great product specs matter more than ever in the age of AI
• How Productboard’s triad model helps product, design, and engineering build better together
• What he looks for in today’s product-minded engineers
• Why continuous AI experimentation is essential for anyone in tech

Whether you’re a product manager, engineer, or someone curious about building AI-powered products, this episode offers a thoughtful look at what the future of product work can look like.

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

What does it take to build AI-powered products at speed - and lead the teams doing it? This episode has the answers.

We sit down with Dominik Plsek, Senior Engineering Manager at Productboard, for an honest and energizing conversation about engineering leadership, the rise of AI-first product development, and what it really means to build something you believe in.

Dominik has been with Productboard for over six years, joining fresh out of his master's degree after an instant connection with the team. Since then, he's grown from engineer to leader, and today he oversees multiple teams driving some of the company's most strategic work, including the newly launched Spark, Productboard's AI-first product management experience.

In this episode, you'll hear:

• How Dominik leads with empathy and empowers teams to take real ownership
• A behind-the-scenes look at building and launching Spark
• Why he believes first-principles thinking will define the next generation of great engineers
• How Productboard is approaching AI adoption across its entire engineering organization
• What kind of engineers and managers Dominik is looking to hire right now

Whether you're an engineer curious about growth and AI, a leader looking for a fresh perspective on team management, or someone exploring what it's like to work at Productboard, this is an episode worth your time.

🎧 Hit play and meet one of the people shaping the future of product management.

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

In our latest episode, we dive into the fast-paced world of design. In a wide-ranging discussion, Zdenek Kuncar, Director of Product Design at Productboard, touches on multi-team collaborations, the importance of feedback, and the benefits of moving from an IC role to the management track.    

Zdenek joined Productboard six years ago and immediately realized he had found his niche. He explains how design is not viewed as a support function here but as an integral part of the company’s core mission to bring new products to market fast. 
He talks about the design team’s deep influence at Productboard. An emphasis is placed on long-term thinking, and truly understanding the needs, motivation, and challenges of each individual customer.

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

We sit down with Bara Votapkova, a Senior QE engineer at Productboard, to explore the highs and lows of engineering, the blend of technical and interpersonal skills required, and how her personal journey reflects the collaborative culture at Productboard. This episode is packed with valuable insights on career growth, overcoming challenges, and how to thrive as a woman in tech.

Bara takes us through her inspiring journey from initially facing rejection after her first interview round at Productboard to later becoming a pivotal part of our engineering team.
 
She discusses how her unique background as a history student and her passion for continuous learning, helped her navigate the challenges of changing career paths and landing her first job in the tech industry. 

She shares her insights on the importance of perseverance, the power of community, and why feeling not “good enough” should never stop you from pursuing your dreams. 

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

We chat with Elizabeth Chase, Manager of EMEA Sales at Productboard, about how surviving a very challenging macroeconomic climate helped reshape our sales approach, placing a bigger emphasis on customer communication, connection, and trust. We discuss the pros and cons of the job, what makes a good salesperson, and why you should never take the word “no” personally.    

Chase shares why she feels Productboard is on the cusp of unlocking a new world of opportunity with a completely different group of organizations, tackling challenges at a more senior level and bringing a new level of value to our customer base.  

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

We chat with Cris Domingo, Head of People, Culture, and Talent at Productboard, about the key shift many HR departments have made in recent years, taking a more proactive approach toward people. 

In a post-Covid world, companies have had to adapt and embrace changes in their office environments, with HR essentially becoming champions of culture and fostering career growth with employees.

We discuss the importance of trust, proactivity, and honest communication, the benefits of diverse workspaces, and the pivotal role of women in tech.

Cris also shares ways people can be mindful when considering a career move and why the interview process should always be a two-way street and she offers insights on our company culture and what she’s most excited about in the coming months.  

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

In the fifth episode of Season 2, we sit down with Jaroslav Tran, Growth Product Manager at Productboard, to talk about why many companies are turning to product-led growth to help secure more customers. We also take a closer look at why product teams in general have become so important to marketing and sales acceleration. 

Customer needs are rapidly evolving. These days, a lot more users want to try products before agreeing to buy, Jaroslav explains, making the role of growth engineers a vital part of the go-to-market process. He talks about what specific skills people interested in going into Growth should have, including experience with productizing as well as a keen interest in experimentation and data. Growth, Jaroslav points out, is still a relatively new and unshaped role, giving these teams many opportunities to help make a big impact on a company’s business strategy. 

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

In the fourth episode of Season 2, we sit down with Eva Novotná, a Product Manager at Productboard, to go over the skills you’ll need to successfully lead a product team, including the three core ones: seamless communication, keen professional analysis, and ruthless prioritization. Eva emphasizes the important role soft skills and routine feedback play when closely collaborating with various teams on a daily basis. 

We explore the differences between project and product management and take a closer look at the pillar team structure we use here at Productboard. Eva shares her personal journey from PM consultant to full-time product manager. She talks about the highs (and a few of the lows) of the job. She also weighs in on the benefits of today’s increasingly popular hybrid work approach and the best way to build lasting professional relationships and align your team’s vision. 

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

In our third episode of Season 2, we sit down with Malwina Fojcik, Senior Product Design Manager at Productboard, to discuss why seamless cross-functional collaboration, now more than ever before, is essential to modern work environments. Team members – regardless if they are designers, engineers, or product managers – need to be encouraged to take full responsibility of every aspect of a project in order to guarantee its success. Trust is so important when building these lasting and meaningful professional relationships, which is why, Malwina explains, giving and receiving feedback as well as gratitude should be a big part of your company’s daily mantra.

Malwina also addresses effective management styles, sharing why it’s more advantageous to be a “partner” than a “boss,” and how leveraging personal strengths is what ultimately helps to craft good leaders. On a final note, Malwina turns to health tech, offering some unsettling news for all those IT people who aren’t getting their full eight hours of sleep each night. 

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!

In our second episode of Season 2, we sat down with Josh Jones, Senior Sales Development Manager for the EMEA region, to talk about powering through the volatile fourth quarter of 2022. 
He shares the lessons we learned during this turbulent period, stressing the importance of actionable strategies, guidelines and roadmaps, and the value of team collaboration and experimentation. 

He looks ahead at Productboard’s goals for 2023 and explains what it takes to build a successful sales career and why it’s so crucial to have a healthy work-life balance.

Interested in joining our team? We're hiring across multiple departments. Check out our careers page for the latest vacancies. We’d love to hear from you!