Product Nation

We chat with Ofir about the way he manages production teams at Viber. We chat about product management processes at scale, and how to hire the best with intentionality. Favorite quote: "The PM role is such a difficult role because you need to be a master of all. You need to be good with people, with numbers, UX, see the small and big picture, and zoom in and out in your thought process".

We have a lively chat about product-market fit with product management veteran Amir Fish, who spends time with us on defining and owning the problem space. Favorite quote: "So you can see how, by going back to the problem and owning the problem space, you can actually generate your next set of ways to unblock your customer or business"

We chat with Allie about use of machine learning in product design over various product iterations, while highlighting the importance of striking a balance between personalization versus narrowing options down, all while keeping users engaged. In addition to her corporate job Allie shares about a nonprofit that she founded in Tel Aviv and a fun product she developed on a recent hackathon.

We chat with Allie about use of machine learning in product design over various product iterations, while highlighting the importance of striking a balance between personalization versus narrowing options down, all while keeping users engaged. In addition to her corporate job Allie shares about a nonprofit that she founded in Tel Aviv and a fun product she developed on a recent hackathon.

We chat Gilad up about the changing landscape of employee benefits due to Corona, specifically in the way of food benefits which is what Platterz originally set out to do, but not only that. At the end Gilad points to what types of solutions he gravitates to and values in product. Favorite quote: "I'm very much interested in companies that provide a product experience. There are many companies that provide great solutions, technology, products, but that's not my thing. My thing is companies that have a product experience, that sell the product experience that customers are looking to buy."

We chat Jonathan Friedman up about launching products from zero to one. Jonathan describes in detail what it's like to ideate and execute a  new product, and how he and his team adapted to change due to Corona. He posits that the biggest issue with new products is the "why", "why us", and "why now", which should lead to a solution that is strong enough to break the barrier of indifference. Enjoy the listen!

Noam heads user research at Wealthfront, and we had a lively  conversation about ways to test for customer needs, reducing barriers, and conducting research that shapes product. Favorite quotes: "Understanding your users  enables you to significantly de-risk the product decisions you're making and reach far better outcomes." and "Diary studies are when we track people throughout their daily lives for a week, two weeks and we see what they do while they are in the context that we care about." and "there's this principle in storytelling, the idea that in every good story you have inertia, you have someone trying to do something and there are barriers - and that person is removing barriers". Enjoy!

Ways to get more of Noam: 

YouTube: youtube.com/c/noamsegal ; Twitter: @noamseg ; LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/noamsegal/

From engineering management to product management to PhD in education to lifelong love for tutoring and now running product for Chegg, we had a blast chatting with Arnon, this time with a focus on managing the PM department. Favorite quotes: "a lot of it is building that trust and building what's called second order model thinking of the person across the table". 2nd Order Thinking: https://thriveglobal.com/stories/second-order-thinking-what-smart-people-use-to-outperform-2/ Also: "What does it take to make a really good VP of product? Not take things too seriously? The product function gets knocked down daily and hourly, it's like don't sweat the small stuff, and it's all small stuff"

Roi is a product management veteran, starting his leadership career in an elite unit in the military, to software engineering, to MBA at Tel Aviv University, product management at analytics startup Convertro, through an acquisition by AOL, PM'ing at Lyft and now at ZipRecruiter, we learned a bunch! Favorite quotes: "You need to spend 90% of your time on understanding really what the problem is. Understanding really what is the alternative. Why is it so important that you come up with a different approach?"

"The most successful companies were built by hacking through that 10% of solution, but spending a lot of time with that 90%."

"Many times you hear, yeah, we validated that there is a problem. But you actually did not understand the underlying need. So there is a much larger problem that you didn't see and is actually much more impactful."

We Zoomed with Rotem Iram about building a novel product in a new world of Cyber-Insurance. Rotem starts his career at an Israeli intelligence unit, works as a software engineer, then at McKinsey, gets an MBA at Harvard, works in cybersecurity, and launches a startup in insurtech after experiencing the need from a customer's vantage point. Favorite quote: "This channel that you select, through which you are going to be selling your product, is a major factor in how you design your product. Because the channel is the keyhole through which your product needs to fit. And if you're building a product that didn't take that keyhole into consideration, there's going to be a lot of squeezing." And another: "One of the smartest investors I know just gave me a ton of money after I told him my plan. It must mean that my plan makes sense, but it doesn't. it's just that you have a good starting point."