Building Product-led Teams with Conviction

1 00:00:00,239 - > 00:00:03,919 SPEAKER_00: Bringing your users in and the don't fall into the 2 00:00:03,919 - > 00:00:06,879 trap of build what they tell you to build and instead watch what 3 00:00:06,879 - > 00:00:08,880 they're doing, listen to what they're trying to solve for and 4 00:00:08,880 - > 00:00:10,880 build solutions for the problems. 5 00:00:13,359 - > 00:00:15,439 SPEAKER_01: Hey product rebels, welcome back. 6 00:00:15,599 - > 00:00:19,039 Today we're joined by Jared Hallis, a product leader who has 7 00:00:19,039 - > 00:00:22,160 spent his entire career in ed tech building products that 8 00:00:22,160 - > 00:00:23,760 shape how people learn. 9 00:00:24,000 - > 00:00:27,600 Jared spent 17 years at McGraw Hill Education, where he rose 10 00:00:27,600 - > 00:00:29,679 from marketing coordinator to VP. 11 00:00:29,920 - > 00:00:32,880 He led the company through a massive analog to digital 12 00:00:32,880 - > 00:00:36,240 transition and built products like adaptive learning platforms 13 00:00:36,240 - > 00:00:38,320 that reached millions of students. 14 00:00:38,560 - > 00:00:41,840 Now as chief product and technology officer at Booknook, 15 00:00:41,920 - > 00:00:45,920 he's led a strategic turnaround of the K-8 virtual tutoring 16 00:00:45,920 - > 00:00:50,000 platform, growing revenue 25% year over year and taking 17 00:00:50,000 - > 00:00:55,280 customer attention from 27 to 70% and driving the company to 18 00:00:55,280 - > 00:00:58,799 its first profitable quarter within a year of joining. 19 00:01:04,239 - > 00:01:07,760 We're so excited to dig into Jared's story and hear how he 20 00:01:07,760 - > 00:01:11,280 thinks about building product-led organizations in a 21 00:01:11,280 - > 00:01:14,079 space where the stakes are as high as they get. 22 00:01:14,319 - > 00:01:16,400 Kids learning to read. 23 00:01:39,200 - > 00:01:42,640 SPEAKER_00: And I think that translates kind of well in that, 24 00:01:42,719 - > 00:01:45,840 you know, this is this is in the product leadership space. 25 00:01:46,000 - > 00:01:49,439 I think of a product rebel more as really, really a strong 26 00:01:49,439 - > 00:01:51,920 belief in a position with enough conviction to fight for it. 27 00:01:52,000 - > 00:01:54,719 And that means moving the barriers, getting over hurdles, 28 00:01:54,879 - > 00:01:57,680 doing what it takes to bring something to fruition. 29 00:01:57,840 - > 00:02:00,560 Whether that means it's a success or not is less the point 30 00:02:00,640 - > 00:02:03,680 and more about taking that leap of faith to go chase what you 31 00:02:03,680 - > 00:02:04,640 believe is right. 32 00:02:05,280 - > 00:02:06,719 SPEAKER_01: Yeah, very cool. 33 00:02:06,879 - > 00:02:09,919 And gosh, it feels like we're living in sort of a dangerous 34 00:02:09,919 - > 00:02:10,159 time. 35 00:02:10,319 - > 00:02:14,000 So I think the start of the old description feels very apropos. 36 00:02:14,240 - > 00:02:15,360 Tell us an example. 37 00:02:15,520 - > 00:02:17,680 Go right into a place when you felt like a rebel. 38 00:02:18,240 - > 00:02:21,120 SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I actually it's one of perhaps my favorite 39 00:02:21,120 - > 00:02:23,280 career moments that I can reflect on. 40 00:02:23,360 - > 00:02:26,639 I've been doing doing this thing, so to speak, in ed tech 41 00:02:26,960 - > 00:02:29,680 for longer than I'll admit out loud unless you coaxed it out of 42 00:02:29,680 - > 00:02:30,080 me later. 43 00:02:30,319 - > 00:02:33,680 But early in the process was working with an organization 44 00:02:33,919 - > 00:02:38,960 that was making this massive pivot from analog into digital. 45 00:02:39,280 - > 00:02:42,560 And it meant that there was a lot of legacy and a lot of 46 00:02:42,560 - > 00:02:45,759 people who didn't really believe that you could do what you could 47 00:02:45,759 - > 00:02:49,039 do on paper online, which is kind of a wild concept. 48 00:02:49,120 - > 00:02:51,360 And this happened to be in the space of education, which makes 49 00:02:51,360 - > 00:02:53,360 it even wilder to reflect on. 50 00:02:53,520 - > 00:02:56,800 But I was working with a mentor who's still a wonderful friend 51 00:02:56,800 - > 00:02:59,120 of mine, and we've done some really, really, really cool 52 00:02:59,120 - > 00:03:00,400 things since this moment. 53 00:03:00,560 - > 00:03:04,159 But we came up with this wild and crazy idea that you could 54 00:03:04,159 - > 00:03:09,280 teach and deliver qualitative higher ed content in a virtual 55 00:03:09,280 - > 00:03:09,680 environment. 56 00:03:14,639 - > 00:03:17,439 We got scrappy, we built some proofs of concept, and we took 57 00:03:17,439 - > 00:03:19,520 it to the leadership of the organization that we were 58 00:03:19,520 - > 00:03:20,080 working at. 59 00:03:20,240 - > 00:03:23,599 And they sat us across the table, big mahogany rooms, of 60 00:03:23,599 - > 00:03:27,120 course, and looked us directly in the eyes and just said, no. 61 00:03:27,680 - > 00:03:31,840 And so we uh fortunately knew they were wrong. 62 00:03:32,000 - > 00:03:34,800 So we went and we actually scraped together and sort of 63 00:03:34,800 - > 00:03:37,599 bootstrapped in the context of a billion-dollar organization 64 00:03:37,759 - > 00:03:41,120 enough funding to go build and develop what we knew was right. 65 00:03:41,360 - > 00:03:44,960 And ultimately it became such a market success that the same 66 00:03:44,960 - > 00:03:48,879 leadership put us on top of or on the stage at a corporate 67 00:03:48,879 - > 00:03:51,199 headquarters and award us a corporate achievement award 68 00:03:51,280 - > 00:03:55,039 because we penetrated a market with such quickness and such 69 00:03:55,039 - > 00:03:58,560 depth that it actually unlocked the opportunity to build out an 70 00:03:58,560 - > 00:04:01,120 enormous amount of follow-on tech in this space, which was 71 00:04:01,120 - > 00:04:01,439 super cool. 72 00:04:01,520 - > 00:04:04,319 So, like just that again, that belief in a conviction, the 73 00:04:04,560 - > 00:04:07,280 staring at the opposition down in the eye and say, I'm gonna do 74 00:04:07,280 - > 00:04:07,599 it anyway. 75 00:04:07,680 - > 00:04:08,879 And it worked. 76 00:04:09,520 - > 00:04:10,000 SPEAKER_02: Love it. 77 00:04:10,159 - > 00:04:13,520 Love the daring attitude and the conviction. 78 00:04:13,680 - > 00:04:16,480 A lot of us get a little scared off when you have leadership 79 00:04:16,480 - > 00:04:17,519 that sort of pushes back. 80 00:04:17,680 - > 00:04:21,680 So I'd love to hear for our audience what were the three or 81 00:04:21,680 - > 00:04:25,199 four major strategies you took to enable you to get through 82 00:04:25,199 - > 00:04:25,360 that? 83 00:04:25,519 - > 00:04:28,800 Because I'm sure at every stage you need resourcing. 84 00:04:28,959 - > 00:04:31,759 You need to have this as a priority, maybe in other 85 00:04:31,759 - > 00:04:34,959 platforms in the organization that that were like, hey, I 86 00:04:34,959 - > 00:04:36,160 don't have the resources for this. 87 00:04:36,319 - > 00:04:37,839 This isn't a blessed program. 88 00:04:38,160 - > 00:04:38,959 I can't help you. 89 00:04:39,040 - > 00:04:41,759 Talk to us a little bit about some of the practices or the 90 00:04:41,759 - > 00:04:44,000 tactics you took to enable that success. 91 00:04:44,319 - > 00:04:45,680 SPEAKER_00: We went straight to the market. 92 00:04:45,920 - > 00:04:49,040 And so the only, you know, come up with a good idea, right? 93 00:04:49,120 - > 00:04:50,639 Have a good idea or get behind a good idea. 94 00:04:50,720 - > 00:04:54,319 Either way, we went straight to the market and presented the 95 00:04:54,319 - > 00:04:58,000 notion on scratch pads and easels and symposia and focus 96 00:04:58,000 - > 00:05:00,160 groups, and we brought people together from different walks of 97 00:05:00,160 - > 00:05:03,040 life and different parts of the space. 98 00:05:03,279 - > 00:05:05,360 And we iterated in real time. 99 00:05:05,519 - > 00:05:08,879 And we came up with all the different ways that we could 100 00:05:09,199 - > 00:05:12,319 deliver content in a way that hadn't been delivered before and 101 00:05:12,319 - > 00:05:14,399 gave them an opportunity to sit up and think outside the book, 102 00:05:14,480 - > 00:05:15,279 so to speak. 103 00:05:15,519 - > 00:05:21,839 And we built a following and we built an adoption list before we 104 00:05:21,839 - > 00:05:23,120 ever started coding. 105 00:05:23,360 - > 00:05:27,759 And so by having market-driven demand, outside in thinking, by 106 00:05:27,759 - > 00:05:30,560 defining product market fit before we even started to get 107 00:05:30,560 - > 00:05:35,040 down to the hard work, we had an ambassadorship, an engaged sort 108 00:05:35,040 - > 00:05:39,439 of VAT population that we could tap into at every single 109 00:05:39,439 - > 00:05:41,600 iterative moment throughout the development process. 110 00:05:41,680 - > 00:05:45,120 And so by the time that we were production and commercial ready, 111 00:05:45,199 - > 00:05:46,240 it was already pre-sold. 112 00:05:46,480 - > 00:05:49,759 And so the market was established and we didn't give 113 00:05:49,759 - > 00:05:51,439 ourselves an opportunity for failure. 114 00:05:51,680 - > 00:05:54,800 Micro failures along the way, of course, but ultimate failure 115 00:05:54,800 - > 00:05:55,519 wasn't an option. 116 00:05:55,600 - > 00:05:59,519 And so I think it's that outside in, it's that bringing your 117 00:05:59,519 - > 00:06:04,160 users in and the don't fall into the trap of build what they tell 118 00:06:04,160 - > 00:06:06,399 you to build, because otherwise, in our case, you'd end up with 119 00:06:06,399 - > 00:06:08,800 just a deeper pile of multiple choice questions. 120 00:06:08,959 - > 00:06:11,040 And instead, watch what they're doing, you know, listen to what 121 00:06:11,040 - > 00:06:13,439 they're trying to solve for and build solutions for the 122 00:06:13,439 - > 00:06:14,079 problems. 123 00:06:14,720 - > 00:06:15,279 SPEAKER_01: Very cool. 124 00:06:15,439 - > 00:06:18,079 You listed so many best practices there and things that 125 00:06:18,079 - > 00:06:21,279 we definitely have, you know, talked about, really built our 126 00:06:21,279 - > 00:06:22,480 business around as well. 127 00:06:22,720 - > 00:06:25,680 One of the things that you said in terms of listening, showing 128 00:06:25,680 - > 00:06:28,639 customers taking it to market early is that you do get a lot 129 00:06:28,639 - > 00:06:29,360 of feedback. 130 00:06:29,600 - > 00:06:33,680 And I want you to take us one step deeper into they'll 131 00:06:33,680 - > 00:06:36,240 probably tell you a lot of things, but people have a very 132 00:06:36,240 - > 00:06:38,879 specific perspective, especially coming from the education. 133 00:06:39,040 - > 00:06:41,839 I love when you said just build more questionnaires, build them 134 00:06:41,839 - > 00:06:42,319 longer. 135 00:06:42,639 - > 00:06:44,879 What is your process to turn that into insight? 136 00:06:45,120 - > 00:06:48,720 Tell us like how you listen and then how you make that decision 137 00:06:48,720 - > 00:06:49,759 on what's important. 138 00:06:50,079 - > 00:06:52,560 SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'll be honest with the project that we've been 139 00:06:52,560 - > 00:06:56,560 discussing, it was just scrappy, sort of intuition, and it wasn't 140 00:06:56,560 - > 00:06:57,600 really built on process. 141 00:06:57,680 - > 00:07:00,879 And so that was part of the scalability in the long term. 142 00:07:00,959 - > 00:07:03,680 Like, how do you make this fabric of an organization going 143 00:07:03,680 - > 00:07:04,000 forward? 144 00:07:04,079 - > 00:07:06,399 And so I'm actually going to answer your question, but in the 145 00:07:06,399 - > 00:07:08,240 context of the next project that followed on. 146 00:07:08,480 - > 00:07:12,480 When we built this initial offering and we proved that it 147 00:07:12,480 - > 00:07:15,279 was there was a there there, it gave me an opportunity to 148 00:07:15,600 - > 00:07:18,959 springboard my career in terms of how do we then think about, 149 00:07:19,120 - > 00:07:21,680 okay, we we were working in these quantitative areas. 150 00:07:21,839 - > 00:07:25,519 Now we're tiptoeing into qualitative, but what happens if 151 00:07:25,519 - > 00:07:27,519 we look at the entire span of offerings? 152 00:07:27,600 - > 00:07:31,360 And how do we go about doing that in a scalable fashion with 153 00:07:31,360 - > 00:07:34,160 now thousands, millions of stakeholders? 154 00:07:34,319 - > 00:07:36,639 The platform ultimately, by the time I left the organization, 155 00:07:36,720 - > 00:07:39,759 we're talking about served six to seven million learners every 156 00:07:39,759 - > 00:07:40,079 year. 157 00:07:40,240 - > 00:07:44,720 And so that level of scale and the ability to rapidly produce 158 00:07:44,720 - > 00:07:48,160 that type of user volume clearly has got to be built on something 159 00:07:48,160 - > 00:07:51,279 better than just scrappy intuition by two guys having a 160 00:07:51,279 - > 00:07:54,079 good time with some undisclosed funding sources. 161 00:07:54,319 - > 00:07:58,240 I was actually invited to participate in a project that 162 00:07:58,240 - > 00:08:03,120 was to go out and build that scaled platform and figure out, 163 00:08:03,279 - > 00:08:06,879 okay, if we're going to do this, how do we accommodate everybody? 164 00:08:07,040 - > 00:08:10,000 Which is always a dangerous question to answer in product 165 00:08:10,000 - > 00:08:10,399 development. 166 00:08:10,480 - > 00:08:12,319 And I know that now, I didn't know it then. 167 00:08:12,480 - > 00:08:16,560 But we were, we engaged in an ethnographic research project, 168 00:08:16,800 - > 00:08:18,879 which was all Greek to me at the time. 169 00:08:19,040 - > 00:08:22,639 And eight of us flew to Manhattan on consultance hours, 170 00:08:22,800 - > 00:08:24,240 Sundays through Thursdays. 171 00:08:24,399 - > 00:08:28,720 And we sat in a small windowless room and we we designed and 172 00:08:28,720 - > 00:08:31,040 defined what we thought we were going to build. 173 00:08:31,279 - > 00:08:34,000 And then we actually did a lot of interviewing. 174 00:08:34,159 - > 00:08:37,440 We did a lot of direct observation of users and what 175 00:08:37,440 - > 00:08:38,399 their behaviors were. 176 00:08:38,559 - > 00:08:40,080 And then we started to build. 177 00:08:40,240 - > 00:08:42,559 And by build, we were building paper prototypes. 178 00:08:42,639 - > 00:08:45,360 If you've never done paper prototypes, and literally is 179 00:08:45,360 - > 00:08:46,159 what it sounds like. 180 00:08:46,240 - > 00:08:48,799 It's stacks of post-it notes on top of each other that you click 181 00:08:48,799 - > 00:08:51,600 with a Sharpie and you can track everything and you're navigating 182 00:08:51,679 - > 00:08:54,399 and you're starting to understand what UX concepts are. 183 00:08:54,480 - > 00:08:58,879 And meanwhile, this is 2005, 6 in a publishing industry, right? 184 00:08:58,960 - > 00:09:01,519 There was no such thing as a digital technology-driven 185 00:09:01,519 - > 00:09:02,879 product management organization. 186 00:09:03,120 - > 00:09:05,519 And so these were all brand new skills that were coming into the 187 00:09:05,519 - > 00:09:05,919 org. 188 00:09:06,080 - > 00:09:08,000 It was a blessing to be part of it. 189 00:09:08,240 - > 00:09:12,159 And we were traveling all over the country with these paper 190 00:09:12,159 - > 00:09:14,320 prototypes in briefcases, effectively. 191 00:09:14,480 - > 00:09:17,120 I mean, that's like walking on the airlines handcuffed to this 192 00:09:17,120 - > 00:09:19,919 whole pile of crazy stuff that nobody has any clue what you're 193 00:09:19,919 - > 00:09:20,240 about to do. 194 00:09:20,320 - > 00:09:22,720 And you sit down next to somebody and quite literally 195 00:09:22,799 - > 00:09:23,519 watch over their shoulder. 196 00:09:23,600 - > 00:09:25,759 And every time they do something, you claim an 197 00:09:25,759 - > 00:09:26,320 assumption. 198 00:09:26,399 - > 00:09:28,559 Don't ask them, what do you do? 199 00:09:28,720 - > 00:09:31,440 Instead, I see that you are doing this or I think you are 200 00:09:31,440 - > 00:09:32,000 doing this. 201 00:09:32,159 - > 00:09:34,879 And that way it gives them an opportunity to object in a much 202 00:09:34,879 - > 00:09:35,279 better fashion. 203 00:09:35,360 - > 00:09:37,360 Because if you simply ask somebody how to tie a shield to 204 00:09:37,440 - > 00:09:40,320 tell you, you loop and swoop and pull them tight, chase the bunny 205 00:09:40,320 - > 00:09:41,519 around the tree, whatever you do. 206 00:09:41,679 - > 00:09:44,399 But if you watch somebody half the time they drop a lace, or 207 00:09:44,399 - > 00:09:47,440 the knots inconsistent, and the one loop is high and one loop is 208 00:09:47,440 - > 00:09:49,840 low, or they're both low, like all those different variations 209 00:09:49,840 - > 00:09:50,559 are breakdowns. 210 00:09:50,879 - > 00:09:56,159 And so we were looking for ways to eliminate breakdowns based on 211 00:09:56,480 - > 00:10:00,559 the general outcome or job to be done that people were trying to 212 00:10:00,559 - > 00:10:00,879 achieve. 213 00:10:00,960 - > 00:10:04,879 And so it was lots and lots of hours and time. 214 00:10:04,960 - > 00:10:08,399 And every observation was recorded, every observation was 215 00:10:08,399 - > 00:10:10,240 transcribed into a post-it note. 216 00:10:10,559 - > 00:10:14,000 And now I know that you guys are big into affinity diagrams. 217 00:10:14,080 - > 00:10:18,080 And so we had a wall that was two conference rooms long, that 218 00:10:18,080 - > 00:10:20,559 we had entire groups of organizations walking and 219 00:10:20,559 - > 00:10:22,000 putting post-its and questions. 220 00:10:22,080 - > 00:10:24,879 And we quite literally built it by the book. 221 00:10:25,120 - > 00:10:27,039 And I don't think there's a better way to answer it. 222 00:10:27,200 - > 00:10:30,399 How we got all that insight and translated into what are product 223 00:10:30,399 - > 00:10:30,960 feature functionality? 224 00:10:31,120 - > 00:10:34,399 No, like fast forward 15 years, I don't have time to do that 225 00:10:34,399 - > 00:10:34,720 anymore. 226 00:10:34,879 - > 00:10:37,919 And so that's the rub in this space these days, especially 227 00:10:37,919 - > 00:10:40,720 with how quick it's moving and what the dev cycles need to be 228 00:10:40,799 - > 00:10:43,840 and when your the expectations are you're getting solutions 229 00:10:44,000 - > 00:10:46,559 feature functionality out a heck of a lot faster than 12 months 230 00:10:46,559 - > 00:10:47,440 down the road. 231 00:10:47,840 - > 00:10:49,039 SPEAKER_02: This is fantastic. 232 00:10:49,200 - > 00:10:50,720 We love rolling up our sleeves. 233 00:10:50,879 - > 00:10:53,759 I think the best product leaders we've talked to, even on this on 234 00:10:54,000 - > 00:10:57,759 this podcast and just worked with in the past are those that 235 00:10:58,080 - > 00:11:02,000 want to be at the grassroots level listening and observing 236 00:11:02,159 - > 00:11:03,360 and talking to customers. 237 00:11:03,519 - > 00:11:04,720 And so we love this. 238 00:11:04,960 - > 00:11:09,200 The challenge comes when you are scaling your own teams, right? 239 00:11:09,279 - > 00:11:12,879 So there's a point at which we have to figure out how to take 240 00:11:12,879 - > 00:11:18,080 what we've learned and have a passion for and scale product 241 00:11:18,080 - > 00:11:20,799 teams to do the same because you can't be in all places and all. 242 00:11:24,559 - > 00:11:28,399 Talk to us a little bit about how you took your sort of 243 00:11:28,399 - > 00:11:33,600 passion, curiosity processes, and practices or philosophies 244 00:11:33,840 - > 00:11:37,440 and how have you scaled that to build really great product 245 00:11:37,440 - > 00:11:39,519 organizations to do the same. 246 00:11:39,919 - > 00:11:41,039 SPEAKER_00: Wonderful question. 247 00:11:41,200 - > 00:11:44,000 And I I feel like this is one of those questions that everybody 248 00:11:44,000 - > 00:11:44,320 asks. 249 00:11:44,399 - > 00:11:46,639 And I don't know if anybody has like a real answer. 250 00:11:46,799 - > 00:11:49,600 I think I have a lot of words I could use to answer the 251 00:11:49,600 - > 00:11:51,679 question, but like some of it just has to be you, right? 252 00:11:51,759 - > 00:11:56,399 Like if you're if you're not by nature a leader, it's going to 253 00:11:56,399 - > 00:11:59,840 be very difficult to just build a team based on process. 254 00:12:00,080 - > 00:12:03,279 And so I like I think some of that is just naturally inherent. 255 00:12:03,360 - > 00:12:06,879 And I don't mean that in like a tromping my horn type way, but I 256 00:12:06,879 - > 00:12:09,679 love to surround myself with people who could take my job. 257 00:12:10,000 - > 00:12:13,759 In a 17-year career, early part of my career at a single 258 00:12:13,759 - > 00:12:16,559 company, I never vacated a position that wasn't refilled by 259 00:12:16,559 - > 00:12:19,120 somebody that I brought up and coached up into a position, 260 00:12:19,200 - > 00:12:21,440 which is a wonderful thing to be able to say. 261 00:12:21,679 - > 00:12:24,879 The in my last couple of organizations, I have brought 262 00:12:24,879 - > 00:12:27,840 very select people with me that are the right skill sets 263 00:12:27,919 - > 00:12:31,440 dependent upon the next company's strategies and needs 264 00:12:31,519 - > 00:12:32,159 and things like that. 265 00:12:32,320 - > 00:12:36,080 But once you start to get those pieces and those puzzle pieces, 266 00:12:36,159 - > 00:12:38,879 the ability to identify the gaps and not be afraid to hire to 267 00:12:38,879 - > 00:12:42,000 fill them rather than trying to, you know, to hire unicorns every 268 00:12:42,000 - > 00:12:43,919 single time you go around, like that's important. 269 00:12:44,080 - > 00:12:46,559 You get cross-functional collaborative skill sets. 270 00:12:46,720 - > 00:12:48,879 People can work across different parts of the organization. 271 00:12:48,960 - > 00:12:53,120 You can task people out with different parts and functions of 272 00:12:53,120 - > 00:12:55,120 the overall product org. 273 00:12:55,360 - > 00:12:59,360 I rarely have a single product manager that is the big air 274 00:12:59,360 - > 00:13:00,799 quote, the CEO of their product, right? 275 00:13:00,879 - > 00:13:02,399 Like they don't have a PL, it's not real. 276 00:13:02,639 - > 00:13:06,080 And so instead, it's more thinking about user types and 277 00:13:06,080 - > 00:13:08,320 persona and different aspects of things, you know, where people 278 00:13:08,320 - > 00:13:11,279 are coming into different parts of a collective, you know, 279 00:13:11,440 - > 00:13:13,519 collaborative product and solution. 280 00:13:13,759 - > 00:13:17,360 I do think that there is a lot of transparency and candor that 281 00:13:17,360 - > 00:13:20,000 has to go into being real with people. 282 00:13:20,159 - > 00:13:21,360 It's okay to disagree. 283 00:13:21,519 - > 00:13:23,679 I'm not always right, but I will try to be. 284 00:13:23,919 - > 00:13:27,519 And but I am at the same time, I'm absolutely willing to listen 285 00:13:27,519 - > 00:13:30,320 and let people prove their point if they have conviction. 286 00:13:30,399 - > 00:13:33,279 And so I think I I don't know if that directly answers the 287 00:13:33,279 - > 00:13:33,519 question. 288 00:13:33,600 - > 00:13:35,759 And as long as I've been trying to answer that question in my 289 00:13:35,759 - > 00:13:38,559 life, I don't think I can just hit it with a sentence. 290 00:13:39,679 - > 00:13:42,480 SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think the fact that you've got that record 291 00:13:42,480 - > 00:13:45,679 of replacing just shows the kind of leadership that you're 292 00:13:45,679 - > 00:13:46,080 practicing. 293 00:13:46,159 - > 00:13:48,159 It's it's very, that's very inspiring. 294 00:13:48,320 - > 00:13:50,559 Um, I want to go actually back to something that you said just 295 00:13:50,559 - > 00:13:51,519 a few minutes ago. 296 00:13:51,679 - > 00:13:53,039 And you said it in passing. 297 00:13:53,200 - > 00:13:57,200 So I just want to go back to you'd spent all this time early 298 00:13:57,200 - > 00:14:01,120 on with you know, long ethnographic, various different 299 00:14:01,120 - > 00:14:02,960 sort of like projects that you've done for research. 300 00:14:03,039 - > 00:14:05,600 And then you said, gosh, do we have the time right now? 301 00:14:05,919 - > 00:14:07,519 And so let's can we explore that? 302 00:14:07,759 - > 00:14:09,039 What does it look like now? 303 00:14:09,360 - > 00:14:12,720 Because it it we are under pressure to build faster. 304 00:14:12,799 - > 00:14:16,559 There's lots of new sort of technology, but I think we're 305 00:14:16,559 - > 00:14:20,960 still very much in favor and we care so much about listening to 306 00:14:20,960 - > 00:14:21,519 customers. 307 00:14:21,679 - > 00:14:25,360 So I'm curious as to what you meant by that remark and how 308 00:14:25,360 - > 00:14:27,279 you're actually involved with customers now. 309 00:14:27,600 - > 00:14:30,879 SPEAKER_00: Yeah, definitely still constantly involved with 310 00:14:30,879 - > 00:14:31,440 customers. 311 00:14:31,519 - > 00:14:35,519 And I don't view customers as process, they're a constant. 312 00:14:35,759 - > 00:14:39,360 What I was really referencing was more the luxuries of 313 00:14:39,360 - > 00:14:42,720 affinity diagrams and easels and whiteboards. 314 00:14:42,799 - > 00:14:44,799 And I work in a fully remote environment now. 315 00:14:44,960 - > 00:14:49,840 And once you can correct the thought process, I think that 316 00:14:49,840 - > 00:14:53,519 you don't necessarily need the tools all the time, as much as I 317 00:14:53,519 - > 00:14:55,120 would love to employ them all the time. 318 00:14:55,360 - > 00:14:59,679 But if you can get people to be thinking about outcomes versus 319 00:14:59,679 - > 00:15:03,759 outputs, and you can get people to be thinking about assumptive 320 00:15:03,919 - > 00:15:06,720 conversations and giving well, they're giving clients, giving 321 00:15:06,720 - > 00:15:09,039 users, giving people, giving whoever you're interviewing the 322 00:15:09,039 - > 00:15:11,759 opportunity to tell you you're wrong and then be able to listen 323 00:15:11,759 - > 00:15:15,200 to that, that some of the structure goes away. 324 00:15:15,279 - > 00:15:19,039 Like at one point, I took a lean six sigma certification because 325 00:15:19,039 - > 00:15:20,320 I needed a framework. 326 00:15:20,480 - > 00:15:24,559 I was involved in a heavily operational project across pan 327 00:15:24,879 - > 00:15:27,360 organization, and like everybody was using different language, 328 00:15:27,440 - > 00:15:30,559 and I just needed a framework and it did a little research, 329 00:15:30,639 - > 00:15:33,360 and that was the obvious language and vocabulary. 330 00:15:33,440 - > 00:15:36,320 And if I could communicate in that model and help people kind 331 00:15:36,320 - > 00:15:38,720 of understand and give a little bit of places for people to go 332 00:15:38,720 - > 00:15:41,200 research and understand, then they could keep up. 333 00:15:41,360 - > 00:15:45,600 And that is sort of similar to leveraging ethnographic research 334 00:15:45,600 - > 00:15:48,879 studies and affinity diagrams and I love user story maps. 335 00:15:48,960 - > 00:15:50,559 Can I do a user story map for every feature? 336 00:15:50,799 - > 00:15:50,960 No. 337 00:15:51,120 - > 00:15:52,480 Does it need to be done for every feature? 338 00:15:52,559 - > 00:15:52,720 No. 339 00:15:52,879 - > 00:15:55,600 But when I came into the organization I'm at now, the 340 00:15:55,600 - > 00:15:59,120 product managers were very green and they didn't really have that 341 00:15:59,120 - > 00:16:01,759 same level of coaching and leadership, and they hadn't been 342 00:16:01,759 - > 00:16:05,039 part of those, you know, big undertaking soup to not 343 00:16:05,200 - > 00:16:05,519 projects. 344 00:16:05,600 - > 00:16:07,679 And so introduced them to user story maps. 345 00:16:07,759 - > 00:16:10,879 And we did it on Miro, which was a lot less fun than doing it in 346 00:16:10,879 - > 00:16:11,200 person. 347 00:16:11,519 - > 00:16:14,960 But we helped, it helped them and it helped them. 348 00:16:15,200 - > 00:16:17,679 Part of the project here was to convert from a sales led to a 349 00:16:17,679 - > 00:16:21,360 product-led organization, but it helped the org understand the 350 00:16:21,519 - > 00:16:24,960 trade-off and decision-making process and you know how you can 351 00:16:24,960 - > 00:16:27,279 slice into an MVP or a V1 and all those things. 352 00:16:27,360 - > 00:16:32,240 And so, in a very roundabout way, it's if we can get the 353 00:16:32,240 - > 00:16:37,600 thinking right, I don't think we always need to apply a tool set 354 00:16:37,840 - > 00:16:41,759 to every product development decision that needs to be made. 355 00:16:41,919 - > 00:16:45,120 And then when you throw in things like cowork and cloud 356 00:16:45,120 - > 00:16:48,720 code and all this V0 and lovable, I mean, it's like 357 00:16:48,960 - > 00:16:52,639 they've they're starting to replace some of that process so 358 00:16:52,639 - > 00:16:56,879 long as you don't displace the customer and the user needs. 359 00:16:58,320 - > 00:16:59,679 SPEAKER_02: Yeah, what a great point. 360 00:16:59,919 - > 00:17:03,919 And that was going to be the my follow-on question was in this 361 00:17:03,919 - > 00:17:08,240 age of AI, we hear so many different ways that AI is being 362 00:17:08,240 - > 00:17:11,599 infused into sort of the more discovery process. 363 00:17:11,839 - > 00:17:15,279 Vidy and I have a very specific point of view around this, but 364 00:17:15,279 - > 00:17:19,519 I'd love to hear your point of view on when and where is AI 365 00:17:19,680 - > 00:17:23,440 appropriate in this sort of I'm gonna call it the discovery 366 00:17:23,440 - > 00:17:25,839 process, which is amorphous and people define it in different 367 00:17:25,839 - > 00:17:26,160 ways. 368 00:17:26,400 - > 00:17:30,559 But how do you think about AI and where it should go and where 369 00:17:30,559 - > 00:17:33,119 we need to stay at the grassroots where we've been? 370 00:17:33,440 - > 00:17:36,160 SPEAKER_00: Yeah, this feels like a trap, but I will I will 371 00:17:36,160 - > 00:17:37,279 give you my my perspective. 372 00:17:37,599 - > 00:17:39,440 SPEAKER_02: It wasn't meant to be a trap, not meant to be no 373 00:17:39,599 - > 00:17:40,000 trap. 374 00:17:40,319 - > 00:17:46,319 SPEAKER_00: So I love the ability to even back to the book 375 00:17:46,319 - > 00:17:47,359 on user story maps. 376 00:17:47,440 - > 00:17:51,039 Like one of my favorite images is three people shaking hands, 377 00:17:51,119 - > 00:17:53,359 all in agreement, and one of them with a thought bubble of a 378 00:17:53,359 - > 00:17:55,599 triangle, one with a thought bubble of a circle, and one with 379 00:17:55,599 - > 00:17:57,359 a thought bubble of a square, right? 380 00:17:57,519 - > 00:17:59,440 And they're all 100% dialed in. 381 00:17:59,599 - > 00:17:59,920 Love it. 382 00:18:00,000 - > 00:18:02,160 We're ready to rock and roll, let's do this. 383 00:18:02,720 - > 00:18:07,039 The ability to make sure that everybody's thinking about a 384 00:18:07,039 - > 00:18:10,640 triangle is like it is awesome. 385 00:18:10,880 - > 00:18:13,680 For me to be able to, I'm not a coder, for me to be able to 386 00:18:13,680 - > 00:18:19,440 write a PRD with Claude and then tell Claude to make it and then 387 00:18:19,440 - > 00:18:21,920 take that to my team, be like, this is what I'm trying to 388 00:18:21,920 - > 00:18:22,319 describe. 389 00:18:22,480 - > 00:18:24,319 I heard this on a client call the other day. 390 00:18:24,480 - > 00:18:27,119 Like, let's fit, let's shop this a little bit and figure out if 391 00:18:27,119 - > 00:18:30,559 this is a scaled opportunity or if this is kind of a one-off and 392 00:18:30,559 - > 00:18:32,799 figure out if we want to apply resourcing to it. 393 00:18:33,119 - > 00:18:36,079 No question whatsoever as to what it is we're talking about. 394 00:18:36,240 - > 00:18:39,200 And the team immediately goes into edge cases, right? 395 00:18:39,279 - > 00:18:40,480 That's good and bad. 396 00:18:40,799 - > 00:18:48,079 But the rapid ability to get complete and total alignment is 397 00:18:48,240 - > 00:18:51,680 like something that I think product management is has been 398 00:18:51,680 - > 00:18:53,920 screaming for since inception, maybe. 399 00:18:54,079 - > 00:18:57,039 And it just cuts the timeline so dramatically. 400 00:18:57,200 - > 00:18:59,839 The other thing I think it's doing is allowing the 401 00:18:59,839 - > 00:19:04,559 engineering team to become a much bigger part of the 402 00:19:04,559 - > 00:19:08,960 discovery process because they can, what I've been finding is 403 00:19:08,960 - > 00:19:14,640 that if I can get a high-level output PRD over to an engineer 404 00:19:14,640 - > 00:19:18,319 that's equipped with an AI toolkit that understands the 405 00:19:18,319 - > 00:19:21,839 stack, they can not only prototype for validation, but 406 00:19:21,839 - > 00:19:23,920 they can also do it in a production-ready fashion. 407 00:19:24,000 - > 00:19:26,400 And we're shipping things on weekends that would have taken 408 00:19:26,400 - > 00:19:27,440 us months before. 409 00:19:27,680 - > 00:19:31,119 And so, as much as I hate the idea of replacing people with 410 00:19:31,119 - > 00:19:35,359 AI, I absolutely love the human in the loop, superpower people, 411 00:19:35,519 - > 00:19:37,599 and make sure to push on the guardrails, right? 412 00:19:37,680 - > 00:19:39,279 And leverage it for discovery. 413 00:19:39,519 - > 00:19:42,640 Should you build everything zero to want and be the first one 414 00:19:42,640 - > 00:19:46,240 person billion dollar organization, a lault man and 415 00:19:46,240 - > 00:19:48,160 all the powers that be, like that's not really what I'm 416 00:19:48,160 - > 00:19:50,720 chasing because I think there's a lot of there's a lot of risk 417 00:19:50,720 - > 00:19:52,559 and scale that approach. 418 00:19:53,519 - > 00:19:57,279 SPEAKER_01: I think the way that you just set this up in terms of 419 00:19:57,279 - > 00:20:01,359 how you presented that to your team, how you're sharing the 420 00:20:01,359 - > 00:20:02,960 structure and like what you expect. 421 00:20:03,119 - > 00:20:05,920 I heard this, I'm showing you what this looks like. 422 00:20:06,160 - > 00:20:08,720 And then it's really like, let's go test this, right? 423 00:20:08,799 - > 00:20:11,759 This isn't a go build, this is a starting point to get us very 424 00:20:11,759 - > 00:20:13,200 quickly on the same page. 425 00:20:13,440 - > 00:20:15,759 I love that framing from a leadership point of view. 426 00:20:15,920 - > 00:20:16,319 What else? 427 00:20:16,480 - > 00:20:19,759 How else are you guiding your team in terms of use of these 428 00:20:19,759 - > 00:20:20,319 new tools? 429 00:20:20,480 - > 00:20:23,119 What else are you telling them and modeling behavior on? 430 00:20:23,440 - > 00:20:26,720 SPEAKER_00: One thing that we have found that the company as a 431 00:20:26,720 - > 00:20:29,680 whole, we're a small company, but that there's not a really 432 00:20:30,400 - > 00:20:33,359 there's not a big operations side of the organization, 433 00:20:33,440 - > 00:20:35,680 especially like a tech-enabled operations side of the 434 00:20:35,680 - > 00:20:36,160 organization. 435 00:20:36,319 - > 00:20:39,839 And so I've been turning the team loose on our internal 436 00:20:39,839 - > 00:20:45,440 processes recently because a lot of it has to do with extracting, 437 00:20:45,680 - > 00:20:50,480 understanding, and translating and transforming data for either 438 00:20:50,480 - > 00:20:53,519 external purposes, client purposes, or even business 439 00:20:53,519 - > 00:20:54,799 intelligence and internal. 440 00:20:54,960 - > 00:20:57,839 And how can we communicate back to the organization in an 441 00:20:57,839 - > 00:20:58,559 effective fashion? 442 00:20:58,640 - > 00:21:02,559 And so we've been giving a long leash in a safe way. 443 00:21:02,640 - > 00:21:06,000 We use bedrock and PIIs covered and obfuscated and all those 444 00:21:06,000 - > 00:21:06,400 types of things. 445 00:21:06,480 - > 00:21:08,960 So we put policy and guardrail around it to make sure people 446 00:21:08,960 - > 00:21:10,799 aren't making just silly choices. 447 00:21:11,039 - > 00:21:17,759 But the ability to be a leader from a product perspective is so 448 00:21:17,759 - > 00:21:20,559 rooted in communication and the ability to communicate across 449 00:21:20,559 - > 00:21:23,200 the organization depends on data, in my perspective. 450 00:21:23,440 - > 00:21:26,000 You can have a really strong conviction, but if you can't get 451 00:21:26,000 - > 00:21:28,480 out and prove it somehow, then it's not really all that great. 452 00:21:28,640 - > 00:21:31,839 And so I've been, everybody on the team has a cloud license. 453 00:21:32,000 - > 00:21:36,319 Everybody is able to come to the table with a show and tell on a 454 00:21:36,319 - > 00:21:37,119 regular basis. 455 00:21:37,359 - > 00:21:39,680 We've got the Slack channels, we're showing off all the cool 456 00:21:39,680 - > 00:21:40,720 things that we're doing. 457 00:21:40,880 - > 00:21:44,240 But the risk is not getting distracted by the shiny objects, 458 00:21:44,400 - > 00:21:47,279 I think, because you can go so fast and because you can do 459 00:21:47,279 - > 00:21:48,480 anything anytime. 460 00:21:48,720 - > 00:21:52,799 And the worst thing that I have seen so far is somebody builds a 461 00:21:52,799 - > 00:21:56,000 wonderful automation and it creates this great deliverable, 462 00:21:56,319 - > 00:21:59,759 but the team that's supposed to then use it tries. 463 00:22:00,160 - > 00:22:02,400 At one time, doesn't really get it fully, didn't have all the 464 00:22:02,400 - > 00:22:05,359 context, doesn't you know know the narrative, and instead just 465 00:22:05,359 - > 00:22:07,920 defaults back to their old clumsy spreadsheets that they 466 00:22:07,920 - > 00:22:08,400 used to use. 467 00:22:08,640 - > 00:22:10,960 So I do think it is it's a blessing and a curse. 468 00:22:11,279 - > 00:22:14,000 You can do everything, but it can result in doing nothing if 469 00:22:14,000 - > 00:22:15,039 you're not careful. 470 00:22:15,359 - > 00:22:16,480 SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so true. 471 00:22:16,640 - > 00:22:20,240 And and your response on how you're using AI is fantastic. 472 00:22:20,400 - > 00:22:22,240 And that wasn't meaning to set you up at all. 473 00:22:22,640 - > 00:22:23,440 So I didn't get trapped. 474 00:22:23,759 - > 00:22:25,119 Yeah, no, you didn't get trapped. 475 00:22:25,359 - > 00:22:29,359 No, I feel like one of our biggest challenges that we see 476 00:22:29,359 - > 00:22:34,079 with teams is not leveraging their own critical thinking and 477 00:22:34,079 - > 00:22:36,400 listening skills prior to using AI, right? 478 00:22:36,480 - > 00:22:38,880 Oh, I'm just going to use AI to take all this and tell me what 479 00:22:38,880 - > 00:22:39,680 to do next. 480 00:22:40,000 - > 00:22:44,319 We even had one team utilize AI as a customer for a customer 481 00:22:44,319 - > 00:22:45,599 interview about a product. 482 00:22:45,839 - > 00:22:49,759 So there's a time and place when AI is fantastic and it's really 483 00:22:49,759 - > 00:22:52,799 as a partner to your thinking, not as a surrogate, right? 484 00:22:52,960 - > 00:22:54,960 So I love your response. 485 00:22:55,759 - > 00:22:57,119 SPEAKER_00: AI is a tool. 486 00:22:57,279 - > 00:22:58,160 It's not a thing. 487 00:22:58,319 - > 00:22:58,480 Yeah. 488 00:22:59,039 - > 00:23:02,240 And if you understand that it's a tool and use it as a tool for 489 00:23:02,240 - > 00:23:05,359 what the tool is good at, it's incredibly powerful. 490 00:23:05,599 - > 00:23:07,599 If not, it just puts you in a build trip. 491 00:23:07,759 - > 00:23:09,200 You're just building stuff that nobody wants. 492 00:23:09,279 - > 00:23:10,480 And so it has no value. 493 00:23:10,720 - > 00:23:11,519 SPEAKER_02: And faster. 494 00:23:11,759 - > 00:23:12,319 SPEAKER_00: Faster. 495 00:23:12,640 - > 00:23:13,759 And sloppier. 496 00:23:14,000 - > 00:23:16,160 And nobody even knows what's going on behind the scenes. 497 00:23:16,240 - > 00:23:16,880 Yeah. 498 00:23:17,200 - > 00:23:17,599 SPEAKER_02: Yeah. 499 00:23:17,839 - > 00:23:20,960 One of the questions we get from some of the leaders that we work 500 00:23:20,960 - > 00:23:26,160 with is it's really hard to understand the return on the 501 00:23:26,160 - > 00:23:28,960 investment we're making in some of these AI tools and sort of 502 00:23:28,960 - > 00:23:31,200 augmenting our processes with AI. 503 00:23:31,519 - > 00:23:32,480 What's your response? 504 00:23:32,960 - > 00:23:34,079 What's your response to that? 505 00:23:34,160 - > 00:23:35,039 Is that important? 506 00:23:35,200 - > 00:23:37,759 Is if it is, how are you doing that? 507 00:23:38,000 - > 00:23:41,440 And if not, what do you want to do to make that happen? 508 00:23:41,839 - > 00:23:45,279 SPEAKER_00: If I followed the question well, we have found 509 00:23:45,279 - > 00:23:48,480 very measurable value on our engineering side of the house in 510 00:23:48,480 - > 00:23:49,680 terms of what we can share. 511 00:23:49,839 - > 00:23:54,160 Now, we also are very, very cognizant on what can it do for 512 00:23:54,160 - > 00:23:56,960 our legacy stack versus what can it do for our net new feature 513 00:23:56,960 - > 00:23:57,519 functionality. 514 00:23:57,680 - > 00:23:59,200 We try to move to shared services. 515 00:23:59,279 - > 00:24:00,799 And so making sure that all those things have 516 00:24:00,799 - > 00:24:03,920 well-documented endpoints and all those things are wonderful, 517 00:24:04,000 - > 00:24:08,000 but we still risk a QA bottleneck if we're doing too 518 00:24:08,000 - > 00:24:09,680 much and too big and too fast. 519 00:24:09,759 - > 00:24:13,279 And so we've taken a very metered approach there, but I 520 00:24:13,279 - > 00:24:17,759 can tell you that a zero-to-one replacement of a tool that we're 521 00:24:17,759 - > 00:24:22,720 licensing right now cost me$700 to build over the last six days. 522 00:24:22,880 - > 00:24:25,359 And so I know exactly what the reward is there. 523 00:24:25,920 - > 00:24:28,319 That's a$60,000 offset. 524 00:24:28,480 - > 00:24:31,920 And so rock and roll, we're gonna we're gonna put that to 525 00:24:31,920 - > 00:24:32,480 production. 526 00:24:33,359 - > 00:24:38,000 On the more product side and business side of the house, it 527 00:24:38,000 - > 00:24:40,079 can be a little bit more challenging. 528 00:24:40,319 - > 00:24:45,359 And so as I mentioned earlier, by pointing the team with these 529 00:24:45,359 - > 00:24:49,119 tools to our internal operational workflows and 530 00:24:49,119 - > 00:24:52,720 processes, we're able to measure it in man hour offset. 531 00:24:53,039 - > 00:24:57,359 And it's like quite literally taking a couple hours of click, 532 00:24:57,519 - > 00:25:03,119 copy, paste work and turning it down into boop, right? 533 00:25:03,200 - > 00:25:04,160 Just boop it. 534 00:25:04,240 - > 00:25:07,839 And it's done and it's logged, and you can review it and you 535 00:25:07,839 - > 00:25:08,880 can validate it. 536 00:25:09,039 - > 00:25:11,839 And you know, it looks great, and it can automatically send 537 00:25:11,839 - > 00:25:14,799 and dump in a Salesforce and be ready for the AEs to take it, 538 00:25:14,880 - > 00:25:15,680 like all the things. 539 00:25:15,759 - > 00:25:17,920 It's fantastic, hyper-measurable. 540 00:25:18,240 - > 00:25:22,880 Can I say the same thing for my teams just kind of rapidly 541 00:25:22,880 - > 00:25:25,119 prototyping a bunch of great ideas that day? 542 00:25:25,200 - > 00:25:25,920 Like, probably not. 543 00:25:26,000 - > 00:25:28,240 I mean, I think that's probably on the negative, maybe the 544 00:25:28,240 - > 00:25:29,200 adverse impact. 545 00:25:29,440 - > 00:25:32,480 We've been trying to be pretty metered and pretty measured with 546 00:25:32,480 - > 00:25:35,119 how exactly we're rolling everything out and making sure 547 00:25:35,119 - > 00:25:41,200 that it does have quantifiable, valid, positive impact on the 548 00:25:41,200 - > 00:25:45,599 business, whether that's in in favor of chasing revenue 549 00:25:45,599 - > 00:25:48,000 opportunities or reducing costs, like both of those, all of those 550 00:25:48,000 - > 00:25:48,640 things matter. 551 00:25:49,039 - > 00:25:49,759 SPEAKER_01: So interesting. 552 00:25:49,920 - > 00:25:51,440 I love the practical nature of it. 553 00:25:51,519 - > 00:25:54,720 I think just giving us really very specific, this is exactly 554 00:25:54,720 - > 00:25:56,720 what I'm doing, is is going to be so helpful. 555 00:25:56,880 - > 00:25:58,880 Like everyone's learning this together. 556 00:25:59,119 - > 00:26:01,920 Just as we come to the end of this, it's been such a great 557 00:26:01,920 - > 00:26:02,480 conversation. 558 00:26:02,640 - > 00:26:04,000 What other advice would you give? 559 00:26:04,160 - > 00:26:06,559 We started with this, this is a dangerous place. 560 00:26:06,720 - > 00:26:10,000 I think there's a lot of things that you said that make it 561 00:26:10,000 - > 00:26:10,640 safer. 562 00:26:10,880 - > 00:26:13,200 What other advice would you give to someone who needs to be a 563 00:26:13,200 - > 00:26:16,160 rebel right now, to one of your peers out there as a product 564 00:26:16,160 - > 00:26:16,640 leader? 565 00:26:16,960 - > 00:26:18,799 SPEAKER_00: Look, I think it's the people around you. 566 00:26:18,960 - > 00:26:23,119 There's no sense in trying to be on a solo mission, so to speak. 567 00:26:23,359 - > 00:26:25,680 One rebel doesn't get very far, but you get a whole group of 568 00:26:25,680 - > 00:26:27,119 rebels together and it and it goes fast. 569 00:26:27,200 - > 00:26:30,160 And so I think that's what I've taken away from my career, as I 570 00:26:30,160 - > 00:26:33,759 can reflect back, is it's you know, get behind somebody else's 571 00:26:33,759 - > 00:26:35,759 good idea is equally as effective as having your own 572 00:26:35,759 - > 00:26:38,160 good idea and finding other people that believe you and 573 00:26:38,240 - > 00:26:40,559 finding those mentors, finding the people who are going to give 574 00:26:40,559 - > 00:26:43,039 you the room to explore and fail fast. 575 00:26:43,119 - > 00:26:45,920 And it's not gonna be, it's not gonna be a punishment on the 576 00:26:45,920 - > 00:26:46,640 other side of that. 577 00:26:46,880 - > 00:26:50,240 Which I guess said in a word is just like it's team, it's way 578 00:26:50,240 - > 00:26:50,400 more. 579 00:26:50,480 - > 00:26:53,440 That's why I focus so much on leadership and making sure that 580 00:26:53,440 - > 00:26:55,759 I'm bringing good people along for the ride and making sure 581 00:26:55,759 - > 00:26:58,400 that I'm always at risk of having somebody replace me 582 00:26:58,480 - > 00:27:00,400 because that means that we're just we're powerful. 583 00:27:00,559 - > 00:27:02,079 We can do a lot more together. 584 00:27:02,400 - > 00:27:03,440 SPEAKER_02: That's great advice. 585 00:27:03,680 - > 00:27:05,519 What's one thing we can brag about you right now? 586 00:27:05,599 - > 00:27:07,680 What do you what's one thing you're really excited about that 587 00:27:07,680 - > 00:27:09,279 you want to share with the audience? 588 00:27:09,599 - > 00:27:12,559 SPEAKER_00: I think we're where I work in the space I work in 589 00:27:12,559 - > 00:27:14,640 right now is high impact tutoring. 590 00:27:14,799 - > 00:27:17,680 And if I'm sure you follow the same news I follow. 591 00:27:17,839 - > 00:27:20,559 High impact tutoring is is having a moment. 592 00:27:20,960 - > 00:27:24,720 And the reason it's having a moment is because the nation, 593 00:27:24,880 - > 00:27:28,559 especially in our KA space, is in an absolute crisis when it 594 00:27:28,559 - > 00:27:32,160 comes to students' ability to read and do math in particular. 595 00:27:32,400 - > 00:27:36,319 Those are undisputed indicators of persistence and success and 596 00:27:36,319 - > 00:27:39,759 the ability to find yourself in the career and the life that you 597 00:27:39,759 - > 00:27:43,359 want as a human outside of education system, but complete 598 00:27:43,359 - > 00:27:46,480 your educational pathways and be successful in those journeys 599 00:27:46,480 - > 00:27:47,200 while you're there. 600 00:27:47,359 - > 00:27:50,480 And so we have built, and through random control trial 601 00:27:50,480 - > 00:27:51,599 study, which is awesome, right? 602 00:27:51,680 - > 00:27:54,160 That's usually talked about in pharma, not education. 603 00:27:54,400 - > 00:27:59,279 We've proven that our intervention can drive outcomes 604 00:27:59,279 - > 00:28:02,319 to the tune of 10% telepoint improvement on standardized 605 00:28:02,319 - > 00:28:04,960 assessments, which is something that is very difficult to be 606 00:28:04,960 - > 00:28:05,839 able to say. 607 00:28:06,240 - > 00:28:09,279 Because it was so successful, and actually this kind of goes 608 00:28:09,279 - > 00:28:10,319 back to our earlier conversation. 609 00:28:10,400 - > 00:28:12,640 We were listening to the market, and the market said, we love 610 00:28:12,640 - > 00:28:13,920 what you're doing with reading. 611 00:28:14,079 - > 00:28:15,440 Can you please do it with math? 612 00:28:15,599 - > 00:28:18,079 And so we brought math to market four months later. 613 00:28:18,160 - > 00:28:20,079 And we we did all the things we've been talking about. 614 00:28:20,240 - > 00:28:23,200 We went really fast and we broke things, but we got it to the 615 00:28:23,440 - > 00:28:27,039 market, and it is proving out to have very accomplible results. 616 00:28:27,200 - > 00:28:30,799 And I think it's just a killer opportunity to be able to play a 617 00:28:30,799 - > 00:28:34,559 massive role and to contribute to the tailwinds that this model 618 00:28:34,559 - > 00:28:38,160 is getting because there's so many other toys and tools in the 619 00:28:38,160 - > 00:28:41,359 education system that are simply unproven and a distraction. 620 00:28:41,519 - > 00:28:44,720 So I think it's really wonderful what we've built at Booknook. 621 00:28:44,960 - > 00:28:47,680 I think it's wonderful what our team is capable of doing, and I 622 00:28:47,680 - > 00:28:50,319 think it's an honor to be part of a mission-driven organization 623 00:28:50,319 - > 00:28:50,960 like this. 624 00:28:52,160 - > 00:28:53,680 SPEAKER_01: What a cool impact. 625 00:28:53,839 - > 00:28:54,160 Wow. 626 00:28:54,319 - > 00:28:56,559 That's what and what a great way to end this. 627 00:28:56,640 - > 00:28:57,920 That's kind of goosebumps. 628 00:28:58,160 - > 00:28:59,839 Congratulations to you and your space. 629 00:29:02,160 - > 00:29:03,119 SPEAKER_02: We're gonna fix it. 630 00:29:03,839 - > 00:29:05,519 SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, please do. 631 00:29:05,759 - > 00:29:06,480 I hope so. 632 00:29:06,640 - > 00:29:08,079 Yeah, I hope so too. 633 00:29:08,319 - > 00:29:11,039 Jared, this has been an absolute pleasure learning from you, 634 00:29:11,200 - > 00:29:11,839 listening to you. 635 00:29:11,920 - > 00:29:13,359 Thank you so much for joining us. 636 00:29:13,599 - > 00:29:16,400 SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much again, appreciate it. 637 00:29:17,759 - > 00:29:20,160 SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening to this episode of the Product 638 00:29:20,160 - > 00:29:21,200 Rebels podcast. 639 00:29:21,279 - > 00:29:23,279 SPEAKER_02: If you enjoyed this conversation and want to learn 640 00:29:23,279 - > 00:29:26,000 more from Product Rebels from companies like Netflix, 641 00:29:26,160 - > 00:29:29,519 Amplitude, and beyond, please follow us wherever you listen to 642 00:29:29,519 - > 00:29:32,880 podcasts and join us for another impactful interview in about two 643 00:29:32,880 - > 00:29:33,519 weeks.