From ChatGPT to Instagram to Uber: The quiet architect behind the world’s most popular products

You built and led Facebook news feeds.

You shipped the messenger app as its own

app. You launched Chad GPT enterprise.

What's an important lesson you've

learned about what it takes to succeed

building something from idea to one to

billions. You have to plan your chess

moves out in advance. You have to really

think before you act and build systems

that are going to let you go sustainably

faster. What's the most counterintuitive

lesson you've learned? Sometimes your

product actually doesn't matter. At

Uber, I learned this because really the

price and the ETA at Uber was the

product. Looking at it from a holistic

perspective, we humans consume the

entirety of the product. It's not to say

that you shouldn't fix the bug, but it

doesn't have as much of an impact as

something that is more important to

people. What's one specific thing you

think will change in a big way with AI

that people don't think enough about?

Education is going to change. My son, he

was nine at the time, built a custom GPT

that you can type in any topic and it

would give you a sentence that had every

letter of the English alphabet. Isn't

that mind-blowing? I can already see his

brain rewiring. What's one thing you

look for in people you hire? In 6

months, if I'm telling you what to do,

I've hired the wrong person. It helps me

and the person operate on a different

level where the goal is not, did you hit

this OKR? The meta goal becomes, are we

calibrating enough? Are we actually

getting to a spot where in 6 months

you're the one telling me what needs to

be done? What's something you've learned

about what it takes to be a great

product person? I think there are five

different types of product managers.

Number one is

today my guest is Peter Deng. Peter is

maybe the most under the radar impactful

product leader that you have never heard

of. I often say that the best product

people are not the people on Twitter and

LinkedIn sharing advice, but the people

who don't have time to do that because

they are too busy doing the work. Peter

is the epitome of this. He was VP of

product at OpenAI where he oversaw

product design and engineering for chat

GBT and helped ship chat GPT enterprise

voice memory desktop custom GBTs and

more. He also oversaw and built their

first growth team. He was the first head

of product at Instagram where he worked

closely with Mike and Kevin and oversaw

all product development including on

content sharing, ads growth, even helped

build out their design and user research

functions. He was also head of the rider

product team at Uber where he oversaw

everything in the rider app including

big improvements to pickups and drop

offs in Uber pool and airports. He also

helped the team launch new products

including Uber Reserve which is now

approaching a $5 billion a year

business. He also spent nearly 10 years

at Facebook as their fourth ever product

manager where he built and led the team

behind the current newsfeed product, the

standalone messenger app, also photos

and groups and homepage and profiles. He

was also chief product officer at Air

Table where he helped the company

systemize how they built products and

transitioned to enterprise. He also led

product management at Oculus. These days

he is a general partner at Felicus where

he's able to bring everything he's

learned to more founders as an investor.

He has never done a podcast before or

shared any of these lessons or stories

publicly. So you are in for a real

treat. A huge thank you to Eric Antinau,

Nick Turley, Lauren Motomedi, Joan Jen,

and Sundeep Jane for contributing

questions and topics to this

conversation. If you enjoy this podcast,

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With that, I bring you Peter Deng. Many

of you are building AI products, which

is why I'm very excited to chat with

Brandon Fu, founder and CEO of Paragon.

Hey, Brandon. Hey, Lenny. Thanks for

having me. So integrations have become a

big deal for AI products. Why is that?

Integrations are missionritical for AI

for two reasons. First, AI products need

contacts from their customers business

data such as Google Drive files, Slack

messages, or CRM records. Second, for AI

products to automate work on behalf of

users, AI agents need to be able to take

action across these different third

party tools. So where does Paragon fit

into all this? Well, these integrations

are a pain to build and that's why

Paragon provides an embedded platform

that enables engineers to ship these

product integrations in just days

instead of months across every use case

from rag data ingestion to agentic

actions. And I know from firsthand

experience that maintenance is even

harder than just building it for the

first time. Exactly. We believe product

teams should focus engineering efforts

on competitive advantages, not

integrations. That's why companies like

you.com, AI21, and hundreds of others

use Paragon to accelerate their

integration strategy. If you want to

avoid wasting months of engineering on

integrations that your customers need,

check out Paragon at

useparagon.com/lenny.

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Peter, thank you so much for being here

and welcome to the podcast. Thank you.

I'm so thrilled to be here. Really

honored. Looking forward to having a

great time here. As we were preparing

for this conversation, we were jamming

on what we should focus on. There's so

much that we're going to talk about, but

something that you said was really

interesting, and I'm really excited to

start with this, which is that you've uh

you've always felt that you haven't been

able to say all the things you really

think and feel because you've been

within corporations, PR people, keeping

on message, and this is the first time

that you feel free to share. First time.

Okay. So, first of all, just how does

that feel? Second of all, tell us

something that you've been wanting to

share that you can finally talk about.

Well, it it feels really good. So I let

me ask I love it that you're starting

with a spicy question here. Um and um

let me share some more context behind

it. Um it's you know I'm here to speak

more freely but it's not really what you

think. I'm not here to divulge any

secrets uh from the companies but

naturally I'm kind of a storyteller. I'm

kind of an introvert. So this podcast I

feel like I have the ability to go

deeper with you on uh any topic and kind

of add the context because I think the

new without some of the context some of

my spicy takes or whatnot might be taken

out of context and just not having the

time pressure not feeling like there's

some you know PR message I have to hit

is just really freeing. So, it feels

awesome. Really, anything that is on

your mind that you would find

interesting to your to your listeners,

I'm here for it. And yeah, excited.

Something I always tell guests, and I

don't want people to take this out of

context also, but I always describe

myself as a a reverse journalist where I

want the guest to be the best version of

themselves. I never want to catch people

off guard or just say something they

never meant to say. So, that's a safe

space. Okay. Okay. But still, is there

anything that you want to share or that

might be interesting to share that

you've been wanting to share that you

haven't been able to? Is there anything

along those lines? I mean, always get

this question around sort of, you know,

AGI, is it coming? Is it going to is it

going to solve everything?

I mean, it's so interesting because, you

know, when I was at OpenAI, it was

around the time that people were really

scared of AI and, you know, oh, it's

going to, you know, get rid of humans or

it's going to just, you know, do all

these things. But with every technology,

I think everyone's been just kind of

taking some time to acclimate to it. And

I think with AGI, it's a similar thing,

which is it's so far out that everyone's

like, well, is it is it what's what's

our world going to be like? And the real

answer is like none of us really know.

But in terms of solving problems, I

think some people believe AGI is going

to solve everything, but I don't think

so. Um, AGI is just necessary, but not

sufficient. A lot of the value is still

going to require a bunch of hustle from

a lot of builders to really turn that

new source of energy and channel it into

something that we humans want to use

that solves some of our problems. And

that hustle is going to be required that

elbow grease is going to be required to

really make AGI something useful. Your

point is that people think AGI hits all

of a sudden all jobs are gone. AGI is

doing everything because I think this is

a a optimistic message that things will

be okay if AGI basically uh AGI being uh

and I'm curious if you have a clearer

definition but AGI being uh AI being

just basically as smart as humans. Look,

I'm I won't claim to be an expert on

this at all. Um but I I just I think

that with every technology that's come

out, we've been able to harness it and

it takes a lot of harnessing. I think

I'm going to use that word very

deliberately, right? I'll I'll use

something really basic what seems

obvious today is that you know there was

a time when databases were all the rage.

It's like, oh my goodness, you can store

a bunch of data and you can query it

really quickly and like imagine all the

possibilities. And I think that a lot of

amazing entrepreneurs and builders, you

know, build some really great products

on top of databases, right? In fact,

that's kind of the basis of all the

stuff that we're seeing today. And it

seems so obvious today, but I I don't

know, maybe in in, you know, 10 years,

15 years when we look back, it's like,

of course, it made sense that we have

this super intelligent, you know,

thinking machine, but it requires uh

product builders to be able to go in

there and say, how do we channel this

energy to make it something that we as

humans love to use and want to use? I

love the optimism around this. It's just

like things will not go crazy once uh

computers are as generally intelligent

as as humans. I I I think that's that's

exactly the the the what I'm trying to

say and I think that again every

technology people uh have this fear

right and I remember reading or sorry

watching a documentary once and they

were talking about how when the bicycle

came out people were like oh my goodness

this is going to be the end of all

things and it again it sounds silly

today right because you're like bicycles

really but then if you put yourself in

the context in the mindset of a previous

generation which you know are the next

gener generation will be looking back at

this podcast in that previous

generation. I think that, you know,

again, I think optimistically things are

going to be okay. We're going to adapt.

Um, and this was actually one of the

things that I talked about with my fresh

friend Josh Constein at South by

Southwest is this idea that humans will

always co-evolve with technology. And I

think that that co-evolution is already

happening. If you take a look at sort of

um there was a lot of uh a fear of AI

just when Chachi BT came out but you

know when you start to get familiar with

it things that kind of things change and

then you are able to to evolve from

being you know fearful to uh familiar

and to go all the way to having this

this mastery of this thing of like oh my

goodness like look at all the startups

that are happening now all the things

that we can build right and just over 18

months I would say we look back and

there's been an attitude shift Right.

And so I guess part of my optimism comes

from if you look back 18 months and you

look forward 18 months, like might it be

the same thing for something that we're

we're chasing now? Let me follow this AI

thread a little bit more and then we can

move on to other things. I feel like

every conversation there's like a time

to AI conversation and then it's like

okay there's other things that also

matter. So let me ask you this the

question. What's what's one specific

thing you think will change in a big way

with AI that people don't think enough

about? I think education is going to

change in a big way. And I think a lot

about this because um I'm involved in my

kids school uh quite a bit and that's

something I've done after I I left

OpenAI. And what's fascinating to me is

that, you know, watching my son who got

to, you know, dog food a bunch of the

Open AI stuff before it was public. I

think that was uh I think I can saf

safely say that that seems okay. And uh

when he was was playing with like you

know Chachi PT and some of the the

latest models and he's he's uh he was

nine at the time. I can already see his

brain rewiring right he was starting to

ask questions and he never heard the

word prompt before but his like just

this is how awesome the human mind is

because he was exposed to this

technology at an early age. Some things

just are unlocked. Um, and I think that

you're able to think differently. And I

I'll give you a specific example of of

what I mean here. You know, he you know,

he goes to Python class, right? And he's

he's coding. Now, I don't actually think

he's going to have to code when he grows

up. I think that's going to be a solved

problem. But it's a very very valuable

skill because I think learning to

program is learning how to think

structure in a structured way, right? In

very semantic way, um, a systematic way.

And you know he was he he was prompting

uh Chachi BT with some really crazy

things that I never even thought of. And

one of the things was hey Chachi PT can

you give me a sentence that has every

letter in the alphabet

along the theme of oceans or along the

theme of space. And the reason this kind

of blew my mind is because in

traditional programming you couldn't

write that program.

you can't say to, you know, in in Python

like, oh, write a function that goes and

and formulate. I mean, it's a really

difficult function to write, but for,

you know, him to be able to think of

that prompt, which is really cool

because he built a custom GPT that you

can type in any topic and it would give

you a sentence that had every letter of

the English alphabet, kind of like the

uh the quick brown fox jumped over the

lazy dog, right? Like, isn't that

mind-blowing? It's like that that he can

now at age nine he could think about

that whereas me at age nine I was

playing with Legos and like maybe Q

basic right and so this idea of how

young humans brains will evolve because

of this new tool we have is going to

change the way I think we're going to do

education right and I'll be very honest

I'm not an expert in education but I

just thought a lot about it and you know

one one thing I'm going to be I think

it's going to be really important in the

future is being able to figure out how

ask the right questions. you know, we

humans are in inherently inquisitive,

but you know, being inquisitive and

turning that into the right questions

to, you know, prompt or ask AI, which is

going to be again something that

everyone's going to have access to, is

going to be a a differentiator for sort

of what kind of work can be done, right?

And I I I I um the the analogy I'll draw

is when when the calculator was

invented, you know, people didn't stop

doing math, right? They just did higher

level math and it frees the mind up to

do other things and think more at a at a

higher level of abstraction. And I think

we got to prepare our kids on thinking

about well how do you think at a higher

level of abstraction and this has

happened before right I think Google has

made memory kind of obsolete like you

don't have to memorize facts anymore you

can just Google it right and the next

phase will be something around well code

will just appear if you summon it so

what are the things that you know people

will think about and the skills that

develop that are at the next level of

abstraction right that tap into our

creativity that tap into our curiosity

that's going to be really interesting.

So I think education is going to change

dramatically just like how progressive

education in the past switch from

memorization of like multiplication

tables into something that's a little

bit more you know kind of higher level

um higher level thinking and I think

that's going to that's going to be one

of those big areas. M this makes me

think about an NPR story I was just

listening to where they were following

professors using chat GPT to create

their curriculum. There's a lot of talk

of students using chat GPT cheating you

know having chat GBT write their essays

but teachers are using chatg in a big

way and and then uh students are rating

professors uh badly because they notice

they're using chat GBT for their

curriculum. So it's kind of this like

arms race. Well, well, but it's also

interesting because then that's that

goes further show further that like you

know the whole system has to change,

right? Because again I still believe

that human brains are in inherently

inquisitive and that we still need

development in some way but how that's

going to develop I'm I'm fascinated to

watch how that plays out. I want to get

back to product but first of all I know

something that uh you think a lot about

along these lines. This came up in many

conversations I had with folks that you

worked with is your uh emphasis on the

power and importance of language being

really good at thinking about the words

you use both in writing and speaking.

Just talk about how you think about that

just the importance and power of

language as a leader. I remember taking

this class that really stuck with me in

college. It was called language and

thought um and it was taught by Herbert

Clark and he had this thesis that kind

of blew my mind which is that you know

language actually affects the way you

think. That's one of the parts of the

thesis and I once I heard that and read

that in his book and listened to the

lecture I couldn't stop thinking about

that because it just rang so true.

Right? I grew up speaking Chinese and I

think that there's a lot of things of

just the Chinese language that, you

know, I feel like I noticed I thought

differently when I learned English,

right? And there were some studies

around this too. I think that there's I

think in in in I I'm not sure exactly. I

have to go check up on this, but I think

in Russian there there are two different

words for like a blue. There's like a

greenish blue and a bright blue or

something. I speak Russian. Uh, and I my

but it's like uh I was I I moved to the

US when I was six and so my Russian is

not great. So I'm trying to think of

this as you say it, but keep keep going.

Well, I mean I So So then this is great.

So I I I need to get a way to to to to

validate this. But you know, from what I

remember because there were these two

different words for this different

shades of blue. Russian speakers who

then learned English had an easier time

distinguishing between these two shades

of blue than and a faster time doing so

than people who had just grown up

speaking English. Um, so I read some

studies on also there's some other

languages that don't actually have a

word for blue I think and then that's

actually really hard for them to

distinguish over time. So that really

stuck with me and and I think that it's

kind of rings true. So when I, you know,

how I put it in practice is that when I

make slide decks, I gave a presentation

to a class a couple weeks ago and there

were probably a total of 20 words on the

entire slide deck and I spent hours

obsessing over them because I really

wanted to make sure I captured the right

essence of what I was trying to say. And

I think that crafting is really

important when you're working in product

because if you're sitting down and

you're writing a vision doc or you're

writing a PRD and you if you don't pay

attention to the words you use and

you're not intentional about it, those

have downstream effects. Like people

might misinterpret things, the

connotations may not actually come

through. And so I I really am very

careful about it because I think that

the there's a multiplicative effect and

a downstream effect for using the wrong

word. Um and I I I really believe in

that kind of language affecting thought

um thesis which is why I've just really

really paid attention to that. Yeah. And

I I feel like AI can help you with that

too. Yes. Well, actually speaking of AI,

actually that's a really interesting

point. I think it's really interesting

and kind of poetic that and and and

fitting that uh the breakthrough in

artificial intelligence came from large

language models, right? Like that's it's

interesting to me because you know

there's with every word in every

sentence so much of the knowledge is

encapsulated and shaped and when chatbt

does something really interesting I I

tell people it's often times just

writing Python code and interpreting it

and Python is a language yet again right

so I think that there's something really

interesting where like the condensation

of human thought in language has is

related to the LLMs and the advancements

in area that we have today. I think it

was Ilia on Dorash's podcast where he

was talking about how you may think LLMs

are just like, oh, just predicting the

next word. What's the big deal? But in

order to do that, it has to understand

the universe and everything in the world

that has ever happened and existed and

everything anyone's ever written to

predict the next word. Yeah. Love it.

Yeah. Okay. So, let me let me zoom out a

little bit and shift a little bit to

just product in general. Sure. You've

worked on at and built some of the most

iconic products in history. You worked

at OpenAI, Facebook, Uber, had a product

at Instagram. So, let me just ask you

this question and see where this goes.

What's the most counterintuitive lesson

you've learned about building products

or leading teams that goes against

common wisdom? I think one thing that

it's a really hard lesson that I learned

at Uber, uh, which is sometimes your

product actually doesn't matter.

And by product I mean kind of the pixels

you put on the screen or things that you

build in your in your in your um uh

mobile app. Um and at Uber I learned

this because you know it it it pains me

to say this but really like the price

and the ETA at Uber was the product. And

I think a lot of times, you know, people

at tech companies think of the product

as just this digital manifestation, but

looking at it from a holistic

perspective, you know, we humans consume

the entirety of the product. And I think

that's that was one of the things that I

I learned, the lessons I learned that

was like really kind of hard-hitting,

right? That um sometimes the pixels

don't matter as much as you think,

right? And you fix a certain bug. Um,

it's not to say that you shouldn't fix

the bug, but it doesn't have as much of

an impact as something that is more

important to people like a price or in

TA. This happens a lot in, you know, B2B

products where it's uh not just about,

you know, how uh it's great that your

product is is well-loved by its end

users, but you know, does it make good

business sense is one of those those

hard lessons I learned as a very uh

brighteyed, bushy tailed sort of

designbased uh product manager uh going

into Uber. I think the other insight

that I had or rather other thought I had

the other day was just the idea that

like so many of the tech companies today

this is kind of counterintuitive

so many of the tech companies that are

most valuable today didn't really start

with any technological breakthrough

they were built on some kind of

technological breakthrough and they

ended up building a lot more technology

but really a lot of these companies like

Facebook for example just put in the

hard work, right? The elbow grease to

especially in the early stages to take,

you know, essentially a database of

human connections and build something

valuable on top of it and that keep on

polishing and iterating that product and

and coming up with new ones like

newsfeed and photo tagging were just,

you know, kind of came out of just

really paying attention to what people

wanted. And some of the ideas are super

simple and it's not something that came

out of the lab, right? So Uber, for

example, took the fact that everyone had

these GPS devices in their pockets and

they didn't invent the GPS device, but

they were able to take that and the fact

that people had cars and people wanted

to kind of um, you know, get around and

there was a human need and they just put

the connected the dots and put

everything together um, and eventually

built a ton of tech to predict the right

marketplace and pricing.

etc. But largely like that's a very

valuable tech company, but it's largely

an operations company. And I I want to

give a huge shout out to my colleagues

there who run, you know, kind of Uber

Eats and and Uber uh rides from a from a

operations perspective because truly

like that was one of the biggest kind of

business model hacks that I've seen,

right? And so I I think that's you know

Silicon Valley gets lost a thought it's

like, oh, this is a new tech company.

Often times, some of the most valuable

ones are just the ones that are just

building what people need on top of

existing tech. This is such there's so

much to say here. I I love it. Uh and

this is coming from someone that led the

Uber writer product team uh and worked

at Facebook and head of product

Instagram. You know, it's like it means

a lot coming from someone like you, not

someone, you know, that's like not in

product especially. Yeah. I mean, I'm

just to go further on the Instagram

part, like it's the the idea was super

simple. It was it was showing photos and

and visual sharing, but the craft that

Mike and Kevin had in putting in the

hard work to get the product just right,

that's what made it really take off,

right? That's a great example. I I'd

forgotten about Instagram. Um, but uh

how could I? But, you know, it wasn't

anything that any other company couldn't

have done, but it was that product taste

that Kevin and Mike had and conviction

that there's a certain sort of vibe, if

you will, uh, that people wanted and

building that and iterating. I mean, and

look at it now. It's it's a it's a core

part of our lives. Visual sharing, they

really solved it. Yeah. I just had Mike

Greger on the podcast. Um, so it's

interesting. There's two tensions here.

One is just like the product doesn't

matter in a lot of really successful

companies. It's secondary to the cars,

the drivers, the the GPS and the phone.

And then on the other hand, uh techn

there doesn't need to be a technological

breakthrough for to build a huge

business. is there it's almost like if

the uh if there's no technological

breakthrough then the product matters

like Facebook as an example basically

it's like a database of connections but

what allowed and Instagram what allowed

them to be breakthrough and there's you

know classically competitors at the time

uh was the experience was a lot better

and then maybe on the flip side if the

if the experience doesn't matter then

it's the breakthrough is on the

operations and other does that resonate

is that kind of what you're saying it

does resonate I think I think both have

to be true. But also I would say that

like even if you did found a company

that has a huge technological

breakthrough uh very shortly I think

that you know kind of the the product

experience will start mattering right

because you know how long does that

technological advantage last right

before humans wisen up to be like well

this is not the product I want to use I

want to use it a little bit differently

and this is more ergonomic for me etc.

So I think I think that that's what you

said is is is a beautiful summary. I I

also think that a point in time in a

company's history will also determine

what is going to be more important. This

this is especially interesting for

companies building on top of LLMs and AI

infrastructure where you're essentially

saying you don't need to have some kind

of technological breakthrough to build

something valuable if you can create a

really special unique experience that

unlocks the potential of this super

intelligence. I think that's right and

and I have some more thoughts on just

sort of the companies that are building

on top of LLMs that are just you know

that's a slightly different thing I

would say I think that for them you know

having the right data and the right data

flywheels is so important like

proprietary data especially exactly um

and the flywheel part is is is just you

know you can start with proprietary data

but the flywheel is really just sort of

how do you continue to maintain that and

generate that and the second thing is

again it's it's the workflow so it's the

it's the ergonomics of how does it

actually integrate into people's lives

and that is going to be more and more

important. Let's actually spend more

time there because a lot of people are

thinking about this. Feels like feels

like everybody's trying to start a

company these days with you know AI

enabling so much more and so I think a

lot of people are just curious where

should they spend time and so I think

this is actually really interesting. So

what I'm hearing here is two things to

think about to create any kind of mo

defensibility against say foundational

models coming to eat your lunch or other

companies. uh what sort of data can you

uh acquire that is proprietary and

create a flywheel to generate more of

that data and then um the other piece is

how do you fit into a very specific like

basically vertical that you understand

really well that fits into their

existing workflow. Is that right? Well,

it's again this is this is something we

can unpack for a long time, right?

Because um you know with any product

that you want to build there's going to

be incumbents that have distribution

advantages. But I do have this thesis

that there are certain products that

will be able to break through those

advantages of the distribution of the

other companies. Uh but you have to kind

of overcome a pretty high bar of your

product has to be so much better, right?

That's I think that's that's one thing.

But yeah, I think the data flywheel

thing is really interesting because you

know the the the models will get really

good at whatever data you show it. And

that's that's one of the things that

people just think that AI is such a

magic wand, but no, it's like if it's

been trained on the right data, it's

going to do the thing that it's been

trained on. Um it's very malleable. Um

so being very mindful of the data that

you have access to to start your

flywheel going and what you can do to

keep on going with that flywheel is

going to be a a critical thing for for

anyone who's starting a company today.

So let's make that even more specific.

When you talk about this, I think about

this. The CEO of Windsurf was on the

podcast and he talked a lot about how

they have all this really unique data

about which recommendations of code uh

snippets people accept and reject and

they actually launched their own model I

think based on that. Is that is that an

example? Any other examples to make this

work? That's a perfect example. Um

there's some companies I've invested in

that aren't public yet that have their

own sort of take on that which is um

really interesting to be able to uh to

take um sort of whatever activity is in

their product to get smarter at the

thing that they are doing again which is

why I think the data flywheel and the

the the workflow go so handinand

together right because if you are

solving something actually valuable for

businesses for people and there's a lot

of that um uh attention that's being

paid to a lot of work is being done

through it. you're going to have that

edge and you know this is where I see

again startups in very different uh

markets who have this insight who

understand this very deeply and are not

just trying to zero everything and be

like no no no like this is how we're

going to build it to make the product

genuinely useful so that it can get

genuinely more useful over time and that

is going to be amazing because you know

as a consumer of any of these products

we're going to benefit what I'm hearing

here is also if you don't have

proprietary data or unique data you can

still have a chance by building this

flywheel where you collect that data

through your usage. For example,

windsurf, they all built on claude 3.5

and then now they have all this unique

data and now they're miles. Yeah, that's

exactly right. And this goes back to

sort of something I might have mentioned

briefly, but you got to have grit when

you're building anything, right? You got

to be able to like have that vision,

have that clear direction, and be able

to really go chase that. I think that's

really important. the and to make uh

your example of distribution being

overcomeable uh a a great example I

think a lot about and we had the CPO a a

CPO turns out there's many CPOs at

Microsoft I didn't realize how many CPOs

they had yeah uh and she she t I asked

her about like why didn't co-pilot like

the fastest growing companies in the

world cursor winer lovable bold all

these guys like co-pilot was so ahead of

these these companies and and these

companies broke through uh while

Microsoft has distribution amazing

talent infrastructure all the things

early first mover advantage and it's to

your point they were just building

products that were much better cursor

winds surf all these like lovable whole

I I do believe there is a a level of

product craft that will make it so that

it's just worth it to switch or try

something else and there are a few

products out there that I see with that

with this I think granola is one of them

there's so many distribution advantages

that Google meet has that Google uh

Facebook start off. Uh Microsoft Teams

has uh Zoom has, but they're just these

tiny little product craft delightful

things that I really appreciate myself

of like, yeah, they got it. They have

these little edges sanded down just

right and they've really figured out a

way to really make it so delightful that

it's like, yeah, I will ex I will

install this piece of software. Yes,

100%. I will talk to my friends about

this because it is so life-changing,

right? And that we're starting to see

that now. Again, before I would say 18

months ago, it's like, oh well, who has

the best model? But think going forward,

it's like really who has the best

workflow and who has the best product?

And we humans are just demanding. We

want the best. And so when that when

someone is going to come out and produce

something that's so wellcrafted, I think

people are going to pay attention. So, a

couple takeaways here is if you're

trying to build an AI startup, a few uh

things you should be thinking about that

gives you a better chance of breaking

through and winning is what are your

data flywheels where you collect

proprietary unique data. How do you

build something that's in the craft is

comes through and people are like wowed

and want to tell their friends about it.

Granola is a great example. Clearly,

cursor, lovable, bolt, rep, all these

guys did that. And then it feels like

there's just like a understand a

vertical workflow really well and then

someone's problem and solve that in a

really unique way. Yeah, you couldn't

have put it better myself. Awesome. Uh

let me ask you this because this came up

in my chat with Mike at Enthropic. Uh

and it's along these lines. So I I was

thinking about just what is what is

product doing at Anthropic? So there's

building this basically a gigabrain

super intelligence thing that's going to

know everything and maybe build its own

experience in the future. And then

there's this like product team building

this layer on top to interact with this

super intelligent gigabrain. What is the

point? What is the value of that layer?

You spoke to it a bit here of just like

there's value in the experience and it

feeling native. But I guess let me just

ask you that just where do you think

product goes at a company like Anthropic

OpenAI where there's just the super

intelligence that the team is working on

and there's this like UX on top. I think

those companies have just such an

advantage because you get to work in the

same building as the researchers and I

think that you know uh there there's

that really kind of symbiotic

relationship close partnership between

post training and and um and product

where uh you know again more and more

it's going to be less about the raw

intelligence. It's going to be about the

fine-tuning

of of what the model can do that that

really resonates with people and what

people want and also what the product

trajectory is is going to be right. So I

think that's going to you're going to

see that more and more. I mean I think I

think uh you know this is less about

anthropic but more about openi. I think

open made a great move. Uh I am a huge

Fiji fan. As soon as that news leaked

that she was going to join I texted her

I was like this is great amazing

congratulations. I'm thrilled for her,

for the company, for all of my friends

still at opening high because it's just

going to be this amazing leader coming

in. I'm also thrilled as a consumer

because some great products are going to

come out. I think that really that close

tight-knit relationship between at any

of these large model companies between

post- training and and product is going

to produce some really incredible stuff.

First of all, Mike actually said very

similar things that the more I did not I

promise you I did not watch that even

come out yet, so I believe you. Uh yeah

they they he had this interesting

finding where he he put product people

on like UX product experience frontf

facing product and then he put PMs on

the research teams and building models

helping models get better helping

researchers build uh things and he found

that all all the leverage and wins came

from the PMs working with the

researchers much less so on the product

experience and so he puts more and more

PMs with that with that with that team.

I I'm so thrilled to hear that because

it's a little bit of it's very

validating because that's what we did at

Open AI 2 like we were very closely tied

to the post trading team and so it was

because of that tight collaboration that

you see some of the advances of of of

Chacht getting better at so many things

right so uh it's great it's it's awesome

that we independently came to the same

conclusion yes it's a good sign okay uh

so we're talking about startups building

new companies I want to follow this

thread a little bit I feel like you've

built more products that from zero to

one to scale than may maybe most anyone

else across all the companies that you

worked at. I'm gonna do a quick rundown

of some of the things you've done. And

uh I'm I'm going to miss a bunch, but

let's see. You built and led the

Facebook newsfeed, the current version

of it. You built the new groups

experience, chat, and messages. You

shipped the messenger app as its own

app. That was that was one of your

projects. You uh led Uber Pool, lowcost

rides. Uh you launched Chad GPT

enterprise. you shipped voice and vision

memory custom GPTs just refreshing the

whole design of chat GPT uh many more

things a lot of work at air table

obviously also uh Oculus uh these are

just some examples in the intro I'm

going to try to go through all these

things so all that to say I feel like

you've seen a lot of what works and

doesn't work building from idea from

zero essentially to one to scale

so let me just ask you this question

what's uh what's an important lesson

you've learned about what it takes to

succeed building something from idea to

one to billions. Yeah. Um thank you and

that was a good trip down memory lane

too. Um uh when you read that off. So I

think the first thing I would say and

you know going from zero to one is

different than going from one to 100

and when you are in the one to 100 phase

which is a lot of the time that I spent

you know is is in the one to 100 phase

um we you know were able to we

quadrupled Instagram usage in two years

that was very much a fun ride and

there's a bunch of other examples at

other uh at other companies but when you

go to one to 100 I I think one of the

things that you really got to take into

account is that you have to plan your

chess moves out in advance.

You have to really think before you act

and build systems that are going to let

you go sustainably faster because the

0ero to one is you're trying to find

that product market fit and then when

you get to one to 100 you're trying to

make sure you can get to hypers scale

and and as fast as you can, right? And

I've been very fortunate to be along the

ride of of many of these products as

they were going through that hypers

scale. And the analogy I always like to

use is that when you do that, you feel

the G-forces, right? And you know, some

people are like, "Oh, yeah, I'm a pilot.

I can fly at, you know, 35,000 ft." But

like the the, you know, feeling the

G-forces of takeoff of a rocket is very

different, right? And the thing that

I've learned there doing that a few

times is you got to build the systems

that help you move sustainably faster,

right? And sometimes you have to go slow

to go fast. Um, and here's an example.

So, in building the newsfeed, the

current version that we have today, it

really hasn't changed much from the time

that we uh built it. I don't even know,

it was like 12 years ago or something. I

don't know the reason why it hasn't

changed much, but I like to think that

it's because we put a lot of time and

craft into thinking about the whole

sharing loop and what are what is the uh

what is the what are the key pieces of

it and how is it architected? What's the

information architecture? And what does

that whole flow look like? How does it

go from posting something at the top of

the page to showing up in the newsfeed

to someone clicking like and then that

notifications thing lighting up red and

then that repeating over and over again.

And I like to think that newsfeed has

stood the test of time uh the current

version of it because we thought very

carefully about how people wanted to

interact and how people wanted to

consume information and also that whole

loop. Um, and so when when that happens,

then I think things are built to last,

right? And I think the this I think this

is the case at a lot of different

companies. So when I was at Uber, we we

had a bit of a spaghetti string code

situation on the writer app, but you

know, taking a step back and

rearchitecting things of like what are

the core components and how do you

actually make it so that the product

selector can scale around the world and

here's a little known fact like you know

talk about grit and elbow grease like

Uber is not just as simple as like

finding a ride. If you've ever been to

another country like in India sometimes

there are no street signs so you have to

like pick up in front of this you know

mini mart or whatever it might be. So

there's a whole team that worked on

pickup and drop offs. This was a large

effort and it sounds so boring but it

was so critical to Uber being able to

scale because pickup and drop offs team

thought about well how do you do it for

venues and that venues and finding that

right abstraction means that you can

have uh a scalable way to to do pickups

at airports and you know configure

different venues and those systems when

you take the time to build them in the

one to 100 phase

help you speed up massively and that's

how you get 4x you users in two years or

on messenger we put a lot of thought

into the infrastructure around push

notifications etc. We grew that product

from zero to 4.7 billion messages sent

per day uh in about two and a half

years. Um and I think it really is

requires that that forethought in in

building the right systems. Well, let me

follow that the red quickly because

that's really interesting. So

essentially what you're saying is once

there's like a phase of once you find

product market fit and I want to

actually ask you this uh before you

start planning when you're starting to

scale going from one to 100 your advice

here is basically don't move fast and

break things don't ship MVPs this is the

time to really think many chess moves

ahead about what you're going to need to

get this to say a billion users. Yeah.

Yeah. It's building the systems and then

that that systems thinking will will

carry you really far. At least that's

been my experience and hopefully

hopefully you can find the same way but

you know um your mileage may vary but

yeah that's exactly right. What's your

guidance on just like when to do that

because you know you can't you know you

build something okay well it's working

there's also this just like okay let's

just keep it going let's scale it as far

as we can there in your experience is it

just like what's the guidance on when to

really step back and really think years

and years ahead. Great question. I'll

say the first thing I'll say is that

it's not a binary switch. It's actually

a ramp rate. Um and so when I've led

teams, I've always believed strongly in

this portfolio approach, right? And so,

you know, famously Google had the 702010

portfolio approach. That may be the

right thing for a more mature company.

Uh maybe it's 50/50 if you're a startup,

right? But you have to think about this

in a non-binary way and in in a way

that's about scaling up and when do you

need to put more resources behind uh

behind that. So every startup is going

to be different, right? every product uh

that you're launching is going to be

different and then thinking about your

portfolio approach and how much you

allocate your time. That would be my my

advice and it's you're you know it's it

is really dependent on the stage that

you're in. I think that actually is a

nice dovetail to my second thing if I if

I may. Um which is uh you know when

you're going from that stage of of uh

maybe you know one to five or one to 10.

So not just fully one to 100. One thing

I found to be very helpful is to measure

everything. And this sounds again very

simple but you know just like how you

wouldn't fly a plane without instruments

like why would you run your product

without understanding the

instrumentation and uh how it's doing

right and so one of the things I did in

pretty much all the teams that I led

whether it was Instagram Uber air table

was all about and chat GPT2 uh the one

of the first things I did was always to

build a growth team and building a

growth team is really interesting

because it actually is a simple razor.

It's a simple thing to think about. It's

like I'm going to build a growth team,

but then you're going to uncover a lot

of things, right? You're going to

uncover how much stuff you have not yet

logged and how non-rigorous you've been

looking at your entire product. And it's

it's so funny because I've seen this

movie so many times, the same movie so

many times at every one of these

companies where I remember walking into

Instagram and I think asking Kevin Lex

like, "So, how many users do we have?"

It's like, "Well, we don't really know."

and and so it's like well there a lot

and we don't really know and so when you

build a growth team and you hire the

right growth leader I've had the

pleasure uh the the pleasure of working

with George Lee at Instagram um you know

some early growth folks at at Facebook

Andrew Chen air at um at Uber uh Air

Table um I had the privilege of working

with uh Lauren um who is currently now

leading growth at at Notion. So I've

I've been very fortunate to work with

some really amazing people on my team.

And when you hire the right person, they

start asking all the right questions

because when you know the archetype of

person who is a a growth PM will be like

well wait why is this happening and

let's get the data on X Y and Z thing

and that's when you realize you don't

have X Y and Z thing logged and after

you have X Y and Z thing logged you look

at the data you're like wait well why is

that happening and then you're you're

forcing yourself to go deeper into the

analysis of doing some analysis of like

well you know what's correlated with

what and what are some hypotheses And

because growth leaders, growth product

leaders are so into this experimentation

side, it actually is this really easy

thing to do is when you start building a

growth team, it just begets all of the

right questions being asked and then it

starts uh you know kind of turning into

all the right behaviors of of of taking

something you've been building which is

seems like it's working into a more

rigorous system. So that's like the zero

sorry the the 1 to 10 phase I would say

that really sets you up for the 10 to

100. What what I like about this growth

team advice is that a lot of people

think of a time to hire a growth team to

we need to drive growth. What you're

saying is there's a lot of second order

benefits which is they help you figure

out what the hell's going on and inform

a lot of uh of other things that are

happening. people just actually

understanding how things are going and

totally and I think that the reason why

growth team is is is the advice I would

go with rather than to build an

analytics team is because if you build

an analytics team or a data science team

it's possible that no one's going to

listen to them right it's like oh I have

these insights it's like well no one

really cares but if you have a if you

hire a growth leader they are now tied

to outcomes of driving growth so they're

going to be the ones who are listening

and asking you know more questions and

really partnering with that data science

team to make your entire product and

business more rigorous and that just

changes the DNA of of your entire team.

I want to talk about hiring but is there

anything else along these lines that you

want to share of building new product

scaling products? I guess the last thing

I would say is like I I I want to make

sure that you know sometimes in the um

in the pursuit of numbers product folks

lose sight of the importance of taste

and craft. So uh maybe this is actually

the dovetail into kind of building teams

but like you got to have the

counterbalances right and it's really

important to give two people on your

team different charges. One is like go

grow the product and the other one is

wait maintain that design that beautiful

aesthetic that that that uh the the the

craft that your that your product is

known for. And that tension is extremely

healthy, right? And so I I've saw I've

seen this at at at at Facebook. I've

seen this at Instagram. I I helped

create this at Instagram. This kind of

healthy tension. Air table, same thing.

But just having chatbt, same exact

thing. You have to have that push and

pull on both sides to really stretch the

gamut. That begs the question, how do

you actually do that? You know, a lot

you could talk about it. You could be

like, okay, we need to make sure the

experience is awesome, but also grow

this number. here's your goal. How do

you operationalize that as like a

performance review attribute thing? Is

it culture? Something else? As a leader,

you have to set up your team the right

way. You have to really think about your

team as a product and what are the

various pieces you need to really

stretch the gamut of what you're what

you're thinking about. Um, and the teams

that I've helped build

are the most successful ones are a team

of Avengers that are just like very

different, have very different

superpowers, but together you as the

leader are the one who's helping

adjudicate any differences or uh any any

disagreements, but you're you know

you're getting the best outcome when

everyone's pulling and obsessing over a

different thing, right? And that's

important. It's important to to create

your balance and and really kind of

increase the space that you're looking

at and create those healthy debates. And

I think a lot of people overlook that. I

think some people think of, you know,

people on a team as like warm bodies to

do a job, but my philosophy has always

been to think about what is the what

does the company need to be successful

and who's the best person who spikes at

that one thing and how do I make sure

that that we get that person and how do

we make sure we get the other person and

the other person? It's almost like

you're playing an RPG where everyone has

different sliders and you have to create

this super team where everyone actually

spikes in different in different ways.

And that is some thing that I've had a

lot of success with in terms of when you

create that environment and you create

that uh vibe, you're going to get a lot

of mileage out of that team. That is a

really interesting answer. It's not one

I've heard before. Essentially, you're

it's not like create the right

incentives. It's hire people that

naturally want us see the world in a

certain way and that creates a balance

and tension a healthy tension between

say a PM and a designer and an engineer

that is really interesting because that

feels a lot more sustainable than like

here's your goal okay but also when your

goal is make sure uh the experience is

great and people support tickets are

down it's just like naturally they need

to want this to happen totally and

actually there was a I I I have a a a

sort of a a framework around like I

think there are five different types of

product managers that has kind of held

true. So, this is a a framework that

just came out of a random jam at Uber

when I was talking to some some of my my

colleagues there and we formulated this

in terms of helping uh with hiring

practices. Everywhere I've gone, I've

also been like best friends with the

recruiters because honestly my whole

thing is like got to build the right

team. So, we have to really partner very

deeply. And at Uber, we developed this

uh this this this five archetypes of a

PM. Um and I've to this day I still

think it's like actually exactly true

and it still holds true to this day. But

is that interesting? You want me to kind

of go into that? Absolutely. I'm so

excited to hear with you there. These

are the five that I found to be most

enduring and actually the most like kind

of different, right? And and when you

talk about I love the way you put this,

Lenny, which is when you hire the right

people and like how they're naturally

motivated by different things, right?

And so these are the five that that we

came up with. Number one is the consumer

PM. So this is the person that's like

half designer, half product person,

really obsessed over the details. Is it

delightful? Is it crafted enough? Oh my

goodness, this is three pixels off. I

can't stand it. this is like making

driving me nuts like why is this so

complex I mean these are the people that

you think of as like you know you know

sometimes the quintessential PM is the

consumer PM but that's just one type

right and um another type just kind of

on the side we've talked about before is

the growth PM these people are like half

data scientist half product person they

are kind of wired to think numbers first

and they have this kind of air about

them that's like the best ones do which

is like I'm really skep skeptical. Show

me the data. Let's run a test and prove

it. I don't believe you. Right? And it's

and and I start with these two in the

framework because they're actually

really different. Right? One, it's like

I have vibe. I feel the vibe. This is

better. And the other one's like, no, I

don't believe you. We should test this

and prove it. And that's like a really

healthy tension. I love, you know,

having two people in a room like

debating that. Like great, we are going

to get some good things done and we're

going to we're going to move the product

forward. The third type is um you know

kind of what I call the GMP PM or the

business PM, right? These are like kind

of half MBA, half product person. These

are folks that are kind of naturally

wired to start with the business model

and think about what are the margins,

like what are the opportunities, where's

the value being created? And we had a

lot of these at at at um at Uber and

they were the marketplace PMs and

they're just like I loved working with

them because their their minds just work

differently. they just thought about

problems from like well what is the

incentive here right and you this is a

fascinating type of mind to to work with

um another one I I found this is it's

it's actually more nuanced than you

think is like there's a certain sort of

archetype that I I call the platform PM

which is someone who's like really

deeply wired to kind of build tools for

other people and at Uber we had like

internal platforms for like messaging or

for you know building internal tools and

often times s these folks are

overlooked, but it's like actually a

really deep wiring because these are the

people that are going to build the

systems that are going to make you go

faster, right? And that's what they love

doing. Um, and the last one I would say

I used to call an algorithms PM, but now

in the in the uh in the uh the the the

world of of AI, I'm going to rename this

to research PM. And these are like half

researcher, half engineer, half product

person. And these these minds are

amazing. So like basically they think

you know you know traditional Google

search algorithm PM right but nowadays

it's like who are the people who really

have that product taste but deeply

understand the tech and the you know the

way the models are trained to go and

affect that and build the most amazing

product. So those are the five I still

think I to this day these hold true and

we might have been on to something the

day that we brainstormed this at Uber

but uh yeah I'm curious to hear your

feedback. This is great. As you're

talking, I'm just like, here's that

person. Here's that person. Okay, they

fit here. Uh, this super resonates. This

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So just to summarize, there's consumer

PMs, growth PMs, business/GMPs,

platform PMs, and sort of research PMs.

Uh a lot of people call them AIP PMs

now. I feel like that's the term that's

really popular. You have to evolve with

the times. Yeah. But also the other part

of the framework I find uh kind of

interesting is that everyone's like a

primary has a primary one and a

secondary one. It's kind of like one of

those like personality tests, right? And

maybe we kind of did this just because

it was hard to pigeon hole people and I

I myself don't think I was

pigeonholeable, but I I do think that

people like, you know, kind of lead with

one type of thinking and then also have

the secondary thing that keeps them in

balance. And so if you believe that and

you apply it to your team, I'm curious

to hear, you know, from your listeners

like sort of if this does resonate or

not. And you know, maybe this framework

will help you realize that you're

missing someone that that you should be

not missing. What was your archetype

when you were a PM? This is and and

that's the other thing with personality

types is the ones you hear, you're like,

"This is me. This is I I own this,

right? There's no doubt about it. I am a

consumer PM uh and also a growth PM.

That's that's my primarily consumer. I

just I I can't I mean this is what I

told you about you know the other

products I've loved. I've see the I can

see the details that people put into it

and I so appreciate that but at the end

of the day it's like you got to measure

things right so that's what I am but you

know again everyone's different. I love

your point about how a lot of people

think of PM like they hear that first

example like oh I guess that's what I

need to be because that's what everyone

talks about when they're amazing product

managers but you're saying there's many

other ways to be a successful PM. We did

a personality test uh at Airbnb when I

was there and one of the biggest

takeaways was it's like this color test

and you get a color green or yellow or

red and like the team was all over the

spectrum and so it was a really good

reminder just you can be a different

type of person and still be really

successful in this role of PM and it's

probably because of these different

archetypes and different needs and roles

of PMs like there's this word product

manager but there's many things that PMs

do and also as an investor now it's

really important to see the fit of the

founder to the market because if you put

a consumer PM into like a really, you

know, boring regulated industry, they're

probably going to get frustrated and

they're probably not going to see it

through. Whereas like there's people

that you look at, you know, the pitch

and you're like, "Wow, this is you are

really passionate about this problem and

you really care about building tools for

others and this is exactly this is the

Twilio PM or you know, whatever it might

be. you're a perfect fit for this

business and like that's awesome, right?

So, I think that yeah, I I love that

what you just said in in the summary

because I think there's no one way to be

a PM and I think this is sort of the

hopefully this framework will get give

people a little bit more space to be,

you know, express who they really are.

I'm curious if other functions also have

these sort of archetypes like designers

and engineers, but we don't need to get

into that. How about if you're listening

to this on YouTube, leave a comment of

which of these archetypes you think you

might be. What's your primary and

secondary? I'll read them again.

Consumer PM, growth PM, business GMP,

platform PM, research

PM. Love it. Okay. Uh, I want to talk

about hiring. So, this actually came up

a lot when I was chatting with folks

that you've worked with, especially uh

Nick Turley, who's head of product at

Chad GPT who were trying to get on the

podcast because that's an uh what he's

awesome. That's what I've heard. Uh so

he told me that the current head of

engineering, the lead product engineer,

the head of design and head of marketing

at chat GPT are people that you hired.

Uh also many of the people that you

hired have gone on to do incredible

things. You've shared a few of those

names. Many of them have been on the

podcast, which is the ultimate measure

of success.

So let me just ask you this. What's

what's one thing you look for in people

you hire that you think are that you

think people sleep on? that you think

people aren't paying enough attention to

that helps you find amazing stars.

That's really flattering to hear that

from Nick. Um Nick is one of the best

people I've worked with period. In fact,

I want to just do a quick shout out like

folks at OpenAI I are are pretty much

the best people I've ever worked with in

my career. When I took the job, I told

the team this is going to be my last

operating role and I'm going to leave it

all on the field and I'm just going to

go all out. And basically I spent

probably as much time if not more time

on recruiting and building the team um

than I as I did sort of thinking about

the product. And this is going back to

sort of what I said earlier about I

think you got to bring the right people

together to have a huge impact. And

often times leaders overlook this and

they're like ah just a warm body. But

truly you know people who have strengths

in certain areas complement others with

strengths in other areas. And when you

build that team, amazing things happen.

It's the mo, it's the best investment

you can make. It's going to pay off so

many dividends. So, I think that's my

opening salvo in terms of like, you

know, you got to get the everyone who's

listening out there, you got to make

sure you look at everyone in your team,

you look at what you need and you have

to get the best in each. And uh truly

like you know in in in in my farewell

dinner at OpenAI I think I I I close

with just that that like look I don't

even know what I would do after this

because all the best people I've worked

with are here. We have Ian Silber

running design there. Thomas Dimpson you

know Joey Flynn Ryan Oor Nick Turley was

amazing person I met there. Joanne, I

mean just I have so many people I'm

missing but you know Coley on product

marketing Eric Antinau on the marketing

comm side on engineer you you you the

name the list goes on product operations

is is is stellar. I'm so proud of like

honestly the pr the team that I built

there more than than the products. Um so

I just wanted to say that like it's it's

a it's a big thing that I really care

about and I hope more leaders think

about that too is like really be mindful

of putting your team together and and

think about that as a product and you

have to really craft that. You have to

really care about the team, right? Just

to double down on that point actually

before you get to the next tip here is I

just love this answer which is in you

know if I were to ask someone here's

hire what's your hiring advice what do

you look for that people may not be

looking for enough. Uh I love that most

of it would be like in that person

here's what you need to focus on and

here's the interview question and but uh

the kind of your broad answer so far is

it's not actually about the person so

much as what is the team going to look

like and where do we need spikes where

do we need to balance out the

composition of this Avengers that we're

building. Totally. Totally. That's

exactly right. And so so that being

said, I I guess I have uh I guess on

brand I have two things I want to share

about about sort of hiring the right

team. Um I have this saying um I

actually have this like doc that I've

taken around various companies called

the PXD API which is like here's how to

work with me. And in it there's there's

um there's a saying that I have which is

what I really optimize for for everyone

that I support and everyone I hire which

is in six months

if I'm telling you what to do I've hired

the wrong person.

And it's just kind of served me really

well as on three different levels,

right? Number one, it's a reminder for

myself when I'm either hiring or looking

for the person is to keep my bar super

high and just not settle because if I do

most likely in 6 months, it would not be

true that I that I would be able to let

this person run and I would still be

telling them what to do, which is not

what I want. That is not my desire.

The second sort of effect of that is

that it's I say that to people, you

know, when they come on the team or as

we're making the fire hire because, you

know, it communicates to them that

that's my bar and that's how they know

they'll be successful, right? And

something to kind of work towards,

right? And the third thing is kind of a

joint thing for the both of us which is

it kind of gives us it it helps me and

the person operate on a different level

where it's not the goal is not like did

you hit this OKR did you hit this goal

the the meta goal becomes hey are we

building you know are we calibrating

enough are we actually getting to a spot

where in six months like you're the one

telling me what needs to be done like

like that are we are we getting there

right Because then if if that's the

framing every you know mistake that you

know is made or whatever on either of

our our parts is becomes a learning

opportunity in terms of like well how do

we grow to to from this to where we want

to be in six months right and how is it

possible that you know I as a as a

manager can do the right things to set

this person up for success so that I

don't have to be involved in six months

right and I think that those those three

things like and and and being able to

have that second order effect of this

simple razor in 6 months I'm telling

what to do I've hired the wrong person

it puts pressure on me it puts pressure

on the person and it creates this really

interesting environment and and this

kind of safe space to really think about

are we heading towards that goal and

again every place I've been at as much

as I've loved building the product I've

taken so much pride in building the team

and it's just been so much of a pleasure

and I think this is my one of the two

secrets that I have here. This is so

good. I want to I have a follow-up

question, but just to point out why I

think this is so genius. Is it there's

kind of a assumption here of this person

uh you can trust them? So there's like a

do I trust this person? Do I feel like

they're going to be proactive? Do I feel

like they're going to have uh correct

insights? Essentially, taste and gut

feeling. Uh it's like the layer below

this question, which is great. And also

just this like autonomy. It feels like

you autonomy almost implies so many

important traits of somebody that you

want to hire. And I love just how simple

this question is for both you and them.

Thank you. And and really without

autonomy, I love what you said about

autonomy because truly if without

as as a leader, as a manager, your goal

is to scale.

And if you don't have if this thing this

simple statement is not true, how are

you able to build the best company, the

best product? So here's the followup

question. Is this mostly for leaders

like say head of product at GPT? Say

someone's not a CPO, they're just like I

don't know a manager of a PM team. Do

you find is there a version of this that

you think might be useful to them or is

this mostly for leaders? I think this is

for everyone.

I think it's for everyone who is a

manager, right? Because you know if

you're going to be a successful manager

at any company um or a leader at any

company and if you're if you're kind of

starting as a line manager or whatnot

and you're kind of you know

wanting to grow or even just wanting to

you know if you're early at a company

you have so much institutional knowledge

and so getting more uh sort of leverage

in terms of being able to pass on the

wisdom that you've learned is so crucial

uh into being successful. that I think

every manager should should approach

their, you know, their their reports

with this because truly like that's it's

just good for everyone. It's good for

the company to have more kind of

leverage and and scale. It's good for uh

the the person who's being brought onto

the team because they know what success

looks like and it gives them a path to

kind of keep on growing. And it's great

for you as a leader, as a manager to be

able to basically scale up the entire uh

uh sort of expertise of your team. And I

imagine you don't even need to plan to

not tell them what to do. Like it's just

a good lens into are they going to be

amazing even if you plan to be telling

them sort of what to do. Yeah. Exactly.

And the other thing is like again in

your interview process, you kind of end

up looking for these insights, right?

and you look for like the behaviors of

like, oh, are they actually going to be

potentially able to to achieve this in

six months and that's going to give you

a really good lens on the picking side,

not just the development side as well.

Peter, what's your second secret? This

is uh one for one. Yeah. Okay. The

second one I'd say is I I feel really

strongly about this, which is um you

know, the area that I look for most is

growth mindset. Um, and I actually came

to this um, you know, some point in my

managing career at Facebook where I real

you know I did make a mistake and hired

someone who just didn't quite have that

growth mindset and it was really

difficult because you know

the way I say is like I don't have time

to sugar coat any feedback, right? And

frankly like the best people I've worked

with are the people who come into one

ones with me and yell at me and telling

them I'm I'm messing up. Like that's I

love that cuz that's there's no nothing

left unsaid and we're able to kind of

move the ball forward of like hey like

how do we get better from this and I

feel like growth mindset's one of those

things Lenny that feels really hard to

teach at a certain age and this is

really important to me and my family I

expect growth mindset of myself of my

kids you know my my colleagues at work

because I think it just like creates

this environment where everyone is open

to like what's the one thing I can can

get better at. And you know that whole

get 1% better every day can become true.

And it's it's funny because like I

whenever I go to teams like TGBT or Uber

when I'm al always the final interview

for someone in my org and I partner with

recruiting on developing that uh the

rubric, I always insist on doing the

last interview and I do not product

sense. I don't do design. I don't do

execution. I don't do metrics. I only do

growth mindset. And it's kind of like

well that's crazy. like what about all

of these other attributes? I'm like,

well, I'm pretty sure I can trust the

other people to assess the other

attributes. But I think the growth

mindset thing is so important to me that

that we build an org where people are

self-reflective and want to get better

and take that feedback and give that

feedback and it just is this meta unlock

that I found to be true. And really if

you don't have growth mindset then and

you're not open to feedback, you're not

open to learning, then that's like the

the the meta blocker, right? At that

point, you know, it's hard to give

feedback. It's hard to, you know,

onboard to a new skill. It's hard to

kind of uh develop in any sort of

meaningful way. And so I found that to

be like the the really critical piece.

That's a big deal what you just said

there that essentially as the CPO, head

of product, big product leader at a

company. Your interview is not like are

you an amazing product manager? Are you

do you have products ta taste? Uh things

like that. It's growth mindset and and I

just want to clarify it's because

everyone that has been you know all the

other things have been interviewed by

the designer by the engineering lead

etc. And that's where that, you know,

kind of the previous principle comes

into play as well in terms of I I do

trust my team to go and assess those

people, right? But the one thing that I

care so much about is growth mindset.

And that's kind of the the thing. And

and to be honest, I do do a little bit

of a sweep. So if some we got weak

signal on one of those areas, I'll do

it. But the the pure sort of uh focus of

my last interview is going to be on

growth mindset. Okay. Well, I need to

ask you what that looks like. But before

I do, uh, when you talk about growth

mindset, I have this, uh, image of Mark

Beni off on the podcast. And I asked

them just like there's so much changing

all the time. It's such a crazy world to

be leading a company in this world where

just everyone's disrupting each other.

AI's changing everything. It's just like

moving so fast. Every day there's a new,

you know, breakthrough and you have to

keep track and just like, how do you

deal with that? And he's like, you

should be thinking, good, this is

amazing. This is the best time to be

building. There's so much opportunity.

So exciting. This is what we want.

Exactly. Good. I just remember seeing

like good. I love that. I feel like

that's the epitome of growth mindset.

Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. So, let me ask

you just what do you how do you tease

out a strong growth mindset? What are

some ways? Well, good thing I'm not an

operator anymore because I'm going to

give away my interview questions. So, no

one can like cheat on this. So, I feel

like this another reason why this is

such a great time to do this podcast. Uh

the question I asked is it's been the

same one I've asked for years and you

can really you know kind of sus it out

from this which is I I asked them

think about the one of the biggest

mistakes you've made like truly the most

the more painful the better and tell me

what the mistake was describe to me the

situation and tell me actually how you

actually think differently now work

differently as a result like how has

that turned into a corporate principle

of yours, etc. And I give them a moment

to think about it. Sometimes I even

share some of my mistakes if need be.

And uh

it's interesting because because I've

asked this question so many times, I can

smell the BS if they're not being

authentic, right? It's like, you know,

kind of like, oh, I've worked too hard

or I, you know, did this thing and

they're really not being that. You can

tell the vulnerability that people are

willing to express and I reciprocate

with that because if they ask me what

mine is, I will tell them what it is,

right? And then that's the vibe. And

then what ends up happening is like

there's multiple reasons why this is

really interesting. One, you get to get

a sense of how reflective they are. And

there were some there's one woman I I I

um was was chatting with and we actually

went on for like an hour because she was

just like educating me on this like

amazing problem that she had made this

mistake on and like how it changed the

way that she worked and the company

worked. It was just incredible, right?

And you can you can sense the passion.

You can sense what's genuine, right? And

then there always once in a while those

those those things where people are like

just very a little bit more defensive

and not willing to open up. Um, and I

think that's uh and it's safe. It's a

it's a one-on-one setting, so it's a

safe space. And I'm, you know, it's also

it's I don't think it actually selects

for or against introverts or extroverts.

I think at that point it's really

genuine. And the second sort of order

effect there is if they end up coming on

the team, you've already had that

moment.

You've already had that moment where

you've just already said like, "Hey,

like this is where I really messed up."

And guess what? It's all okay. It's not

a loss. It's a lesson, right? And so it

just sets a different tone for your

working relationship. So again, I've

never AB tested this, so I can't tell

you if this is actually you it works or

not, but I found it to be very helpful

in the style that I work in to be able

to have that level of connection whether

it's with a direct report or somebody in

the or what I love about this answer is

it's very much like fail Corner, which

is a recurring segment on this podcast

and I might tweak Fail Corner to be even

closer to this question. Okay. So, let

me summarize these two. Essentially, two

questions that you've found to be really

helpful in finding these superstars that

you've hired over the years. One is you

ask people in six months if I'm telling

you what to do, I've hired the wrong

person or I guess how do you say it when

you say it to someone just like you're

probably the right wrong person? Uh,

well, it's it's actually framed a little

bit differently. It's in so there's

there's five different sort of part of

my API or just how to work best with me.

There's like five attributes of people

that um uh that are most successful who

who who work with me and I love working

with and and one of them is framed as

sort of like you know that that you know

there you're telling me what to do not

the other way around six months after

joining. Right. Right. And then I I

follow up with in six months if I'm

still telling what to do I've hired the

wrong person. Right. And think that is

that's that's how I frame it. Okay. Uh

by the way you should open source this

uh p PXD API doc. I would love to. I

think now I got nothing to hide. I'm

just like here I'm an open book. So

maybe we'll do that at some point.

You'll you'll you'll make me brave

enough to do that maybe after this

podcast. So you may find a link in the

show notes for this podcast to that doc

if I'm brave enough. Okay. And then the

the other question you ask is tell me

essentially a a story of when you failed

a product that you launched failed and

how that changed how you behave, how you

think about product, how you operate.

Yeah. Amazing. Okay. Great. Okay. Let's

talk about management. Sure. So, this

came up. So, I talked to a bunch of

people that have worked with you and

interestingly, one of the most recurring

themes. It wasn't about like AI or uh

hiring came up a bit, but it's actually

mo mostly about how skilled you are as a

manager. And this has already come

through in a lot of the things we've

talked about. So, I want to talk about a

couple things here. Sure. One is uh

someone that you worked with at at

OpenAI, Joanna Jen, or is it Joanne?

Joanne. Joanne. Joanne Jen or Yang?

Yeah, Jen. Jen. Okay, cool. You worked

with her at OpenAI and she shared a

couple things that I think are really

interesting. One is that you had a

profound impact on her career by

teaching her how to manage up more

effectively. And you did that by

teaching her a really simple phrase that

she just says and uses. First of all, do

you remember what that phrase is? I've

said a lot of stuff and I've kind of

forgotten. I tend to forget what I say.

So, you might have to remind me. Okay.

So she said say you'll do the thing do

the thing say you did the thing. Mhm. As

a skill of managing up. So sure just

talk about that just the power of that

and what that's all about. I mean look I

I I I learned this from uh my time at

Uber from Jill who runs uh PR comms and

policy there and she used to have the

saying which is like repetition doesn't

spoil the prayer. It's just a a natural

thing where people are busy. So whether

you know if you think about managing up

or even managing you know the entire org

if you don't repeat what your goals are

if you don't repeat what your vision is

if you don't repeat the thing that you

feel strongly about that what you're

doing what you're you know you whether

it's maybe it's your manager one I think

you might lose sight of the thing that's

important and I think this is where it's

a little bit of a behavior this is

another language affecting thought thing

right by uh by by by giving this this

phrase to Joanne, maybe it was just

like, hey, let's just be very

intentional about what we build. That's

like that becomes a a constant reminder,

right? And uh and it's also has this

other effect where uh if you're saying

this is what I'm doing, and then that's

a thing that your manager is like, wait,

we don't need to do that anymore. You

can have a conversation about that as

opposed to just like doing the thing and

not saying that you're doing it. So, let

me take a step back. So one say what

you're going to do and then in that in

that exercise you're going to be able to

calibrate with your manager again with

anyone right what is it that we're going

to do and it's I think the words are

really important here going back to what

I said earlier so figuring out what is

that goal and crafting that to really

pack the most punch and the densest of

uh of of uh concepts right and then

you're telling them that you're doing it

which that's the second phase which is

like well in your 101 ones or in your in

your your your your team all hands,

you're saying this is what we're doing,

right? It's a great time to reaffirm

what you're doing or invite the

conversation that this is no longer the

thing to do and you got to tell them

that you did it. So, just close the

loop. Just be like, "Okay, great. This

is now done." Um, and I think that's

again, it's one of those like really

piffy phrases that has so many secondord

effects that are behavioral almost. And

this is a little bit of a hack in terms

of helping people. You know, it's funny

that Joanne thought of it as managing

up, which is which it is, but in my

mind, it's almost like this is how we

operate and this is how we're successful

to stay on stay on task, stay on goal,

and be able to revisit the goals that

we've set when they no longer are

relevant. Okay, so the phrase again is

say you'll do the thing, do the thing,

and then say that you did the thing.

It's actually Sorry, one more time. It's

it's it's say it's the way I would say

it is say you're going to do the thing,

say that you're doing the thing, and

then say that you did it. This reminds

me of uh this also works for

presentation advice. So, this came up. I

I don't know if it was Guy Kawasaki or

someone had a very similar phrase that

was for how to present well, which is

tell them what you're going to tell

them. Tell them and then tell them what

you just told them. That, you know, it's

possible that I might have, you know,

incepted it from there. So, I take no

ownership over this phrase. I will just

say that yes, I did I did repeat it.

This is great. And I love that this

isn't just managing up advice. It's just

like operating advice for everyone. And

there's an implication of uh the last

part is just like take like make sure

people know what you did. Like almost

like make sure you get some credit and

people understand the impact you've had,

which is which is important. I think

there's a lot of people who are kind of

introverted and don't want to draw

attention and don't have the hero

complex. And I think that those people

tend to get lost in in organizations. So

if that describes you, just remember to

to say what you did. There's another

management trait that Joanne shared that

I want to spend a little time on, which

is you're very good at helping people

understand that they can lean into their

strengths and not feel like they need to

fit into a certain box. She shared that

you basically helped her create almost a

new role within OpenAI that wasn't even

a thing before. So just maybe share that

example and then just talk about why

this is important, how you think about

this. Well, I I love that we're talking

about things that Joan

are telling you because Joanne's really

special. I I got to just take a moment

to give her a giant shout out. She is

uh the only person that I've worked with

that has as much technical depth as she

does have product taste.

And I just want to pause there like it's

it's just truly special. I I feel

entirely privileged to have the chance

to cross paths with her at opening eye.

I learned so much from her. Like again,

t talk about like not telling you what

to do after 6 months. Like she was

telling me what to do from like day two

and I loved it because she was she's so

technical and she has this taste and

that those two things are very rare to

find together. And with Joanne because

she was so special in that way and I

spotted that I was like wow like I've

worked with so many PMs and it just like

this is very unique. It just it feel

felt like we had to find a way to craft

this, right? And sure enough, she was I

was like, "Hey, can you just write up a

job description of like what is this

thing?" Because there's something

magical here, but I don't fully

understand it. I don't think any other

person really thinks of things this way

and think this might be a big superpower

for OpenAI. Like, let's codify it,

right? And again going back to my

language being a really important thing,

I think the exercise sometimes of

writing things down of like things that

you intuitively feel give you an

artifact that can kind of communicate

with somebody else. So like in this case

Joanne writing down like kind of some of

the things that she got really excited

about helped me really understand that

and you know I was luckily in a in a

position where I can basically say like

let's let's create this role. let's

let's let's create this role and have

you lead it and I think this is going to

be great for the product if we're able

to codify it. So I don't think I did

anything special. I was just following

my instincts and just like following her

lead. Again, I will be clear. I did not

author that document. I my recollection

she did that. So she did all the hard

work and all of this thing and I don't

want to take any credit for it. The only

thing I did was just gave her a little

nudge of like I think there's something

here like can you just take a moment to

go and write this down and when she did

it was just like okay this has got to be

a role and you have to be the leader for

this function. What is the actual role

she ended up in? I think that'd be

really interesting to share. Yeah, the

role was model designer. Um, and it was

just a really interesting way that she

framed it and and I know this role

probably exists in some incarnation in

other uh uh foundational model

companies, but the way that she

described it and the things that she

found to be the spikes required led us

to hire our first two model designers

after running a search and they were

just perfect fits for the team, right?

Um, and that I think is is largely a big

secret as to why I'm biased. I love

Chachi Piti so much in the way the model

design comes off. Um, and and the vibe

of the model is largely because of this

like technical plus taste role that she

has created and she is leading. I love

one of the interesting takeaways from

this is as a leader is just pay

attention to some to what people are

really really excited about and then

take the step of let them try to

describe it very clearly in a dock

coming back to your point about the the

power of language and words is just like

okay tell me exactly what you're

thinking and let's jam on it because

maybe there's something here. Yeah. Is

there anything broader here about just

like leaning into strength that you find

just like you know there's a lot of

people there's all this debate of like

should I just work on the things I'm

terrible at and that'll make me better

or should I find the things I'm amazing

at and just get better at those things.

Any thoughts there? I genuinely believe

that fit is a two-way street. And so

what you are passionate about, what your

strengths are, you got to really find

the right company, the right role for

you. And I think there's a lot of

force-fitting that people want to do is

to fit into a certain archetype. I'm

glad we talked about the PM archetypes.

Hopefully that frees people up to kind

of really lean into what they love,

right? Because, you know, life's pretty

short. It would be it'd be great if

everyone would find the thing that they

really wanted to do and be able to lean

in and do that. And I think the optimist

in me is also why this is I'm so excited

about the time and age that we're in

right now because there's so many

different companies popping up. So

there's like there's there's something

that really resonates with people,

right? I mean, take a look at just the

the you know, we're doing here. It's

like podcasting was not a thing 20 years

ago. Like we there's there was it was

not a thing. But now we're able to like

have these amazing tools and platforms

that allow people to really express

themselves and really what really truly

brings them joy and and makes them happy

uh and also brings a ton of value uh to

the world, right? So I think that yeah I

definitely believe in leaning in

strengths and I think that you know as

hard as it may be sometimes you got to

look at sort of where you are right now

and is this the thing that you really

want to do or is there something else

that's kind of like kind of uh drawing

your attention and and drawing you

towards that. There's another

managementoriented question I want to

ask you. This came from Eric Antel who

uh apparently has worked with you for 17

years across a bunch of off and on for

17 years. one of my my biggest uh

mentors and friends like he's amazing.

Okay, so he's he he he's like you need

to ask this question. So the way he put

it is you've hired, managed, mentored

many, many, many product people, some

junior, some senior, across so many

different cultures. And he's just like,

we need to learn something from your

experience doing that. Uh, in terms of

what you've learned about what it takes

to be a really successful product

person, whether it's being successful in

building product or career-wise, what's

just like a nugget that you learn from

seeing so many different types of people

and cultures and seniority? I think for

a product person specifically,

it's really important to obsess over the

details of craft because you're

ultimately you're crafting a product.

It's important to obsess about the

details of craft while simultaneously

having the perspective and wisdom of

which details don't actually matter.

I'm going to pause there and just kind

of try to unpack this a little bit

because at the core of being a product

person, you're like, "Oh, like I want to

build something that people love,

right?" And

that's the job and that's that's what

draws people to be product people is

that you have this desire to build. And

I think that

I've been

involved in enough teams where I myself

and when I was really young and and

coming up as a product person, I would

just get obsessed over these little

little details and I've I realized

afterwards that we just wasted a bunch

of time on something that didn't

actually matter. So I think that

dichotomy is somewhat

interesting and beautiful to me because

it encapsulates both the core of what

the ethos

of a successful product person is, which

is you really have to care and you have

to to give a crap about the product that

you're building.

But you also have to have the

perspective and business knowhow to

understand where do you apply your time

and where do you apply the care there.

And I myself feel like I've gone through

cycles, you know, like everything that

I've done, I've gone super deep and

really obsessed and then I take a step

back and I'm like, wait, actually, I was

missing something and this other thing

was was more important, right? I I'll

give you an example. I'll use the Uber

example here as as um as you know what I

said that you know that the digital

product didn't really matter, right? And

it was all about the price, the ETA.

one of the proudest products I've built

at Uber, which is Uber Reserve, right?

It's the simplest of thing. Going back

to what I said before, sometimes the

best products are the simplest of

things. But the problem that we were

trying to solve is that, you know,

everyone has this. You have a 6 a.m.

flight

and are you really going to wake up at

4:00 a.m. and request an Uber and hope

that there's enough Ubers and the person

is going to come, right? because if you

do that, you're not going to sleep well

and you're going to like, you know, wake

up every two hours and you're you're

probably going to miss your flight

anyway because you're going to fall

asleep or whatever. And so there was

this insight of like, okay, there's a

whole mismatch between what people

really want, which is the the peace of

mind that their car is going to be

there, and guess what? I'm willing to

pay for that, right? And so we built

Uber Reserve which was like it was the

simplest thing which is like oh just

like go ahead and say what time your

flight is and we'll work backwards or

even just like tell us when you want to

get picked up and everything about that

product we crafted what really mattered

for the user which was the peace of

mind. So if you go there and you say

what time your flight is and you you

pick up your your pickup time or

whatever I think that the product is it

hasn't changed that much since I was

since I was there. It would tell you oh

this is cutting it really close. You may

not make your flight. It's like, wow.

Again, that was put in there because of

the principle of peace of mind, right?

And and on the other side, it's like,

well, what do drivers need? They need to

they need to know you're not going to

cancel and all this other stuff. So, you

got to think about the driver

incentives, too. So, it was a simple

idea. Uh really proud of the team for

figuring out all the intricate details.

Did some testing. And last I heard from

folks internally, this is like a $5

billion a year business now and one of

the highest margin ones. And I'm really

proud of this because it's like it came

from the idea of like, let's focus on

what actually matters, right? which is

this that peace of mind and how many

people really need it in that moment.

So, so that I think that's a story that

the best the best story I can tell.

That's an awesome story. Uh it connects

so many of the things you've talked

about. One is just uh it may not be the

product that really matters and

microoptimizing the experience is not

going to move the needle when there's

something else that's more operationally

oriented. But, you know, there's always

going to be a product component if

you're building it for for users. The

other piece that I think is interesting

here is it's uh well, there's two. One

is just it connects back to your point

about the importance of autonomy of

product people is just like I feel like

you're like here's the team here's what

I'm told to work on and then you're like

oh but this thing is actually the

problem we need to solve and let's just

build a new product around it and then

there's a whole story imagine of you

getting buying and all that stuff. The

other thing this connects to, we just

had the CPO of the of Uber, the current

CPO of Uber on the podcast, and he

talked that'll be out a few episodes

before this one, and he's it was all

about dog fooding and basically exactly

discovering these problems. He he's done

7 to 800 rides as an Uber driver to do

to discover these problems. He had this

great quote about uh it's like one thing

to watch to build an app for drivers

sitting in your office making it look

really pretty. It's another to be

driving 60 miles an hour with this phone

a few feet away from you trying to

figure things out. 100%. Oh, I remember

that I I took um two weeks off before I

joined Uber and in that time I've I've

been obsessed with kind of like user

research for the the longest of times

and this is like more relevant back then

when you wanted to really understand how

you know you the wide uh mass of uh

users were using your product. Um, and I

remember I actually leased a car to to

drive for Uber those two weeks. Um, so

it was a little white uh uh VW something

or another. I put an Uber sticker on it.

I turn on the app and I just started

driving. It's like there's no better way

to learn than to dog food. And I'll just

build on what what Sachin Sachin, right?

This is the person you had on on the

podcast. Yeah. It's amazing amazing guy.

And and so I'll just build on sort of

what he said there. I think that, you

know, what really stuck with me in terms

of framework that

I learned back in school was cuz I was

brought up at with the ideo way of

design thinking. Um, and I was at the

design school at Stanford where before,

you know, we literally were in uh

trailers. Uh, that's that's that's how

early it was. But I remember the the

framework that really stuck with me is

what IDO preached, which is like there

are five stages to great design

thinking. Number one is empathize.

Two is to define. Three is to ideulate.

Four is to prototype. And and five is to

test. And what I love about this

framework and I really hope this doesn't

get lost because I I don't know how much

it's being preached nowadays in in

design thinking is that it really it has

the right words associated with it. You

know, like the first thing is

empathizing. Like it's not just about

you got to really feel the pain of your

customers, right? It's not just about

kind of theoretically understanding what

the problems are. It's like really

empathizing which is why you know user

research was so important to me right is

to understand that or even you know like

Sachin said just taking those rides but

also you know flying around the world

and and when I was working at Uber to

figure out well what are the various

conditions

and so empathize is like a really

powerful word. The define is a also a

really powerful word because it forces

you to articulate what the problem is.

And this is again going back to the

language thing of you have to be very

intentional about defining the um the

the the problems that you want to solve.

And then ID8 we all know it's

brainstorming and prototyping and tests

are self-explanatory. But the first two

stages I think are really insightful um

and it talks directly to what Sachin was

saying. It's like you got a dog food

because you really have to empathize and

the great products are when you really

feel the pain and you really empath

empathize with the with with what people

are are experiencing. This is a great

connection to another podcast episode

that I I came to mind as you were

talking uh the head of product at linear

naan had this really great concept

that's exactly what you're just saying

which is as a product person you want to

feel the pain of your customer the same

way they do. You shouldn't stop asking

questions to understand what they're

telling you until you feel the pain that

they feel and that'll help you empath

that basically that's like how to

operationalize empathizing. It's just do

you feel the suffering. Yeah. And I

really do hope um product people still

do this to this day because I think

there's so many shortcuts that if people

take you're going to miss the point,

right? I still remember distinctly

flying down to LA with Kevin Cyester to

go do a user research study. Uh, and it

was a one-way glass thing where we

listened to pe uh people talk about

Instagram and how they use Instagram and

it was there's no substitute for that,

right? I think that if to anyone out

there who's like doing user interviews

and then saying, "Hey, Chachi PT,

summarize the takeaways." You're missing

the point. You can't empathize with the

summary. You have to be in the room

fully immersed, no phones, just actually

hearing the words and the intonation.

That's how you're going to get the full

color. So, yeah, it makes me think of

Jeff Bezos has this great quote. If

you're trying to if you have an anecdote

and data and they're telling you

different things, trust the anecdote.

Oh, man. So many lessons. Okay, so to

start to kind of wrap up our

conversation, we covered a lot of

ground. I want to ask you about Facebook

real quick. So you joined Facebook very

early. Uh Eric Antinau who I've

mentioned previously told me that it was

very strange that you left Google to

join Facebook at that stage. Google was

killing it on top of the world. You had

such a strong career path. Things were

going great but you decided to take a

big leap joining Facebook. What made

what did you see? Because I think

there's something interesting here that

we can learn about what you saw that

helps that may help other people decide

where to go work.

I've always been enamored with this idea

of understanding us as fundamentally

human and how we're wired.

And

I remember at the time, you know,

talking to the folks at Facebook and

seeing it and this is back when like

people like, "Oh, this is just a college

site, you know, and and that's that was

the the vibe back then." But what I saw

was

that the team and Mark and and others

really

understood the fundamental human sort of

desires that people had to connect and

feel lonely and to to share and they

really got the right articulation of the

problem they were trying to solve which

was to to to make the world more open

and connected. And this really resonated

with me because I again I studied a lot

in college like psychology and just I

was really enamored with this idea of

like how are we as humans fundamentally

wired and it felt to me like a a

no-brainer to go work at Facebook

because they saw

how people were wired and how to

actually build products that complement

how people are wired, right? And it

wasn't that they were trying to force

fit something into something that was

unnatural. It was almost like, you know,

how do we build technologies and and

products that actually um augment our

our fundamental desire to kind of stay

connected? And this goes back to sort of

why I think the power of wars is so

important is because, you know, you take

a look at some of the mission statements

for like Fster or or MySpace. I don't

even know if they had mission statements

or what they were. they were kind of

vapid and they didn't really speak to

the fundamental humanity of what

Facebook was striving to build and that

just deeply resonated with me, right?

And so it's I remember spending time

with Eric being like, "Hey, what should

I do? Should I take this offer from

Facebook or should I stay at Google?"

But ultimately it was just like that

deep resonance with my values of

building things that were fundamentally

human. And ultimately, I think that for

any startup out there, anyone building

product, the more that you can get a

good impedance match between what you're

building and what humans fundamentally

want and need, the more successful

you're going to be, right? Um, so that's

that's like my my my big answer. I think

the the second an secondary answer um

I've always

optimized for learning like in my career

and this is a huge thing that I say to a

lot of people because they look at sort

of like oh you've been at all these

companies like what's your secret? like,

well, I've just figured out that I want

to go to the place where I can learn the

most.

And for me, that wasn't really Google,

but I had so much I wanted to learn from

operating at Facebook. Um, and at

Facebook, I would say, yeah, I was there

for nine and a half years, but I always

jumped around every two and a half or so

when I feel like there was something new

to learn. And

that's it. That's I mean I don't know if

it's a secret or not. It just it just I

got lucky and I just was able to have

opportunities to learn different things

and different skills. Um and that served

me quite well and regardless of any

outcome I would say that's just a great

way to live your life. Um personally is

just to kind of optimize for learning

and those experiences and and for me you

know moving to Facebook was that I saw

so much learning that that that could

have happened and it ultimately did

happen. So I feel like that it was a

good outcome too. Boy did it.

So, a couple takeaways here for folks

that are maybe trying to decide between

a couple roles, maybe deciding if they

should leave and do something new. Is uh

one, are you feeling like you're

learning enough slash is the new place

you're thinking about going to help you

learn a lot more? too is this uh is what

they're building aligned with human

behavior almost this impotent impetence

match that you described feels like

there's another element you uh shared

which is do they have a really unique

insight about how things work and also

do you really care about this is this

also how you see the world so you're

talking about a Facebook like they had

this really unique insight about human

behavior and that was really important

to you and so it's a really good fit

100% yeah I think the insight thing

thank you for summarizing that and

drawing that out because that is um

that's also what I look for and when I

you know want to partner with companies

and startups now is like do you have

that unique insight? Are you teaching me

something that I I really don't know. Um

and that usually is a good indicator of

a strong point of view. Um and uh having

a strong point of view is really

important because like you know there's

a saying that Mike and Kevin had at at

Instagram which is um uh we may not be

right but at least we're not confused. I

think that just it was it's a beautiful

phrase I thought because like you know

sometimes you just got to go and do the

thing that you think is right. Um and

the indecision is going to be one of the

things that really kind of gets you and

bites you right. So that that that for

me is is something is I look for folks

who have a strong conviction uh whether

it's the the founders I support uh you

know when I go join and and be an

operator at the company or the founders

I support in my current role. That's so

interesting. Tor Cohen, the CPO of

LinkedIn, uses that's that's a famous

phrase that he often uses, too. So, I

wonder if you borrowed it from those

guys. Yeah, that was that was one of his

mottos. Uh, we may not be right, but

we're not confused. Wow. I didn't know

that. So, I I did talk to him at one

point. I don't remember if that's

something we talked about, but again, it

could just be like, you know, great

minds think alike, and we just had

different uh different great folks from

Mike and Kevin and and Tor feeling

feeling the same vibes. I love just how

many episodes this conversation has

referenced. Okay, so speaking of

learning, final question before we get

to our very exciting lightning round.

I'm going to take us to fail corner,

right? Which very aligned with uh your

growth mindset question. So the idea of

this segment is people come on this

podcast, they share all these amazing

stories of everything's working out. I

had so much success, worked at all these

incredible companies, everything worked.

But in reality, things don't often work

out. Most people go through a lot of

failed uh initiatives, projects, career

uh hits. So the question is just what's

a product that you built and launch that

was just a big failure? And I'll ask it

the way you ask it. What's how did that

change the way you think and operate?

You know, one one example is, you know,

since we're talking about Instagram

before, um you know, we tried to build a

kind of camera first app at Instagram.

It was called Bolt and it didn't work.

and the

great, you know, kind of levels of craft

and design and and the premise was

essentially like, you know, can we make

it so it's just reduces the pressure to

share, right? And you can open to a

camera, you can you can just kind of

like send some things to folks and you

get some good feedback and you kind of

uh go from there. And uh it was and

obviously the Instagram design team, so

it was top-notch like the app was

designed really well. It was really fast

because it was Instagram, you know,

engineering team and they were just

really good at making performant mobile

apps, right? It had all of the

advantages that we had talked about uh

that we valued at Instagram, but we

launched it and I believe it was New

Zealand or Australia and it didn't work.

Um, and I remember the the reason we we

we knew this is we're looking at sort of

the the retention graphs and retention

is the key indicator in any product that

you build. uh it's not the number of

users, it's not the volume, it's

actually retention and cohorted

retention. You can you can draw the you

plot the line and and if it asmmptotes

then you're in a good spot um because

that means that people over uh x period

of time will continue to stay on the app

and that just didn't happen. And I think

the learning here was that you can

really have the best team in the world

with the best product taste. Um, and you

can't really predict what's going to hit

on the first go.

And failure is okay. You're just going

to up and learn from that, right? And

nobody wallowed over that. We actually

had some technology that we built there

that we were able to port over to the

main app which was really really

helpful. But, you know, to quote the

great American poet Sean Carter, it

ain't a loss, it's a lesson, right? And

I think it's really important that you

see that as a product person is that you

don't you don't see it as failure. You

see it as like kind of great now I now

I'm that much smarter, right? Um and

this is something that I've just

collected. There's other examples as

well. Um but I think this is one of a

good example of sort of uh something

that's somewhat counterintuitive that

you have the best team. you're going to

provide those hits over and over, but

sometimes you you can't predict those

hits. And you just have to have the

wisdom to be like, "Okay, let's let's

let's uh see what we can learn here, see

what we can save here, and then move

on." I absolutely remember that product

and launch or heard about it. And uh but

I also don't ever think about it. And so

I think it's a good reminder because

that's a you know, Instagram launching a

new product that's trying to rethink the

way you do social your camera. That's a

big deal. And so I could see that being

a really big deal for it not to work

out. At the same time, nobody remembers

that really. Exactly. Yeah. Peter, we've

we've gone for two hours at this point.

I feel like we could do it two hours

more. Uh we'll save that for another

conversation. Great. Before we get to

our very exciting lightning round, is

there anything else you either wanted to

share or want to leave listeners with to

maybe double down on a point you made

that you think might be helpful?

Otherwise, we'll just jump right in. I

think we should jump right in because I

I I feel like you've uh you've extracted

every little ounce of what wisdom I had

here. Um and you did a great job here

just helping me uh remember these

stories and uh recounting stuff. So I'm

I'm ready to jump in. That's my goal. Uh

although I know there uh is much more

that I haven't even started to tap. Uh

but with that we reached our very

exciting lightning round. Are you ready?

Uh I'm ready. Question one. What are two

or three books that you find yourself

recommending most to other people? This

is easy for me. Um, number one is

Sapiens. Um, you if you're a product

person, you have to understand uh our

own humanity if you want to build

products for people straight up. That's

that's that's a beautiful book. I read

it before it was called Sapiens. It was

called uh from animals to gods uh and it

was just republished a different name,

but it has really stuck with me and I

remember it's a very short easy read.

So, I I'd recommend that. Uh the second

book I think for product folks is is a

classic one which is the design of

everyday things by Don Norman. This may

seem outdated and old but it's I promise

you it's not. It really helps you

understand you know physical product

design which is again things that mold

and shape to humanity. I think it gives

you a good sense of that. Third book is

something I'm reading right now. It's

recommended by a a friend of mine and I

can't put it down. It's called The Silk

Roads um uh by Peter Franco and

basically this is a recounting of

history through the lens of the Silk

Road and and sort and the Middle East

and how how that's evolved. It's so

fascinating because one of the things I

love, Lenny, is seeing things from

different perspectives. This is why

travel's fun. This is why like, you

know, user research is fun for me. And

it really helps you see the events of

world history that we've all been

experiencing through a very western view

uh viewpoint in a in a different way.

And it kind of connects a bunch of

things that are like, you know, there's

western thought, there's eastern

thought, but if you see the connection

between them, it's super fascinating.

I'm only two chap three or maybe four

chapters in, but definitely something I

would recommend off the bat. What is a

favorite recent movie or TV show that

you've really enjoyed? I have to go.

Maybe it's not as recent, but I the one

that always comes back to me is The

Wire. Uh HBO's The Wire. And And I just

I guess there's just so many TV shows

now that are I'm still processing, do I

want to put it in my all-time great, but

the storytelling there and the v the

various different sort of consistent

characters, but the fact that there's

the beautiful writing of The Wire is

something that's unparalleled. I'm now

curious what's in your all-time great

list, but I'm not going to go there.

We're going to keep going. Uh what's a

favorite product you've recently

discovered that you really love?

Um, I I I'm just going to go with

Cornola because I think that we talked

about this before, but this has been a

superpower for me and I have a lot of

commute time now. What I do is I just do

a single player mode. I go up and I I

start thinking about and brainstorming

about sort of ideas or thesis I have for

investing or whatnot and I get to where

I'm going and boom, it's there organized

in a more cogent way and oftentimes ways

that I didn't even think about

articulating them. So, it it goes

through the process of of forming words,

but it also helps that assistance and I

think it's a beautiful product um on

many different levels. Wow, Granola's

killing it at this category recently.

And I'll give a shout out. You get a

year free of Granola if you become

yearly subscriber of my newsletter,

which is the not just for you, but your

entire team. They're just they gave an

incredible deal. Is that true? I didn't

know that. 100% true. Okay. Well, I tell

you, I was not compensated for that

little pitch there. That was that's

that's genuine right there. I'm also not

compensated. Yeah, if you go to

lenniesnewsletter.com and click bundle,

you'll see a way to get it. Uh, love the

product, use it all the time. I should

be using it for these interviews and

then I could have a whole summary ready

to go. Uh, okay. Next question. Do you

have a favorite life motto that you

often come back to in work or in life?

Yes. This actually something that my dad

taught me. Uh, it's it's a it's a saying

that is in Chinese that it actually

rhymes in Chinese, but you know, kind of

almost rhymes in in English. And it's uh

it goes something like this in English,

which is if you move a tree, it dies.

But if you move a person, he thrives.

And I think it's a really interesting

thing I keep on coming back to. And this

goes back to why, you know, for me, it's

just the the joy of learning and trying

new experiences and trying, you know,

being at different companies that I've

been very fortunate to be at. I really

think that that's how you should live

life is just to kind of experience these

different experiences. And it's kind of

poetic to be like, yeah, like something

as you know, unfortunately for trees,

like you can't really move them after a

while. But for humans, I think that you

move them around and, you know, we get

different travel experiences and we get

different life experiences when we go to

different jobs. And I think that's

that's makes life really worth living.

There's a I always think about what I

would answer to this question, and

there's a few, but one is uh something I

always come back to when my wife and I

are deciding to do something is choose

adventure.

similar sentiment. Final question. Okay.

So, you've now be you moved from product

leader to investor. So, I just want to

give you a chance to share tell people

what kind of stuff you're looking for.

So, you moved you're felicus now

investing in startups. Yep. What sort of

startups are you looking for who should

reach out if they're interested in Well,

I I I appreciate that uh opportunity.

Look, for me, um I just I think it's

been very clear like I just love working

with great people. Um, and uh, you know,

it's it's for me investing is just the

ability to support uh, more amazing

founders. I've always been drawn to the

founder archetype, right? Like working

closely with Zuck or you know with

Travis or Howie um, Brendan at Oculus

and uh, you know, folks at OpenAI. I

think there's this amazing sort of

visionary person that I just I love

supporting in one way or another. and

I've supported them from uh mainly from

the inside as a product leader but uh

for me it's just finding those amazing

founders and in this current role I get

to work with many founders at the same

time right and and just two days ago I

was on had meaningful calls product jams

with like three different founders in

three different industries and that kind

of keeps my mind super alive so you know

that's that's kind of why I'm doing what

I'm doing now and and I I I would love

to find some more of those those amazing

thought partners and people that I can

just help out if I can. Okay. Then, uh,

stage and, uh, market, anything there

for folks of like, okay, he's a fit, not

a fit. Absolutely. So, I would say, um,

early stage, uh, seed, seed plus, and a,

uh, is where I really get excited. I

feel like I I'm able to help folks see

the next stage. I've seen a lot of

movies in my life, in my career, so it's

like, oh, great. I can definitely see

this extrapolating out. You don't have

to convince me of the future. And then

it's really fun to be able to jam and

and and help support if I can and how

you scale from the uh the one to 10 and

10 to 100. So that's that's really big.

Uh and in terms of what I look for, it's

the two things I said before. It's like

in this day and age, there's so many

amazing things going to be built. One is

do you have unique data and do you have

a data flywheel? Two, uh do you have a

really crafted workflow that you can

really get after? And I guess third,

it's it's like do you have that insight

of what product things actually matter?

and also which ones don't and then how

do you actually go and expand upon that.

So yeah, really excited to meet a bunch

more founders whether it comes from here

or somewhere else. Okay, so final

question then is how do folks reach out

if they want to actually talk to you

about this and how can listeners be

useful to you? Thank you for the

question. I am an introvert so I I'm

really kind of silent on a lot of social

media. I have accounts on on on on X and

you know threads but uh really I think

LinkedIn is the the the network of

choice for me. is just like I I really

uh I want to be able to passively kind

of consume and learn about what what's

what's happening, how you listeners can

be helpful. I just want to learn like

what what what's what are you all

thinking about? What are some of the

insights you're you're seeing? One of

the analogies I have about AI in this

day and age is that it's this really

interesting new element that humanity

has discovered. And what's awesome is

that humanity is also very creative. And

so what humanity does with this new

element I'm fascinated by, right? And

you can tell the founders who've

actually played with this element

because they have this innate sense of

what this thing can do and can't do. And

I I'm just looking to be inspired by the

creativity of of all y'all out there.

Wow, that's such a cool way of thinking

about it. It's going to change my

perspective on AI a little bit. Peter,

this was incredible. I really appreciate

you taking the time to share so much

wisdom. I know this is the first time

you've done anything like this. Uh, I

feel like this is going to help a lot of

people in a lot of different ways. Feel

like we covered everything I wanted to

cover. So, just again, thank you for

Well, thank you for having me. This has

been a real pleasure and it's hopefully,

you know, some folks out there can get

some some learnings from this and find

it useful. But that's that was my goal

is to be able to share some things and

hopefully it will be helpful to some uh

folks out there. So, thank you. Thank

you for the opportunity. Thank you,

Peter. Bye, everyone.

Thank you so much for listening. If you

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