The Future of Product Management

Today, the remarkably gifted leader, teacher, coach, and thinker, Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia joins Vikram on the podcast. In 2014, Carlos founded Product School, now the global leader in product management training. With over a million members, including mentors from companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, Airbnb, PayPal, Uber, and Amazon, Product School boasts an enviable network of individuals, and is the largest community of product managers in the world. Like most product managers, Carlos has several talents up his sleeve. Besides building Product School, he's written a book calledThe Product Book, organizes conferences such as ProductCon, and is a self-taught orator who's spoken at more than a thousand events and conferences around the world.

Carlos discusses the origins of Product School, a solution that helps people build data products much more efficiently than traditional education, and goes on to explain the types of product managers and their roles and responsibilities. He also  identifies one all-encompassing quality of product managers: they are generalists, not specialists. Carlos then takes us through a day in a product manager's life, how product managers handle all the functions they deal with, and why they need to be rich in empathy. Throughout this episode, Carlos shares the wisdom garnered during Product School's eight-year growth journey, including how to scale without compromising quality.

The Finer Details of This Episode:

0:00 Introduction

1:23 Product School

4:26 The growth journey of Product School

7:14 How to scale without compromising quality

10:01 Different types of product manager

12:57 The different functions product managers work with and the empathy needed for each

15:14 How to know when you have a product-market fit

19:24 The evolution of product management

22:32 Carlos’ top product management frameworks and methodologies

24:57 Carlos’ startup advice