Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
01:26:26 · Fiona Fung, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:26:26] S1: So usually definitely there's themes of where we think the work. And actually the whole team will bring everyone together every six months. So there will usually kick off some themes, but then it's really the making sure we keep the pulse of what... Because again, even those themes change so fast when the landscape changes. [01:26:49] S0: All right, let's pull out the spreadsheet. Let's take a look. Oh, man, man, this whole podcast could have been just talking about this planning stuff that you do. Okay. I'm going to have to find someone else to talk about this because this is so interesting just how you all plan. Yeah. Okay. Well, Fiona, with that, we reached our very exciting lightning round. I've got five questions for you. Are you ready? [01:27:10] S1: Ready. [01:27:11] S0: Okay. First question, what are two or three books that you find yourself recommending most to other people?
01:27:11 · Lenny Rachitsky, Fiona Fung
[01:27:11] S0: Okay. First question, what are two or three books that you find yourself recommending most to other people? [01:27:17] S1: Ooh, I will say for fiction, actually two authors I recommend to everyone, Margaret Atwood and Haruki Murakami. I mean, I grew up in Canada, so I read a lot of that when growing up, but her books are fascinating because it's almost like speculative fiction of you can squint and say, "Okay, could this actually happen to a society?" So I love her take on speculative fiction and Murakami, I love his magical realism style. But then the one book, so there are authors, but the one book I always recommend to everyone to read at least once a year, The Little Prince, I'm sure we probably all read it at some point in our lives, but I think I read it at least once a year just to remind me to think about what's truly important. [01:28:17] S0: Wow, that hasn't come up a bunch. Okay. I love it. Favorite recent movie or TV show you have really enjoyed? [01:28:25] S1: I haven't watched TV shows. [01:28:27] S0: That's very common across Anthropic people I have on the podcast. Tell me theme.
01:28:27 · Lenny Rachitsky, Fiona Fung
[01:28:27] S0: That's very common across Anthropic people I have on the podcast. Tell me theme. [01:28:32] S1: But I will share with you what I always have downloaded on my phone so that if I'm on the airplane... So there's three movies that I'll always have on my phone because I think they're just so fun to watch if I have time. One is Emily. It's this French movie that, oh, my gosh, all of these movies are going to be very old, by the way. It's going to be like vintage movies, but I loved Emily, super whimsical. So really highly recommend it to anyone that haven't seen it. If you remember, I told you I was going on a... I thought I was going to be a visual artist. So when I was 16, my high school, we took a trip, a high school trip to Paris and I have so many memories of that and Emily really captures the magic I felt at Paris. And the other two are Ghibli films. I love Spirited Away. I just love that story. I just love everything about Spirited Away. It's probably one of my favorite Ghibli films. And then the third one is another Ghibli film, Nausicaä Valley of the Wind. And I think about this one quite a bit because if anyone asks me, "Hey, how did you think about all these leadership traits?" I think I watched that movie probably when I was eight or nine and the heroin Nausicaä and seeing how she leads just left such a thumbprint in my heart, I guess you could say, that probably Nausicaä has inspired me to a lot in a lot of my different leadership principles. [01:30:08] S0: Wow. What is that book called again?
01:30:08 · Lenny Rachitsky, Fiona Fung
[01:30:08] S0: Wow. What is that book called again? [01:30:11] S1: The movie's called Nausicaä Valley of the Wind, but it was actually based on a manga. [01:30:15] S0: Valley of the Wind. So it's like high output management and you grow Valley of the Wind, Nausicaä. [01:30:21] S1: That's right. [01:30:21] S0: Two top management books. So cool. Okay. Do you have a favorite product you've recently discovered that you really love? Could be an app, could be clothing, could be a gadget, could be kitchen equipment.
01:30:33 · Fiona Fung
[01:30:33] S1: I'll share the product that I'm reminded of how much has made a difference in my life recently because I've been just traveling a little bit and I like to travel really light so I use whatever shampoo and conditioner the hotel gives and I forgot that... So the product that I actually have one of their hand, I promise is it's not an infomercial, but Sweet Sisters Body Care, it's a local business on Whidbey Island, but the reason why their product has made such a big difference in my life, it's a full line of organic, hair, body, skincare. But a few years ago, I started getting this rash on my nose right here that was really painful, actually bleeding. And I could not for the life of me figure out how to stop it. I tried not using any lotions. I cut everything on my face and it was still really hurting. And then somebody says, "What's the shampoo you're using?" I'm like, "It's the same shampoo I've used since I was a teenager." And they're like, "Maybe your body has now..." And it's like generic brand shampoo they get anywhere. And they said, "May your bodies just start developing an allergy to it because of the chemicals in it that..." I'm like, "What?" And so anyways, this was an organic shampoo that I found. Lo and behold, I use our shampoo because you don't think that when you wash your hair, it actually then goes over to the rest of your body. So since then, I've switched everything that I used to be Sweet Sisters, but I'm recently reminded of how important this is because after a week of hotel shampoo, I actually started having some skin reactions again. I'm like, "Ah, maybe I should get travel size bottles that I could bring with me."
01:32:18 · Lenny Rachitsky, Fiona Fung
[01:32:18] S0: This is an awesome pick. I love local business picks, even big bonus points for that. And by the way, this travel you're doing, just for folks that may not know this, there's these Code with Claude events that are happening all over the world. I went to the one in SF, there's one in London, you're going to one in Tokyo. Is that the end of it or is there more after that? [01:32:36] S1: Tokyo is... So yeah, that's next week and that's the last leg of the trip. [01:32:42] S0: Okay. And then probably more in the future. So cool. I love that that's happening. Okay, two more questions. Do you have a favorite life motto that you find yourself coming back to often in work or in life? [01:32:51] S1: Ooh. So in work, I really love to remind folks, keep it simple. What is the thing that you're really trying to do well and focus on that? Keep it simple because I think sometimes we could overthink. So it's always a good mantra to think about that. And then in life, probably in a world where you can be anything, be kind. [01:33:14] S0: I love that one. We were at a Montessori school tour and that's what the teacher had up on the wall. [01:33:21] S1: We have so many things going on that you never know what's going on in someone else's life and that one small act of kindness can make the biggest difference. For me actually that was when... Do you remember COVID? We were all working from home during the COVID- [01:33:37] S0: How could I forget?