Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
00:17:33 · Oji Udezue
[00:17:33] S0: Twitter is actually more fun in terms of ICP because, first of all, I'll talk about the thing that's not obvious about Twitter. Twitter has... 30% of Twitter's customer base were unseen. They were media organizations. People like the NFL, the NBA, HBO, who wanted con... Their content to reach more people, to be in conversational spaces. And they were essentially business customers and not seen in the in the conversation pool. It's not obvious, but we interacted with them all the time, and we rev shared ads for their their videos. Right? Because we're making content all the time, and so Twitter was a way to extend the monetization of that that content, that inventory they already had. But when you go to the consumer side of Twitter, who are... What was the ICP? Well, actually, understood, and this is sort of reflected in what Elon Musk is doing these days, that he doesn't seem to understand. And if you ask anyone who's... Who was at Twitter, you will you will see the understanding in their eyes and the fact that he doesn't understand because Twitter's ICP is bifurcated. On one side, it is the most accomplished people in the world. Right? The people who have something to say. This is why there's neuro Twitter, there's weather Twitter, there is cancer Twitter, and so on and so forth. In fact, if something breaks, some new innovation happens in the world, it probably breaks on Twitter before it breaks anywhere else because these are people in informal communities following each other and sharing their results. So basically, there's this big circle of experts. We break down into celebrities. We break down into luminaries, leaders, and so on and so forth. That's the ICP. Now how does Twitter work? These people attract the other 90 who listen to these people, but also they need to create their own informal communities around the things they're passionate about and have this mimetic relationship with the the luminaries and the experts. And that is sort of the planet Twitter. Experts on one side, humans who need to connect with the things they're passionate about, the people who are like them. That is the ICP of Twitter, the people who have something to say in those two categories.
00:19:57 · Lenny Rachitsky, Oji Udezue
[00:19:57] S1: Are you happy you're not working on Twitter anymore? [00:20:00] S0: I am ecstatic. I'm ecstatic. It seems it seems like such a such a shit show. You know, no shade on anything or anyone, like, purposely, but, you know, look. What's happening is evident, so I don't think I have much to say about that. [00:20:18] S1: Yeah. What a wild ride over there. [00:20:20] S0: Mhmm. [00:20:20] S1: Zooming out on the frameworks question, when I asked you ahead of our chat about what frameworks you love and anything you think would be interesting to share, you had a really interesting response. And so I'd love for you to just share your perspective on frameworks broadly.
00:20:34 · Oji Udezue
[00:20:34] S0: Yeah. Look, two things simultaneously. One is I actually... I like frameworks. What what... The the way that I try to express them is mental models. Right? Because the essence of a framework and mental model is that it is a shortcut. It packages some dense thinking into a way for you to approach a problem or to approach an opinion and so on and so forth. So I do collect them. But I think that what's important actually in product management, is to have the ability to understand the fundamentals or the empirical relationship that constructs the framework in the first place. In math, you would call it like being able to derive the equation. And the reason that's important is because there's so much uncertainty in what we do. Like, product management isn't a science. In fact, programming isn't even a science, really, because if it was, we'd treat it differently. So the art of building, say, a software company that is profitable is not scientific. There's a lot of uncertainty, a lot of unknowns, there's timing issues. So I guess while I love mental models, while I love frameworks, what I want people who listen to me and maybe listen to you to understand is you have to go deeper because as situations change, like, you know, as an investor and advisor to startups, I advise differently if you are just starting, if you're in the middle, and if you're scaling. Right? In the book that I'm writing on product, I actually make that distinction a lot in the book, which is which stage are you? Because then the thing that applies to you is different. If you understand the fundamentals, you'll be able to use frameworks in a much more productive way because you'll adapt it to your stage, you'll adapt it to the problem. And I think that's really important. I see lots of people using frameworks very blindly, and I think that's harmful to them and harmful to their businesses.
00:22:31 · Lenny Rachitsky
[00:22:31] S1: What a great segue to where I wanted to take us next, which is around the book that you're writing, which is my understanding is it's product management for product led growth. And I'm on your wait list to find out when it's out. And I saw that the other day you asked people for their advice on what to call the book. Do you have any favorites at this point and what you might title it?
00:22:50 · Oji Udezue
[00:22:50] S0: Well, first of all, like, there are two things happening with the book. One is I believe PLG is... I have a... Maybe a different definition of PLG, but I think the way that we are basically adapting products to the consumer or to the business professional and using the product itself to sell the value proposition is really key to transitioning from what we used to do twenty years ago to today. Basically, think even enterprise companies will tend towards a consumer type product management over the next decade than the other way around. That's my bet. And so let's call that PLG just writ large. And also, think product management is set for growth. So, obviously, that's good for you, Lenny, because everyone needs to know how to do this. It's the integrative art within building software, and software is leading the world. The book, I want to get very practical, what matters about doing those two things well. And the best titles coming up are... My original title was Building Rocket Ships. So it's like, how do you think through all the different things you need to build a really successful software company? Think about the practice, think about the business, meld those two things together. So a lot of people love that title. Well, there's a huge variation in submissions. So I think we're gonna do that one more time and offer more options before we, we nail down the title of the book. So till TBD.
00:24:22 · Lenny Rachitsky
[00:24:22] S1: Cool. Alright. I'm excited to see where you land. So let's just spend some time on PLG. I feel like this is your bread and butter as a product leader. You've worked at some of the most successful PLG companies, and I think you have some of the most unique perspectives on what works and doesn't work. And I saw you shared a preview of what you're gonna be sharing the book. And so there's a few things there that I thought were really interesting that I haven't seen other places when it comes to PLG, so I was just gonna dig into it. Very. Absolutely. The first is this, framing that you had for where to start and how to focus with your PLG problem, and you described it as starting with a sharp problem. Can you talk about what that means?