91 / Capacity to Learn: A Skill All Top Product Managers Possess

“It depends.” A two-word answer that might seem overly safe. But is the only honest response to the question: “What does it take to be one of the top product managers?” Among dozens of dependencies, the PM role depends on whether you’re at a startup vs. a large, well-established company, says Karthik Suresh, co-founder of Ignition and a product leader with extensive experience as an early start-up hire and a key player in defining product strategy at Facebook.

“It’s like two completely different roles,” he adds. When at a startup, Karthik realized that product managers worked with limited resources, so much of the role was based on how well you hustle just to get things done. At Facebook, his role focused more on stakeholder management and collaboration than product strategy.

One skill that all top product managers possess – regardless of specific role or circumstance – is the capacity to learn. Particularly helpful when things don’t go according to plan. As Henry Ford once said, “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.”

This holds true even when that mistake cost a company $400 million in just 30 minutes! Be sure to listen in as Karthik Suresh shares a story about an algorithm gone wrong – and the important takeaways not only for a company, but also for an entire industry.

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