Lenny's Podcast: Product | Growth | Career

The essence of product management | Christian Idiodi (SVPG)

Dec 21, 2023

Christian Idiodi, a partner at Silicon Valley Product Group with a rich background in product leadership, sheds light on the challenges facing product managers. He discusses the negative perceptions surrounding the role and how to overcome them. Christian emphasizes the importance of understanding customer needs and the critical role of reference customers in product success. He also shares insights into high-volume hiring processes and the significance of effective coaching in building trust and fostering collaboration within teams.

01:33:13

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Episode guests

Christian Idiodi

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Quick takeaways

Coaching plays a crucial role in leadership, helping team members improve their skills and achieve desired outcomes.

Building trust is critical for effective coaching, fostering open communication, collaboration, and a positive work environment.

Coaching empowers product managers to define and solve customer problems, validate product ideas, and prioritize features based on business goals and customer needs.

Problem-focused coaching enables leaders to support their team members in finding solutions and achieving desired outcomes, enhancing the ability to deliver successful products.

Deep dives

The Importance of Coaching in Leadership

Coaching plays a crucial role in leadership as it focuses on getting better results in specific areas of expertise, such as product management. The responsibility of the leader is to provide guidance and support to their team members in order to help them improve their skills and achieve desired outcomes. However, effective coaching is often overlooked or not prioritized in many organizations. The lack of experience in receiving good coaching can hinder the ability to provide it to others. It is essential for leaders to understand that their job is not only to manage tasks and projects, but also to coach their team members on a daily basis. By offering guidance and feedback, leaders can help their team members grow and excel in their roles, ultimately leading to higher performance and success.

The Essence of Solving Problems for Others

00:42

The Core Competency of Product Management

00:43

Importance of Practice and Finding a Coach

01:26

The Influence of Positive Reviews on Trying New Things

00:47

Intro

4min

Elevating Product Management

13min

Connecting with Reference Customers for Product Success

19min

Navigating Recruitment Challenges in Fast Food and Beyond

10min

The Power of Non-Scaleable Actions and Effective Coaching

3min

The Power of Coaching in Leadership

26min

Empowering Innovation in African Markets

13min

The Importance of Showing Up and Life Lessons from Isolation

2min

A Taste of Nigeria: Culinary Traditions and Community Building

2min

Christian Idiodi is a partner at Silicon Valley Product Group. After a long product career and founding multiple companies, Christian now spends his time working closely with product leaders at companies big and small to implement and improve their discipline of product management. In today’s episode, we discuss:

• Why there’s often a negative perception of product managers, and how we can fix this

• The four attributes of a product manager’s job: value, usability, viability, and feasibility

• The power of finding reference customers

• How Christian developed a process for high-volume hiring to help companies like McDonald’s and Starbucks

• Tactical tips for coaching, building relationships, and building trust as a leader

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Brought to you by Jira Product Discovery—Atlassian’s new prioritization and roadmapping tool built for product teams | Vanta—Automate compliance. Simplify security | Teal—Your personal career growth platform

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Find the full transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-essence-of-product-management

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Where to find Christian Idiodi:

• X: https://twitter.com/CIdiodi

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cidiodi/

• Website: https://www.svpg.com/

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Where to find Lenny:

• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com

• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/

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In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) Christian’s background

(03:56) The negative perception of product managers

(07:58) How to become a PM people want to work with

(11:30) The definition of a product manager

(14:46) Where new PMs fail

(16:59) Reference customers: what they are and why they are so important

(24:05) A quick summary of how to build a product that people want and love

(26:44) How to determine product-market fit

(29:54) The benefits of this approach

(34:11) Real examples of using reference customers

(40:06) Doing things that don’t scale

(48:40) How to get better at coaching and build trust with leaders

(55:53) The fastest way to build trust

(01:00:01) What to do in the absence of good coaching

(01:02:51) How to get into product management

(01:04:16) The pitfalls of early promotions

(01:11:11) How to train someone for a promotion before giving the promotion

(01:13:30) How to find a good coach

(01:14:40) Christian’s product work in Africa

(01:21:22) The importance of passion and empathy in product work

(01:22:54) Lightning round

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Referenced:

• Marty Cagan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cagan/

• The nature of product | Marty Cagan, Silicon Valley Product Group: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/the-nature-of-product-marty-cagan-silicon-valley-product-group/

• Silicon Valley Product Group: https://www.svpg.com/

• Enhanced Product Discovery by SVPG Partner Christian Idiodi at Lean Product Meetup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQKaFEqhiqc

• Geoffrey Moore’s technology adoption curve: https://fourweekmba.com/technology-adoption-curve/

• Stripe: https://stripe.com/

• Building a culture of excellence | David Singleton (CTO of Stripe): https://www.lennyspodcast.com/building-a-culture-of-excellence-david-singleton-cto-of-stripe/

• Building beautiful products with Stripe’s Head of Design | Katie Dill (Stripe, Airbnb, Lyft): https://www.lennyspodcast.com/building-beautiful-products-with-stripes-head-of-design-katie-dill-stripe-airbnb-lyft/

• Rippling: https://www.rippling.com/

• Snagajob: https://www.snagajob.com/

• Howard Schultz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/howardschultz/

• Tesla portable charger: https://shop.tesla.com/product/mobile-connector

• Innovate Africa Foundation: https://www.innovateafrica.io/about/

• Inspire Africa Conference: https://www.inspireafricaconference.com/

• Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love: https://www.svpg.com/books/inspired-how-to-create-tech-products-customers-love-2nd-edition/

• Empowered: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Products: https://www.svpg.com/books/empowered-ordinary-people-extraordinary-products/

• Transformed: Moving to the Product Operating Model: https://www.svpg.com/books/transformed-moving-to-the-product-operating-model/

• Succession on HBO: https://www.hbo.com/succession

• Billions on Showtime: https://www.sho.com/billions

• Real sports app: https://www.realapp.link/

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Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com.

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Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

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Lenny's Podcast: Product | Growth | Career

The essence of product management | Christian Idiodi (SVPG)

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Deep dives

The Importance of Coaching in Leadership

The Power of Building Trust through Coaching

The Impact of Coaching on Product Management

The Value of Problem-Focused Coaching

Importance of Coaching and Trust in Leadership

Finding Opportunities for Collaborative Problem-solving

Enabling Technology and Empowering Africa

The Essence of Solving Problems for Others

The Core Competency of Product Management

Importance of Practice and Finding a Coach

The Influence of Positive Reviews on Trying New Things

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts