Products That Count holiday party featuring Uber early VC

As product managers, we are required to be customer-centric. That said, the ways in which we interact with customers are often overlooked. How can product managers build better products through data-driven analysis of their customers’ needs? WW (formerly Weight Watchers) fmr Product VP Nicolas Chikhani shares best practices for optimizing the customer experience - from customer service engagement to building every touch point with your customers in mind.

Nicolas Chikhani is the Chief Product Officer at Feelmore Labs, a Brooklyn-based stealth startup focused on a new category of wellness devices. He also teaches a class at Columbia University on Product Management and Business Analytics. Previously, he spent 6 years at WW (formerly Weight Watchers) where he held various leadership Product Management positions, including VP of Product. Prior to that, he spent 4 years at Morgan Stanley. He holds a Masters in Financial Engineering from Columbia University and a Masters in Engineering from ENSTA in Paris, and currently lives in NYC.

There are 10 secret, psychological drivers that we all have, whether we want to admit it or not. This framework explains why we do what we do and how you can take advantage to improve your product. What are the drivers and how you can tap into them to boost growth and engagement? Zillow Product VP, Nate Moch, to share tactical examples of ways to increase conversions, grow your user base, and take your business to the next level.

Nate is Vice President, Product at Zillow and has been with the company for over 13 years. He is responsible for Zillow’s Growth and Rich Media Experience teams, helping expand Zillow’s audience and unique rich media. Nate has built and managed a number of Zillow products, including its Growth teams and mortgage business. Nate joined Zillow from Microsoft and has an MBA from the University of Washington and a CS degree from DePauw University.

This lively session connects two of mankind’s greatest inventions: product management and world mythology. Enough with that newfangled stuff - boost your product leadership skills with learnings that are thousands of years old. How do mythological tales apply to delivering great product outcomes? LinkedIn fmr Product Lead, Prasad Gune’s, extensive experience in enterprise and consumer software means you’ll walk away with actionable insights for your PM toolkit (and maybe hear a new myth or two).

Prasad Gune is SVP, Product at Signifyd, the world’s largest provider of guaranteed fraud protection. Before joining Signifyd, Prasad was Senior Vice President for product at OpenTable, leading global product management, strategy and design for all consumer and restaurant products and experiences. Prior to OpenTable, he spent seven years at LinkedIn, serving as product lead for LinkedIn Recruiter, building it from its infancy into LinkedIn’s flagship monetization product within the Talent Solutions business. Prior to LinkedIn, Prasad held senior product management roles at Oracle and Siebel Systems as well as various consulting roles at Bain & Company.

When looking at the state of your product, short-term KPIs provide insight into what’s working right now. However, ensuring long-term success goes beyond these early indicators. How can you ensure success in Year 2 of your plan to build toward your 3-5 year goals? Docusign fmr Product VP Damon Dean shares his experiences on crafting the right milestones in your product strategy to ensure that you not only know where you’re going - but are getting there when you thought you would.

Damon Dean is the VP of Product at Flexport - setting the company’s strategy for building innovative solutions for freight forwarding. Prior to joining Flexport, he served as VP of Product at Docusign - holding product leadership roles for nearly a decade. In addition, Damon has held product roles at Sprout Designs, Revcube and the California Healthcare Foundation. Damon is a graduate of UCLA and currently lives in the Bay Area.

The rapid rate of technological innovation is making an impact not only on product development - but how companies manage themselves internally and externally. From ways of working to connecting with customers, businesses at every stage need to evaluate how they're functioning at every level. What does it take to reimagine how a mature business operates in the short-term for long-term gains? LearnVest Director of Product, Roman Geyzer, talks about the power of digital transformation - sharing results that he's driven through key product strategies and implementing a culture of experimentation.

Roman Geyzer is a Director of Product at LearnVest. Prior to joining LearnVest, he led the product lead at LearnVest. In addition, Roman worked at Allocate Software and spent over a decade as an online services consultant. Roman holds a degree from Fordham University and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Viral growth is the holy grail for enterprise companies. Product managers and marketers spend late nights thinking of tactics that can make their product “go viral". How can product managers operationalize viral loops? Yammer fmr VP of Product, David Stewart, discusses different strategies and tactics that focus on channel optimization and product design to make your product “go viral".


David was VP of Product at Yammer. Prior to joining Yammer, David was Chief Business Officer at Turo; Senior Director of Growth at Playdom; and worked in product marketing and management at YouTube and Google. He started his career at the Boston Consulting Group. David received his bachelor's degree and MBA from Yale University.

It’s easy for product managers to get laser-focused on a singular growth metric (such as engagement or user conversion). That said, you can lose sight of your product’s big picture value - especially when it comes to keeping your customers happy. How can you stay focused on your users and drive your business forward at the same time? Microsoft Product Director Gail Giacobbe discusses how PMs can operate like customer experience managers to drive business growth by anchoring their priorities around the customer journey.



About The Speaker: Gail Giacobbe is a Director of Product & Data Science at Microsoft - focusing on the company’s experience & devices organization that provide organizations with tools to scale their business. Prior to joining Microsoft, Gail was VP Product at GoDaddy and led product teams at Skype - along with over a decade at Microsoft working on their Office product team. Gail holds a Master’s Degree from Brown University and currently lives in Seattle.

There are many qualities that define great product managers - but none is more important than your ability to own your domain. From your customers' feedback to product results, there's a difference between "owning" your product and "renting" it. What does it take to truly take ownership of your product? DoorDash Product VP Rajat Shroff shares the secret to operating as a product owner - providing best practices that are proven to steadily increase your effectiveness.



About the Speaker: Rajat Shroff is the VP of Product at DoorDash - leading the product development and strategy for the company’s delivery service solutions. Prior to joining DoorDash, he held Product VP roles at Groupon and Valassis Digital. In addition, Rajat has held product leadership roles at Deem and Buysight. Rajat has also held product roles at Oracle and Rhythm NewMedia. Rajat holds a degree from The University of Texas at Austin and currently lives in the Bay Area.

If you have your sights set on being a founder one day, then product management is the perfect role to master. From cross-functional operations to understanding your users, these are essential skills for building an early stage company. That said, how can you optimize your current PM experiences to set yourself up for becoming a successful founder? Blue Apron fmr Product VP Melody Koh talks about what it takes to build from zero to one - and how product managers can prepare themselves in the present for future success as a startup founder.

About The Speaker: Melody Koh is a partner at NextView Ventures - an NYC-based firm that focuses on investing in early-stage tech companies who are building solutions for the everyday economy. Prior to joining NextView Ventures, she led the product team at Blue Apron and also worked on the product team at Fab.com. In addition, Melody founded WineMe/FirstCrush and also worked for Evercore & Time Warner Investments. Melody holds an MBA from Harvard University and currently lives in New York City.

More so than any one factor, building a great culture within your product team is vital to building meaningful solutions and scaling your business. That said, it’s one of the most difficult concepts for any company to master and integrate into your team’s daily routine. What does it take to build a great culture within your team? Netflix fmr Product VP Gib Biddle talks about building an innovative culture by sharing the key tenets of the Netflix Culture Document - which has been cited by many executives as one of the most important documents to come out of Silicon Valley.

About the Speaker: Starting in 2005, Gibson Biddle was VP of Product at Netflix. In 2010, he became the Chief Product Officer of Chegg, a textbook rental company that went public in 2013. Today, he's an adviser for multiple consumer tech companies, as well as a teacher at graduate-level programs at both Stanford and Dartmouth.

From delivery to dog walking, the product requirements for today's workforce are constantly evolving. Plus, with more workers operating on their own - it's even more critical for products to deliver on the complex web of users’ financial, operational and emotional needs. How can product teams adapt their solutions to match these demands - and most importantly, deliver high-quality products that perform? Favor Delivery Product Lead P.J. Tanzillo talks about threading the needle between stability and innovation when building for the gig economy - with examples of process evolution in research, design, marketing and more.



About the Speaker: P.J. Tanzillo is the Head of Product at Favor Delivery - building new solutions for delivery services in urban environments. Prior to joining Favor Delivery, he held product leadership roles at Evernote and RetailMeNot. In addition, P.J. worked at National Instruments and started his own company (Bearded Pony). P.J. is a graduate of The Ohio State University and currently lives in Austin.

Every great company starts with an idea or "ah hah" moment that inspires the next big thing to become a reality. That said, you also need to focus on making a decision on how to move forward. Brainstorming sessions are great - but you need to make sure that you're selecting the right idea that provides tangible value. How do you sift through the whiteboard / sticky notes to find the "best idea" - and most importantly, what steps must be taken to turn an idea into a business? Amperity fmr. Product Lead Mona Akmal talks about building companies from zero to one and going from idea to business - including the three essential workstreams that will ensure success and validating demand before you build a product.



About The Speaker: Mona Akmal is currently the CEO of Mad Alice - a startup that focuses on Mona’s three passions (art, storytelling & technology). Prior to starting Mad Alice, she led the product team at Amperity - driving product/market fit for the company’s first product and later building its first enterprise solution. In addition, she held product leadership roles at Zulily and Code.org. Mona also worked at Microsoft for a decade - leading product teams focused on SkyDrive and security services. Mona currently lives in Seattle.

We all get bombarded with emails, pings, dings and rings. While we’re more connected than ever before, there are surprising burdens that these technologies place on employee productivity and happiness. In an age of ever-increasing distraction, how do we control technology and make sure technology doesn’t control us? Bestselling Author Nir Eyal shares actionable advice and case studies for how successful companies manage these technologies to increase customer satisfaction, team output, and employee retention. In addition, he shares the secret of operating with “super-focus.”

About The Speaker: Nir Eyal is a bestselling author whose first book - Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products - focused on teaching design behavior in Silicon Valley product teams. His next book - Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life - provides a guidebook for getting the best of technology without letting it get the best of us. Prior to publishing these titles, Nir served as CEO at AdNectar and Sunshine Business Development. In addition, Nir lectured at Stanford's Graduate School of Business and Institute of Design. Nir holds an MBA from Stanford University and currently lives in NYC.

Many organizations have seen value in a product mindset. As a result, these same organizations have created product functions. How can these teams be built and supported for maximum impact? Sam's Club (part of Walmart E-Commerce) Sharon Su Plasser will talk about the role culture plays in building product teams and discuss tactics for leading teams when there's more at stake than simply building products.


About the Speaker: Sharon Su Plasser is a Director of Product at Sam’s Club (part of Walmart E-Commerce) - leading the product team focused on retail operations and reverse logistics. Prior to joining Sam’s Club, she led product management and business operations teams at Yahoo. In addition, Sharon has also held leadership positions at Goldman Sachs and Meebo. Sharon holds a degree from Skidmore College and currently lives in San Francisco.

When businesses go from startup to growth mode, this presents a number of challenges for sustaining success. From learning new ways of working as a product team to maintaining customer loyalty, there are a number of factors that can maintain (or disrupt) your business' growth. As product managers, what does it take to drive bottom-line results without sacrificing the quality of your product? Aceable CPO Erin Defossé shares the secret to scaling growth products from your V1 or MVP state. He will cover driving alignment across product & marketing on user experience and maintaining focus on your customers' needs.



About the Speaker: Erin Defossé is the Chief Product Officer at Aceable - responsible for building, maintaining and executing the company’s product strategy and roadmap. Prior to joining Aceable, Erin was the SVP of Product at Bazaarvoice. Prior to his product management career, he was a spacecraft mission design engineer for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In addition, Erin is the Founder of The Magellan International School in Austin and was Co-Founder and CTO of Isochron Data. Erin holds a Masters Degree in Aeronautics & Astronautics from Stanford University - and currently lives in Austin.

There’s no substitute for direct user feedback in order to set the direction for your product development process. With more data available than ever before, how can product managers capture and analyze user input most effectively? Expedia fmr. Product Lead Anne Retterer will cover the top five methods for managing Customer Feedback Loops - with specific applications that product managers can use to guide their next product journey.



About The Speaker: Anne Retterer is the Founder and CEO of Mindspand - an online community that enables organizations to list course offerings and provide access to services for local customers. Prior to starting Mindspand, Anne managed the product portfolio at Expedia and established an investment fund for tech companies in Chile with Hambrecht & Quest (now JPMorgan Chase & Co.). Anne holds an MBA from UC Davis and currently lives in Seattle.

As product managers, we tend to think of software and hardware development as completely separate worlds. That said, these two product spaces are becoming more intertwined and dependent than ever before. If your background is rooted in one of these areas, how can you apply your skills to the other? Brilliant Home Product Director Gaurav Hardikar talks about the similarities and differences between building software and hardware products - along with his personal experience of learning hardware after many years of working exclusively with software.


About the Speaker: Gaurav Hardikar is the Director of Product at Brilliant Home, a Series A startup revolutionizing the Smart Home Industry through the Brilliant Control, the World's Smartest Light Switch. With an extensive background in Accenture Strategy, Trulia, Zillow Group, and Shopkick, Gaurav has 5+ years of experience delivering bottom-line growth, leading teams, and building consumer products that delight millions of users.

Product managers are tasked with building digital applications, internal tools and platforms to meet a variety of user needs across segments. How do you prioritize features for specific users and build a comprehensive suite of solutions? Oscar Health Product Lead Neha Kumar will talk about learning to break down and address the key needs of your users. In addition, she will discuss how to successfully build products that empower positive user experiences.

The modern tech world isn’t slowing down its rate of innovation or changes to the product management function. Now more than ever, product managers need to be nimble and learn new product skills on a constant basis. How do you keep your product career moving forward in the midst of regular change? Expedia Product Lead Rick Eames will talk about adapting to new product roles while leveraging your previous skillset. In addition, he’ll talk about the importance of “learning as a lifestyle” - and how to avoid stagnation in your product career.