Building your product strategy stack | Ravi Mehta (Tinder, Facebook, Tripadvisor, Outpace)

Lenny's Podcast: Product | Growth | Career

Lenny Rachitsky

Technology, Business, Entrepreneurship

5 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 19 January 2023

⏱️ 81 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ravi was previously CPO at Tinder, Product Director at Facebook, and VP of Product at Tripadvisor. Currently, he’s co-founder and CEO of Outpace, a coaching platform designed to help people reach their professional goals. In today’s podcast, we dive deep into Ravi’s product strategy stack framework and how it was used to develop a powerful strategy at Tinder. We also cover his other popular frameworks—the frontier of understanding and exponential feedback—and how both of them can help you grow in your career. We discuss the differences between building product at a startup versus a large tech company, and how Ravi has had to shift his mindset as he’s moved away from a product leadership role into a founder role. Finally, he shares a bit about how Outpace is using AI to amplify coaches and help make them more efficient and effective.

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Find the full transcript here: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/building-your-product-strategy-stack-ravi-mehta-tinder-facebook-tripadvisor-outpace/#transcript

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Where to find Ravi Mehta:

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ravi_mehta

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

• Website: https://www.ravi-mehta.com/

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

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Referenced:

Disclaimer: Lenny is an angel investor in Ravi’s company, Outpace

• Reforge’s Product Strategy Program created by Casey Winters and Fareed Mosavat: https://www.reforge.com/programs/product-strategy

• Matt Mochary on Lenny’s Podcast: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/videos/how-to-fire-people-with-grace-work-through-fear-and-nurture-innovation-matt-mochary/

• Indie Hackers: https://www.indiehackers.com/

• Everything Marketplaces: https://www.everythingmarketplaces.com/

• The Product Strategy Stack: https://www.ravi-mehta.com/product-strategy-stack/

• Balsamiq: https://balsamiq.com/

• Set better goals with NCTs, not OKRs: https://www.reforge.com/blog/set-better-goals-with-ncts-not-okrs

• Ravi’s product manager’s competencies framework: https://www.ravi-mehta.com/product-manager-roles/

• Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products: https://www.amazon.com/Hooked-How-Build-Habit-Forming-Products/dp/0241184835/

• Working Backwards: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Working-Backwards-Insights-Stories-Secrets/dp/1250267595

• Ian McAllister on Lenny’s Podcast: https://www.lennyspodcast.com/videos/what-it-takes-to-become-a-top-1-pm-ian-mcallister-uber-amazon-airbnb/

• The Ezra Klein Show podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ezra-klein-show/id1548604447

• Ezra Klein’s AI episode: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a-skeptical-take-on-the-a-i-revolution/id1548604447?i=1000592835492

• Andor on Disney+: https://www.disneyplus.com/series/star-wars-andor/3xsQKWG00GL5

• Airtable: https://www.airtable.com/

• Superhuman: https://superhuman.com/

• Descript: https://www.descript.com/

• Outpace: https://www.outpace.co

• Unlock Your Product Manager Potential: https://www.outpace.co/guides/unlock-your-product-manager-potential

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In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) Ravi’s background

(04:24) Why Ravi left Tinder, and what he’s been up to recently

(08:05) Differences between working at an established tech company vs. a startup

(12:45) Why founders should network with “early-stage” folks

(14:29) Why you need to do some research and relationship-building before starting your company

(17:49) What the product strategy stack is and how to use it

(22:08) Mission vs. vision

(23:37) How Ravi developed his strategy framework at Tripadvisor

(26:43) Why PMs should understand design, UX, and UI

(28:20) Examples of the product strategy stack in action

(32:42) Why Tinder resisted adding filters

(34:10) Monetization features at Tinder and the “whales” who spend the most

(38:18) How customer feedback led to new features at Tinder

(42:28) Why goals come after roadmap in Ravi’s framework

(44:30) Tripadvisor’s strategy for increasing bookings

(47:25) How to set goals that drive outcomes

(50:24) The four buckets of the frontier of understanding

(51:38) Different methods for trying to hit goals

(53:08) Understanding why you hit or missed your goal

(54:34) The product management competencies framework

(1:02:08) The exponential feedback framework

(1:04:25) Why you should ask for feedback—and graciously accept it

(1:06:05) How to determine the right amount of leadership your team needs

(1:09:40) What selective micro-management is

(1:12:25) How Outpace uses AI to assist in coaching

(1:15:24) Lightning round

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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	So framework I like to use with product leaders that I'm coaching is to think about a matrix.
0:05.0	Your ideal goal is to lead in a scalable way, which means you feel really confident about the
0:10.8	direction of your team and your team has the autonomy to move in that
0:14.6	direction. There's another really effective way of leading which is selective
0:19.1	micromanagement which if you don't feel confident in the direction that your team is moving,
0:26.0	the right answer is not to be hands off and to let them go in that wrong direction.
0:31.0	The right answer is to micromanage, but do it in a very tactical in a very temporary way
0:36.7	so that you can help them understand what is the right direction moving forward so that you can then
0:42.1	pull back.
0:46.0	Welcome to Lenny's podcast.
0:47.8	I'm Lenny and my goal here is to help you get better at the craft of building and
0:51.3	growing products.
0:52.3	I interview world-class product leaders and growth experts to learn from their hard-win
0:55.7	experiences building and scaling today's most successful companies.
0:59.7	Today my guest is Ravi Meta.
1:01.7	Ravi was Chief Product Officer at Tinder, a product director at Facebook,
1:05.3	VP a product at TripAdvisor, and now he's co-founder and CEO of a company called Outpace
1:10.3	that he shares a bit about. Ravi is one of my favorite writers and
1:14.7	shares of product wisdom and he also helped create and teaches the re-forch programs
1:19.3	on product leadership and product strategy, which is where we spend most of our time.
1:24.7	We talk about how to get better at crafting product strategy, how to develop your skills as
1:28.4	a product leader, and a bit about the differences between being a PM at a large company versus building your own company.
	...

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