Post by Vince Law

AI WILL NOT HELP PMs THE SAME WAY AS ENGINEERS & DESIGNERS. While AI can help increase product development throughput dramatically, there’s one resource PMs need for product success that is still limited (spoiler: it's not eng time). Many of you probably came across Julie Zhuo’s post on The Death of Product Development (https://lnkd.in/g2GqEVAS), which raises interesting points on how the design-eng-product tripod will evolve given AI’s ability to accelerating coding and design. For my Haas MBA course, we had my friend Jean Hsu (https://jeanhsu.com/) join a fireside chat to discuss the implications (her take on the topic: https://lnkd.in/grwiwq2q). My takeaways from the discussion: ☠️The MVP is even more irrelevant than it already is. While the concept of the MVP is still important, the practicality of THE MVP has diminished a ton. In this age of AI, when general-purpose LLMs can make rough wireframes and write decent code, the need for a PM to define a single “right” MVP goes out the window. 🤔INSTEAD, PMs can now define a general strategic direction for multiple potential MPVs and audiences, then experiment with them rapidly. 🧭HOWEVER, this doesn’t excuse a PM from setting good strategy & direction. As Jean noted, with AI, it’s like a rowing team where “every rower suddenly gets access to a turbo paddle… but without coordination and clear direction, the boat doesn’t go anywhere.” 🤖WHAT DOESN’T CHANGE WITH AI is the PM’s responsibility to understand customer needs, create relevant value, and set a vision. AI can help, but it is not (yet) great at this, and human empathy (for now) still matters. 💰THERE’S ONE RESOURCE THAT IS STILL LIMITED. This becomes evident when you consider the implications of faster development = more products. We have lived through this cycle many times; from the internet, to elastic cloud infra, to mobile app stores, the barrier-to-entry has lowered significantly many times. The one resource that hasn’t increased, and in fact has gotten MORE PRECIOUS, is the customer’s attention. Just look at the long tail of unused apps in the App Store to appreciate how lowering the entry cost doesn’t solve the strategy problem. When users become impatient with crappy products, you need to clearly solve a relevant problem for them to pay attention.  WHAT INCREASE IN IMPORTANCE IN THE AGE OF AI, unfortunately, are proof points and the associated gatekeeping. The products that garner our attention aren’t necessarily the best products, but the ones that are able to collect proof points like VC funding, press coverage, app store curation, search ranking, or "relevance" as deemed by “the algorithm.” And it is on this point where I feel the most pessimistic.🫤 PS: thanks for getting to the end of this post! I’ve been considering writing more again. If you want to hear more, please like/repost/share/subscribe!🙏