Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia
Growing the Next Generation of Product Managers
In this episode of Brave UX, Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia speaks openly about his entrepreneurial journey, why he's not a fan of traditional education, and shares what it takes to make it as a product manager.
Highlights include:
- What traits or mindsets do successful product managers share?
- What are companies looking for when hiring product managers?
- How can product managers effectively demonstrate their value?
- Why is the Product School community so important to you?
- Is the analogy that the PM is the CEO of the product helpful?
Who is Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia?
Carlos is the Founder and CEO of Product School, the world’s largest and leading provider of product management training, delivering over 200 courses and 1,000 events a year! It is also runs the world’s largest product management community, with over 1 million members.
In 2017, Carlos co-authored and published The Product Book, a guide for becoming a great product manager. Since its release, it has been downloaded over 200,000 times, and translated into four languages.
Before starting Product School, Carlos was founded Floqq, which became the largest online education marketplace for Spanish and Portuguese speakers.
Transcript
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Hello and welcome to another episode of Brave UX. I'm Brendan Jarvis, Managing Founder of The Space InBetween and it's my job to help you to put the pieces of the product puzzle together. I do that by unpacking the stories, learnings, and expert advice of world class UX, design and product management professionals. My guest today is Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia. Carlos is the founder and CEO of Product School, the world's largest and leading provider of product management training, delivering over 200 courses and 1000 events a year. It's also the world's largest product management community with over 1 million members, all of which has been achieved in under seven years. Through Product School, Carlos and his talented team connect aspiring product managers with instructors, all of whom are existing product leaders. At top companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, Uber, and Amazon. The learning is practical personal impact, full of the latest product thinking before starting Product School in 2014, Carlos was the founder of Flock, which became the largest online education marketplace for Spanish and Portuguese speakers. Flock was invited to join the 500 startups and startup Chile accelerated programs, but back to Product School. In 2017, Carlos co-authored and published the product book, A Guide for Becoming a Great Product Manager. Since it's released, it's been downloaded over 200,000 times and translated into four different languages throughout his career. Carlos has spoken at more than 1000 events, classes and conferences, including Mind the Product and Product School's very own ProductCon, which is the largest online product management conference in the world. And now he's here with me on Brave UX. Carlos, welcome to the show.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Thank you for having me on Brendan.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- You are most welcome. And I thoroughly enjoyed researching for today's conversation and I always like to start on a serious note as my listeners know. And something that I noticed about you Carlos and your background is that you are a former lifeguard. When did you trade your swimsuit for a real suit and why?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah. I don't think I ever wore a real suit. Well actually indeed when I was working in Europe, but then when I moved to Silicon Valley, the etiquette changed. But at the very beginning, being a like was my first job, I was still in high school so my dad had to sign the agreement cause I wasn't even authorized to do so. And I think that was part of my curiosity. I was always looking to do something and I think that the traditional education didn't fill me up. I didn't have access to the best mentors. I wasn't learning what I wanted to learn or my own terms. And I was always fascinated about the idea of going out there and doing something different on my own terms. And being a lifeguard was my first exposure to that. And then from there, the rest is history. I continue creating different business. I think being a lifeguard was probably my first and last official job as I'm
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Doing
. Have you got any heroic moments that you wanna recount before we move on? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Nothing. I think I have to put a bandaid on little kid once
. - Brendan Jarvis:
- Okay. Well you touched on it there, your sort of passion for learning and obviously it's something that's a big part of what you do now at Product School. I've heard you say that you are a big believer in life term lifetime learning. And given what you've done and what you're currently doing, where does this deeply held belief come from?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah, I, I'm very passionate. I think I have a love hate relationship with education.
. The hate part comes from probably not having access to the right mentors when I was growing up or access to just deciding what I wanted to learn or just learning on my own terms, I wasn't supposed to make those type of, the story I told myself is that, well, I'm here on the education system, I'm supposed to follow the process and then one day all of this will be useful. But then I realized that that never, never came and that I could actually modify those assumptions and create my own path and that I wasn't the only one thinking that way. So I'm still learning. I think I'm a lifelong learner and what we decided to, the two companies that I've created are in the education space mostly because this is a way for me to find a solution to my own problem. - Brendan Jarvis:
- So it sounds like you're sort of scratching your own niche and the only way to do that is to actually make it happen yourself.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yes.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Yeah. I also noticed when I was looking at your background that you didn't start life as an entrepreneur, at least not officially. You started as a support engineer in Spain. What was it that motivated you to move out of engineering and into entrepreneurship?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- So very early on, I, I'm originally from Spain and as I was studying computer science, I soon realized that I didn't want to spend the rest of my life coding. And actually it was an internship that I took after being a lifeguard and it was fine. I was a discovering I was doing something, but I was always getting outside of the room of the engineering room asking other people, what do you do and how can I be helpful from literally fixing a printer all the way up to understanding the business model of the organization. And that was fascinating to me because I also realized that a lot of people had a very different perception of engineers. They thought that there were these people hid hidden in a room with black screens doing magic and that's not the case at all. So I always felt very comfortable switching between both technology and business. Unfortunately I didn't even know how to label that. There wasn't what he told me, well by the way, this is called product management. I wasn't supposed to do that. What they told me is, well you start as an engineer, then maybe you become a senior engineer and so on. So part of just that curiosity to understand how I can leverage my technical background in a different way is what eventually led me to start different companies.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Now that you mentioned curiosity and that's got my curiosity up as well. You said earlier that you didn't have access to mentors that would provide you with what you were searching for. Is this curiosity that you have and what it's led you to be able to do with your life so far, is this something that is unique in your family life and how you grew up? Or has this been partly inspired by something else that you're exposed to when you were younger?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- None of my parents are entrepreneurs. My come from a family of doctors and lawyers, which is very traditional and my buddies didn't encourage me to start a business either. They wanted me to be safe, that probably any good part out there. They care about their children and they didn't want me to take risk. They wanted me to follow the process. I think in a way I was also kind of a rebel. So that probably pushed me even more to go and create my own path.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Good. And it seems that you've fully embraced that, given that what you've done, I also noticed that you moved from Spain to California, which is probably wasn't on your parents' agenda either and possibly wasn't something that felt entirely safe at the time you studied at Berkeley. What was it that brought you to the USA and where you now find yourself living?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- So I started an unofficial business when I was in high school. And then as I was in college, which was selling wristbands online, dunno if you remember back in the day there was this yellow wristbands from Nike called Live Strong
that became really, really popular and there was a really real supply constraint, at least in Spain. A lot of people went to buy them. It was impossible to find them in real stores. So that's when I discovered the internet. I realized this sounds very basic back in the day, it was revolutionary that I could go online to live strong.com, put a credit card down, buy a bunch of those responses, ship them to my house and then distribute them. And I was putting ads on local newspapers, literally a meeting with people in person to sell those restaurants. That's why I said an official business because I never incorporated the company or anything. - I was just a kid trying to make some money and also having fun because I think part of that curiosity that you mentioned in the beginning was because for me was a game. I wasn't thinking about, oh, let's hire a lot of people. Let's think about, no, I just realizing that the school wasn't fun for me. And yes, I knew how to pass those tests, but that wasn't really fulfilling me. And I had this other game that was about meeting real people, figuring things out, things out. So anyway, I started scaling that unofficial business to a point where I started putting all their ads online, doing partnerships with local distributors that would ship those s not just in the same neighborhood or city, but also to other cities in Spain. And then I made a lot of money. So with that I saved all of that. I never bought a house or a car or anything like that. I invested all that money into a program in uc, Berkeley. So I paid for it. I showed up literally with zero debt, which was a huge win, but a backpack full of dreams. I also didn't have a huge safety net or anything. I just wanted to be in Silicon Valley. I was always very inspired by the stories of Steve Jobs and other pioneers. And I wanted to be in the place where things happen in tech.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- And take us back to those first few weeks after you landed in the us. What do you remember? What was it like? Does anything stand out for you?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- It was so scary and I was so naive and I think part of being naive helped me a lot to continue moving forward because I didn't speak good English. I still don't, I mean still have a pretty big accent that I kind of get by. And I think that was one of the things that called my attention. I don't need to Eventually as I realized that I was able to survive. I didn't need to be perfect. I think it's beautiful to have an accent. I think it's beautiful to be different. I just think this country gave me the opportunity to love myself, to take advantage of the opportunity and to work hard. And I'm not saying this because this is easy by any means or there was an overnight success, not at all. I've been in this country for over 10 years now and I started a student on a very, very thin budget because my parents couldn't support me either. And then after that I continued pursuing my own dreams and here I still kick and now I have a family. I'm married and I have two kids and both of them were born here in the us.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- What a great story. And I do want to come to Product School momentarily, but I want to continue down this conversation around your arrival in the US and what it was like for you coming from somewhere else. In this case Spain, I'm gonna quote you now. You've said as an immigrant I know what it's like to fight extra hard for an opportunity. What did you mean by that?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Well, there are certain constraints that as an international, I know that this myself, but a lot of us have to face, which is mostly visas, working permits,
on top of having to find a job or creating your own business. We also need to figure out a legal way to stay in the country. And that's something that I assume its part of the comes with the territory. So I'm not trying to say that I'm better than anybody, it's just comes with territory. And I had to figure this out. And again, I had no idea about it. I just showed up once and I realized that oh, my student visa is not enough. I need to convert that into a work visa. And there's certain things that I just had to do as I grew. And I think comes back to the idea of making this a game or a passion of myself. I've always been building things that I really care about, trying to solve my own problems, doing it with people that I like and cause life is hard already and everyone goes through stuff. So if on top of that I also need to worry about building a company that doesn't really fool me or makes me happy, then what's the point of it? - Brendan Jarvis:
? Yeah, that's a huge point actually. And I've also written down something else that you've said and it's timely for us to have a chat about that. You said it's all about products and money growing fast, becoming a unicorn. And I've tried that before. I imagine you were talking about flock care. This is not my first rodeo. I just realized that it didn't make me happy. I wanted to start something where I could spend my time with customers where I would be able to truly help them and see the results. I still want to grow, but I want to grow in a sustainable way. What was it that made you realize after Flock, if that was what you were referring to, that you didn't wanna pursue someone else's idea of success? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah, I think I had different expectations. I was younger and more naive and I thought that the definition of success was already created
and I had to kind of follow that. But then I realized with time that success or happiness are very abstract words and what makes me happy can be different from what makes you happy. And I got trapped a little bit into the Silicon Valley area of growing fast at all costs. So my previous company, I did that thing and there are a lot of really good things about it. I learned a lot, but mortally speaking it wasn't a success. But at the same time it also inspired me to start something else. So basically, yes, we raised a lot of money probably too fast. - The success metrics that we defined for the business probably weren't the right ones. We were focused more on just pure growth number of people on their website and not so much on the actual engagement and the value that those users were getting. The monetization and the recurring business of it. So incredible journey and I don't think I would be here without that experience in my life. But as I also reassessed my priorities in life and I had the opportunity to then start a new journey, realized that for me happiness is first of all spend the time with my users. I wanted to scratch my own needs, but I also wanted to make sure that I am constantly doing that. In my previous company, I found myself constantly pitching PowerPoint to potential investors that were never going to use my product. And that felt almost yes, not right to me.
- I didn't want to do that. I respect people who do it, it just wasn't for me. So I wanted to start in a very different approach, which was basically the opposite. Proud school is fully book strapped at private school. I still invest most of my time with customers or with instructors or students or with people who care about the community
. And as I said in that previous statement, we're still growing and we're growing fast. It's growing a different way. We probably grow faster if we chose to raise capital, maybe sacrifice quality over quantity. But for me the bar quality bar has to always be really, really high. And the same with the topic. The previous company was an all online education marketplace, the largest in the Spanish and Portuguese speaking world, which sounds really impressive, but for me it's not just so much about those numbers, it's really about, okay, what happened with the students who actually take that training. And here at Pro School we only do one thing, which is we teach product management and we make sure that every single student finds value in that and that means them getting a job or get them getting a promotion. - Brendan Jarvis:
- You obviously have brought a next level of focus to Product School after flock and really thought about what you wanted to get out of the company and what you wanted the company to contribute to others. Now you started in 2014 and product management has taken off in recent years, but I'm not so sure that would've been the case back in 2014. What was it that made you think at the time that starting a school for product managers was a good idea?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I actually chose something that resonates with me. It wasn't like a super evaluated market research around the opportunity. If I were to do that, probably be stuck analyzing numbers and pros and cons,
, I did something that really, really is a passion of myself. I've been building products my entire life. The funny thing is I was never taught how to do that. I went to an engineering school and I also went to a business school, . None of those places really taught me a single thing on product management, and not even product management and business school I didn't have or business class on UX design, digital marketing, data analytics, and a lot of the detail skills that many of us use on a daily basis. So that inspired me to create a broad school, which is a hybriding between those two . Then I've been building companies my entire life and realized how did I do it well By doing it literally and then most different stages in my life, I got access to really, really good mentors. - You mentioned that in my previous company I was part of two acceleration accelerated programs called 500 Startups and Startup Teaming. Those programs were incredible. I was able to really get feedback and advice from incredible product leaders and CEOs from top companies like the co-founder of Airbnb, product leaders from Google and other amazing professionals. And I realized, oh wow, I like this type of school. In this school. They pay me to build something. The instructors are not teachers, they give me feedback and it's more about doing and coming back with questions than really having to pass a test test. So there was something there that really make me very excited. However, startup accelerators are mostly focused on helping people build companies and then go out there and maybe raise some money at private school we focus on helping people grow their own careers, which is getting a product management job or then getting that next promotion.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Yeah, they get a really, really good sense for that from the website, just how tangible the outcomes are and also how close the instructors are to the practice because they're all practicing instructors now. I suppose it's easy in retrospect to look back at where you are now and for people to look at that and go, you've got a million product managers in your community, you've got the world's largest online product management conference. You have all these amazing things going on. But take us back to the beginning. What did the first version of Product School look like? Just so people that are thinking about starting something and not quite sure they can get a sense of what that journey has been like for you.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I love that question because participate in a lot of events where I'm always talking about the future and a lot of things can be taken for granted, but that zero to one phase, that early beginning where nobody was paying attention is really where the magic started and you're looking at it, there's nothing else. It was just myself with an idea. My wife told me, Hey, you should take a few months and figure something out. And I had a small exit from my previous company but nothing really meaningful. It was more about for me to keep the lights on for a few months and I just couldn't help it. It took me, I think two days to go back at it and start trying to figure something out.
I decided to teach the first cohort myself, . So I created the first curriculum, I wouldn't even call it curriculum. - I think I created the first set of PowerPoint slides,
and I went for it. They rented a conference room in a coworking space in San Francisco and the investment was my time because in reality there was nothing else I needed other than just making sure that the first set of students would have an amazing experience. They were my marketing team cause I knew that if I actually deliver or deliver then they'd be more than happy to refer me to others. So I had a big dream. I wanted to build a huge platform for over a million or 10 or a hundred thou or a hundred million product manager. But it always started with one, which was myself. I was the user of my own product. And then in addition to to that class that I was running, I was also running a few free events. So every week I would organize a one hour long free event where I would teach a small piece of product management, something tangible so the folks could understand exactly what I'm talking about and why. This is interesting because you're right, seven years ago product management wasn't hot at all. A lot of the questions were about but what is this? Is this project management? Some people still use, they say project school instead of Product School. - Brendan Jarvis:
. That must annoy you - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
. But with not just my, I think timing was right and I think I got very lucky because I couldn't predict, I've been talking about this for a long time. I just didn't know when that was exactly going to happen. And it's true that now the questions are not about if product management is important or not. I think we all agree it's more about how to become a great product manager. How can I grow in my career? And I love that because it's part of the evolution of the market and we are playing a part of it in educating the market in levering up that playing field. Over 90% of our resources are absolutely free and available to everyone. From the events that you mentioned to books, job portal, discussion photo and other resources, the goal that I have with this is first and foremost to give access to education, to good quality education. And then from there, yes, there's a percentage of people who want to take that next step and take one of our paid certifications, but that's not mandatory and that's okay. - Brendan Jarvis:
- Where does that generosity come from?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Well, I think it's because I didn't have access to that when I was growing up. I wish I had something like this and that's literally the problem that I'm trying to solve.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- I love that and I love the way that you took us back and told us that you facilitated that first cohort and you were the product, the user of your product. I think there's so many good lessons in there for people that are considering doing something. I think the biggest thing that you've shared with us there is the brave nature of actually just getting started. You've also touched on growth as a challenge. Now aren't the only person. Clearly you're probably not even in the classroom on the day to day anymore. Probably many years since you've done that, you've got this big and growing business. You mentioned that you didn't want to take on external funding, that you were bootstrapping it and that you wanted to achieve sustainable growth. What is sustainable growth for Product School? What does that look like?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Just having a profitable business, which sounds crazy in Silicon Valley,
, , a lot of the questions people will ask me is, how much money did you raise? How big is your team? Those seem to be some of the metrics to qualify how good you are. That goes back to the definition of success or happiness. I just don't play by those rules. I respect people who define happiness in a different way. It wasn't for me. And I also got questions such as, oh, are you a teacher? Well you can think about it. I do a lot of things but is you're not offending me by calling me an A teacher. Other people who ask me, oh is this your, I remember teaching in some of the events, people come to me like, oh, what else do you do? Almost like, oh this is nice pet project. But wait, was your job - Brendan Jarvis:
the jokes on them? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Totally. And honestly it wasn't an easy journey, especially the first two years were tough. Like I told you that I taught the first cohort when I didn't tell you is that I taught the next 20 literally on weeknights and weekends because one of the value propositions of our trainings is that you don't have to put your life on hold. All the students who participate, they have full-time jobs as well as instructors. So that means that I had my full-time job, maybe not very well paid, but I was working literally Monday through Friday to run the operations of the business. And then on weeknights and weekends I was teaching classes and then sometimes other weeknights, I was also running free events. So I was really rough on my health, rough on my relationship with my wife. She was always very supportive and I really respect that. But that's a big commitment basically because we didn't see the light at the end of the tunnel.
- Brendan Jarvis:
, when did that change? Was there a moment where you did start seeing that light and what was that? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- It was very organic. I don't remember a specific point where we went from one to a hundred, literally went from zero to one, from one to two to three. There's no silver bullet, there's no magic story about oh my god, and one day we won the lottery and now no, it was all pure hustle and grind. And that's the same spirit that we follow today. We are still going one student at a time. It's all about making sure that they have a good experience because at the end of the day, they are the real community and marketing team.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- I really like that. I also like how you touched on how that hustle and grind started to take a bit of a toll on you personally, your wellbeing. And I think also you mentioned your relationship. What advice to other founders or people that are considering starting an organization do you have in terms of looking after themselves as they go through that finding their way phase of trying to establish market product market fit?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah, I don't like to give advice to anybody because what works for me might not work for other. But I can talk about personally my own experience. I wish I had learned to take care of myself earlier. I think I was so focused on work. Work was my number one priority, but also my priority number 2, 3, 4, and five
. My life was work and I liked it and I said I chose a specific problem but still there are moments that I didn't love and I think that getting married and then having kids really helped me realize that there's something bigger than work and family's important to me and my own self. Self care is really important. So being able to block time for different areas that are important and kind of really finding that the reassessing the definition of happiness, I think it was really, really critical for me. I can't claim that I have everything figured out, but I am happier today than seven years ago and I'm also healthier - Brendan Jarvis:
. Yeah, those are really key things to have achieved. I really, really like that. Now let's talk about Product School. You mentioned Product School is in part set up to help grow product managers and help them develop in their careers. Just exactly how does Product School do that? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah, we do it through training
. So particular case, we have a certification called product manager certification, which is a two month part-time program for professionals, have at least three years of experience that would transition into product. So an example of that could be a software engineer that doesn't want to spend the rest of their life coding like myself, . And they got the other cases. We see management consultants, marketers, people in operations. Now it's all over the place. And we even have people from outside of tech, real estate brokers, attorneys who want to be product managers and obviously they have to put in the work, but we give them that support, we give them that curriculum, we give them a leading instructor who is a real product leader from a top company who is there giving them feedback and making sure that they follow the specific process and framework that we created. - We also connect our students with companies that are actively hiding and we also help the students kind of treat themselves as a product cuz there's a difference, a big gap between knowing what you have to do and then setting yourself. And this is something that I struggle with personally, especially as an engineer. Nobody taught me anything about public speaking or sales. And so part of the curriculum, especially at that one, is not just about and here's how you do product, this is also how you can position yourself as a product manager so you can increase your chances of getting a job
- Brendan Jarvis:
. Yeah, that's hugely valuable isn't it. You mentioned that there were a lot of different people coming to Product School to become product managers from various professional backgrounds. You've probably seen a lot of this in the last seven years and I'm not sure that there's any one profession that you can say makes the best product manager, but what traits or mindsets do you see and observe in the students that then go on to be the most successful product managers? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- So we've graduated over 20,000 product managers at this point. So we collect a lot of data. We can see exactly what are the most successful students and what are some of those traits. So we identify three main traits. One is a technical acumen. By this I don't mean that you need to be a software engineer, by the way, if you're a software engineer, that's great. You already checked that box before the course, but you don't need to do that. Whatever. However you need to feel comfortable collaborating with engineers, understanding trade offs, have been able to have a conversation, not just at a very surface level, but really knowing how they work and why their work is impacting other functions. Not because you're going to tell them how they have to do their job, but it's very important to really explain them what you want and why and how their work is going to make a huge impact.
- This is something that I as an engineer, nobody told me. And I think in a way product manager are great product managers to do a much better job at really involving engineers in the entire process and not just putting them at the end in the corner and saying, okay, code this, fix that and then we'll take the business. People will take it from there
. So that's one. Second one is business acumen, which means that you need to understand the product. Ideally you could be the user of your own product. Now I understand that's not always possible, you're working in B2B and specific well, but if you can choose, I think being passionate about the product, about the problem that you are solving is absolutely huge. Nobody's ever going to believe more in the product than the product manager. So what that means, how can you learn more about business or the product? - Well one I said being the user of your own product. Two is really using the product is understanding the market, the competitors, what you like, what you don't. That's something that you don't really learn in business school. So the same way I said, you don't need to be a software engineer, you also don't need an mba. You'll be surprised how many MBA grads we get that come to us after two years saying, you know what? I realize I want to be a product manager. By the way, there wasn't a single class in the program before me and well I wish I had met you, I did it earlier. Cause we both have said a lot of time, but still that's a big one. And then number three is communication skills. This is something that's probably across many other roles, but in product you are not there because you know how to code or because you know how to sell or design or market. So why the hell are you there? So it's a valid question from the outside. People think why do we need a product manager? If you're not really executing anything, you are kind of in between helping others execute in a more efficient manner. So how do you make that happen? Well, through communication, through really making sure that everyone feels part of the team. Cause the product team is not the product manager. The product team is everyone involved in shipping product.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- I like that. So you've got the business acumen, the technical understanding, and also the communication skills. Can all of those be taught?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- They can all be taught now. You can't be the best at all of them. Usually the way we visualize product is the intersection in between technology, business and design. Most of PMs are really good, at least one of them.
, maybe two, but that's very, very rare. The point is to be good enough or curious enough. So while you can leverage your previous experience, you also need to be open-minded enough to learn fast and to collaborate with other team members. The communication skills is something that it happens throughout your career and there's no book that is going to teach you how to speak in public. The way you learn how to speak in public is by speaking in public and if someone doesn't give you the option to do it, but you can create your own option. And that's something that is really mind blowing for some people. - Like you are more than your job title. We are more than what you are telling others on LinkedIn. And you can create products outside of your job. You can ask for opportunities inside your job. Don't limit your potential to what someone tells you.
. You can learn it and by the way, you can learn it just enough to be dangerous. And I think that is the beautiful thing in product. That's what I love about it. It's like we're constantly learning because obviously we don't have enough time to learn everything or be the best at anything, but just being in the middle, having access to the big picture gives you the opportunity to really understand what's really going on. - Brendan Jarvis:
- A hundred percent. It's also made me think of a couple of conversations I've had in recent time. One with Marty Kagan who I know well and also Robbie Ellen, who I know has been a Product School instructor and they emphasize the value of coaching and helping them to develop as product managers. In effect, Robbie told the story of his boss that might have been a head of product or someone in a similar role, taking him aside one day and suggesting that he might want to be a little less analytical and literal and forceful in the way that he was communicating with his colleagues. And he said for him that was one of those watershed moments where just having that mirror put up in front of him allowed him to be a more effective communicator. Not just in the technical sense but also I suppose in that more human and more empathetic sense as well.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yeah, there is this misconception around, oh product managers need to be these visionaries. Like Steve Jobs. We have these crazy ideas and are telling others what to do. Well, not at all. Yes, it's important to have opinions, but you're also going to be questioning your own opinions, trying to get opinions from others and you can learn it a, there's a framework. First of all, it's not rocket science. You can learn it and there's certain tools that are going to help you have better quality conversations with other stakeholders and that's the name of the game. You just need to be good enough to participate in the conversation and then take it from there. You can't assume that just because someone gave you the product manager title, you are done. This is just the very beginning.
- Brendan Jarvis:
. And I think this is probably a good time to pick up on the practical and PR practice based industry relevant style of instruction that comes through at Product School. Now we mentioned earlier that all of the instructors are themselves practicing product leaders at top companies. Why is it important for something like product management for it to be taught by practitioners rather than academics? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I mean yes. Even the question that you asked made me think why should an academic who's never applied product management be teaching product management? It's almost like that perverse concept around traditional education that I had to follow to a certain point until I start. Wait a second. But why
? So specifically in tech, not just in product management, these things change so fast that it's almost impossible by definition that a traditional institution that is teaching so many different things to so many different people is going to be up to date with all of them at the same time or be the best. So by picking a very specific topic in this case product, we are able to have a competitive advantage, which is that we only have to do one thing instead of 150. Now why should I reinvent the wheel and try to now explain people if I'm not the best product manager? - And I think I never be the best product manager, however, there are a lot of incredible people out there who are really building the products that a lot of us use on a daily basis. So this is not like, oh, trust me, in the future this will be helpful. No, no, if you open your phone today, these are the apps that you use every single day. These are the humans behind them.
, that is so powerful. I wish I had had this without in school. And on the other side, students are also not your typical students who go to school because their parents send them there to get credits. These are people who are hungry to learn to get a job. So you put those two things together, it's almost like it's an explosion of knowledge. And people do they do it because they want to think about it like the instructors who did first school don't do it for the money. - Yes, we pay them, but we are competing with their family time. And the main reason why they do that and a VP of product and Netflix will show up on a Friday night to teach a class and 40, the reason why that person will do it is because they didn't have that when they were getting started. And a lot of people really want to give back because if you asked a lot of these product leaders who have been around for a while, how did you break into product? Each of them would have different story. They were you say in the massage room and they had an idea or maybe they got a promotion, their company got acquired, maybe they did an MBA and they didn't even know what companies they were applying and someone gave him the job. So nobody would tell you, oh I actually got training this and then it was a straightforward path. So we are creating that straightforward path now that next generation has, I'm not saying it's easier, but at least they have access to opportunity
- Brendan Jarvis:
. And it sounds like you've tapped into that shared passion that you and some of your instructors or potentially all of them hold for the practical aspect of this education as opposed to the ivory tower academic old school style that you've all experienced and have been underwhelmed by. You also mentioned that the emphasis with Product School has been in part on creating a product community or a product management community. This is clear from anyone that looks at Product School from the outside that has been a lot of energy and effort going to develop that community. Why has the community been so important to you and so important for your team at Product School? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I think of our company as a community. I think the community is about everything about the business itself. It's literally the opportunity for people to join a movement, to connect with peers, to learn and just do it for the pure reason of just learning and not doing it alone. And I believe that that is also a very respectful way to grow and to do something good for the world. Cause I assume that not everyone can or should take a course. Not everyone should be a product manager either, but I think everyone should know what product management is and then decide for themselves what they want to do next.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Yeah, a hundred percent. Let's shift gears and turn our attention now to the other side of Product School, which is the side where the students come out and they may be looking for their first role in product management. What are companies who are relatively new to the product world, what are they looking for in their product managers? What sort of ways can the product managers that are applying for these roles demonstrate their value?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- So this has changed a lot. So when I started the product manager role as a role wasn't that popular in many companies. It was mostly for tech companies in Silicon Valley. Now that has changed completely. Now we all understand that every company is a software company and that this is not just in Silicon Valley. This is a global movement across any industry. What I mean by this is that yes, take, I don't know, a restaurant is an example. A restaurant has probably a software who that manages all the reservations and they also have probably a chat between the team to coordinate, just to collaborate. They probably have a billing system to do accounting and imagine if they have multiple restaurants. So they have to do videos. Every company, every person uses multiple products every single day.
. So what means is that if you're using a lot of products, how do you take sense of all of them? Who is going to organize that whole system that looks very different regardless of the companies? Well that's called product management. And that has created a huge amount of possibilities for a lot of people, especially than the last two years. I think the pandemic has exposed the need for more detailed services. So now as more companies start offering the services or products online and also start working remotely, that means that the need for product managers is bigger than ever. So this is probably the best time in history to build products. - Brendan Jarvis:
- And what are those companies looking for in those people to fill those roles?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Well they're looking for, well the characteristics that I mentioned before. You have to be tech savvy, enough business driven enough, and also know how to communicate now with those parameters in mind, the specific definition of what each company needs changes. And that's the beauty and also the weird part about product management because you may be applying for two different companies and then you maybe end up doing two different types of jobs. So it's important for the candidates to read the job description and not just get stopping the title and also ask clarifying questions because there's some companies that are really, really technical and they would say, you know what? Actually need you to come from a very strong technical background. Imagine if you're working on an a machine learning algorithm that is all about voice recognition, well then it's fair to ask for more technical acumen than if you're working on an e-commerce site that is more consumer facing
. - So one of the things we do with the students is to help them identify their strengths. And one thing is, yes, you have to position yourself well on LinkedIn, on your resume, but you also need to do your own research and understand what companies are a good fit for you for real. Because we get a lot of people that are like, Hey, I want to be a product manager at Google or every Airbnb pick the name and great that let's create a path to get there because we also need to be realistic. The fact that there are more opportunities for product managers, that also means that there's more competition. So it's very important to pick your niche, pick that company that you think can add value so you can really do a good job when you have an opportunity to explain why.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- I was having a conversation with someone who just graduated from a master's program in UX, a two year practical program and they were having trouble securing interviews. And I said something very similar to what you've just said, which is you've got to identify with the type of organization that best suits your story and you have to be really clear as to what your story is and how all the things you've done to date will lead you to this point and why you are the best candidate. And they never really thought about that. And I think that being clear on your point of difference and representing yourself well and a competitive market we are now has never been more important.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I agree. And I think that's another thing that I don't like about traditional education, which is they have this career service departments, but in reality they're giving advice on so many different professors who knows what are some of their credentials. And the war has changed
, a lot of companies don't even look at resumes, they look at LinkedIn. So if the person who's giving you advice on career doesn't even have a LinkedIn page, what's their credibility today? ? So I am big fan of practitioners and I believe that even if you don't have the official title of recruiter, there are a lot, most of our instructors actually recruit product managers for their teams. And one of the reasons why they also teach is because they want to recruit talent directly from their classes. They spend a lot of time with those students so they know what they want but they can also help students understand the recruiter point of view and they can give them some tactical insights on how to optimize themselves. - They can treat themselves like a product. And I can give you a very clear example. LinkedIn these days is a go-to. Like sometimes I don't even look at resume resumes, I just Googled you and I see what's going on
. So this tendency about just adding a lot of content on your headline or your bio, for me that goes against the person because it doesn't let me understand exactly how you can add value. I would much rather see one thing than three. And that can be counterintuitive for some people because they're like, Hey, in reality I would take whatever. Cool, I understand that. But let's also do this exercise to really understand how you can add value, know what you want. Cause as a product manager, that's also how we operate. We are all about understanding the user so we can solve their own problems. We need to treat ourselves like a product. - Brendan Jarvis:
- Yeah, a hundred percent. Invite the hiring manager into the story that is you and show them why that's a great story to be part of.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yes, totally. Yeah. I mean you asked me at the beginning of this interview, why did you start private school? Right? And I told you in two lines, well because this is a solution to my own problem. That's it. Yeah. I don't need to go for 10 minutes and tell you everything. And you almost would go against myself
- Brendan Jarvis:
- And people would get bored, right? Disengage. Yeah,
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Totally. And if you want more, you will ask more questions. It's always better to leave people with that need to ask for the next question that just give them too much at the
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Same time. That's some good advice right there.
, I wanna move on now. I want ask you about the analogy that's become popular that is being a product manager as being CEO of the product. How accurate or useful is that analogy? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- It's oversimplifying. This can be dangerous because there are reasons to say why this makes sense and why it doesn't
. So I try to move away from that. The reality is that you're not the ceo. That's, that's plain and simple. However, if you are running your own company, especially at the early stages, you might be the CEO and the product manager cuz I think I've been that role my entire life. And so what I mean by this is that at the very beginning, product pretty much equals company. You need to build something that users love. And then if that's true and your product evolves and you start getting more and more users, then your business gets more and more complicated. Cuz you also need to take care of other functions such as recruiting, finance, legal, and things that if your business, your product doesn't work, don't worry. - You don't have to worry about any of that
. So it gets to a point where one, usually the founder or one of the founders is acting or wearing the hat of the product manager gets to a point that that is just not sustainable. Someone needs to run product full time. So a decision that needs to be made. That's why there are not that many product managers in small companies, usually the ratio engineer to PM is five to one more or less. So you need enough doers, enough engineers and designers in order to bring in someone to organize the work. - Brendan Jarvis:
- Well let's talk about engineers and designers, engineering and designer, quite craft based. They have highly visible and tangible outputs and those outputs can be measured in terms of outcomes. How can product managers most effectively demonstrate the value that they're contributing to their organizations?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- That is a great question because it would really change depending on the product. But at just a high level, it's about creating a common goal. Because if we keep thinking silos, if we keep thinking our engineers are responsible for fixing bars and shipping features and designers are in charge of making their website prettier, then I, there's no alignment. So it's more about finding that common ground. What is the goal here? The goal here is to solve the problem of the user. So what is the problem of the user? I can give you an example. Imagine it's Product School. The user wants to get a job as a product manager. That is the real goal. Well let's figure it out together. And that involves some technical challenges, design challenges, business challenges, but ultimately we are all part of the same team.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Yeah, there's often this misconceived notion that the product manager has to control the other subject matter experts that are part of this product team. And the reality is that you don't often control anybody. And so what Carlos is just what you've just described is really important and what is the goal and how do I help align the people that I'm responsible for driving towards an outcome behind that goal. So thinking about your experience building Product School to date, Carlos, what does the near future hold for product management education?
? - Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- I believe the future of product is bright and it's been proven, especially during the last two years. I believe this is the best time in history to build products and we want to continue growing sustainably, which is exactly what we discussed at the very beginning. Of course, we want that community to be bigger, but only if the quality of the content in the community and the quality of the conversations is better.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- And is there anything coming out that you might wanna share with the audience at Product School?
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Yes. Well we have a ProductCon conference coming up in June. ProductCon is the largest conference for PMs and we've been doing it for three years now. So it's an opportunity to celebrate our craft to get together with thousands of people from all over the world. Cuz this time we'll do this online and to learn from some of the best product leaders out there. Examples would be the Chief Product Officer from Coinbase that just took company public or the VP of product at Airbnb and many other incredible leaders.
- Brendan Jarvis:
- That sounds great, Carlos. We'll be making a point of linking to that in the show notes. Thank you. This has been a hugely valuable conversation, lots of insights packed in there for people who are considering a career in product management. Thank you for so generously sharing your knowledge and your experiences with us today, Carlos.
- Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia:
- Thank you for sharing your platform with me. And of course I invite anyone to continue the conversation. If you want to connect with me online on social media, especially LinkedIn, I'd be more than happy to
- Brendan Jarvis:
- Help. Wonderful. We'll put a link to your LinkedIn in the show notes. Thanks Carlos. And to everyone else that has been listening, it's been great having you here as well. Everything as I've just mentioned, we'll be covered in the show notes, including where you can find Carlos as well as Product School, as well as the product book and ProductCon. So many great product things in there for you to check out. If you've enjoyed the show and you want to hear more conversations like this with world class experts and product management, UX and design, don't forget to leave us a review and subscribe. And until next time, keep being brave.