Lenny's PodcastProduct lessons from Waymo | Shweta Shrivastava (Waymo, Amazon, Cisco)
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
85 min read · 16,877 words- 0:00 – 3:47
Shweta’s background
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... are you proactively trying to challenge your own assumptions? It's extremely important, right? I, as a beginner product manager, as well as a seasoned product leader, if you're not doing enough of that, then I think you might not be listening. If y- there's no conflict, if there's no contention, then, uh, something is missing. (laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
(instrumental music) Welcome to Lenny's Podcast, where I interview world class product leaders and growth experts to learn from their hard-won experiences building and growing today's most successful products. Today, my guest is Shweta Srivastava. Shweta is senior director of product management at Waymo, which, if you're not familiar with Waymo, they are building self-driving cars that are already live on the streets in San Francisco, LA, and Phoenix. I actually got to take a ride in one ahead of this chat, and you'll hear all about that in this episode. Before joining Waymo, Shweta was chief product officer at Nauto, an AI startup focusing on driver and automation safety. Before that, she was head of product management at Amazon Web Services for their database and analytic services, and before that she was at Cisco. In our conversation, we delve into what it's like to work as a PM at Waymo, and how it's both different and similar to software-only products. We talk about their KPIs and goals at Waymo, including how they track progress towards a future of self-driving cars, how they build subtle cues and behaviors into the cars to create trust for the rider and also for other cars on the road, plus Shweta's biggest lessons about building products and teams across the many companies she's worked at. I can't wait for a future of every car being self-driving, and it was super fun to learn about what goes into making this all happen. With that, I bring you Shweta Srivastava after a short word from our sponsors. This episode is brought to you by Vanta, helping you streamline your security compliance to accelerate your growth. Thousands of fast-growing companies like Gusto, Calm, Quora, and Modern Treasury trust Vanta to help build, scale, manage, and demonstrate their security and compliance programs, and get ready for audits in weeks, not months. By offering the most in-demand security and privacy frameworks such as SOC2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA, and many more, Vanta helps companies obtain the reports they need to accelerate growth, build efficient compliance processes, mitigate risks to their businesses, and build trust with external stakeholders. Over 5,000 fast-growing companies use Vanta to automate up to 90% of the work involved with SOC2 and these other frameworks. For a limited time, Lenny's Podcast listeners get $1,000 off of Vanta. Go to vanta.com/lenny. That's V-A-N-T-A dot com slash Lenny to learn more and to claim your discounts. Get started today. This episode is brought to you by public.com, who want to tell you about their new treasury accounts, which earn a 4.8% yield on your cash. That is higher than a high-yield savings account, while still being backed by the full faith and credit of the US government. Treasury yields are at a 15-year high, but buying US treasuries is super complicated. You have to go to a bank, or navigate an ancient government website, or at least that was the case. Now, you can move your cash into US treasuries with the flexibility of a bank account. You can access your cash whenever you want, even before your treasury bills hit maturity. There are no hold periods, no settlement days, just a safe place to park your cash and earn a reliable yield. Public will automatically reinvest your treasury bills at maturity, so you don't have to do anything to continue growing your yield. And you can manage your treasuries alongside stocks, ETFs, crypto, and any alternative assets. Do all your investing in one place, and earn 4.8%, a higher yield than a high-yield savings account. Only with a treasury account at public.com/lenny.
- 3:47 – 5:30
What Shweta and her team are responsible for at Waymo
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Shweta, welcome to the podcast.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Thank you. Great to be here.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
It's great to have you. I thought we'd start with just a little bit about what it is you do at Waymo today. Uh, what are you and your teams responsible for at Waymo?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah. My team's, uh, responsible for three key areas, I would say. One is, um, building a big part of the software that actually runs onboard the fully autonomous vehicle and that determines the actual behavior and trajectory of, of the vehicle. Uh, secondly, building the simulation tools and technologies that are required to validate the performance of the system. And then a third part of the team's focused on commercially scaling our ride-hailing business, which is one of our key go-to market applications, uh, for the technology we're building.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
So, as you know, you, uh, arranged a ride for me on, in a Waymo in San Francisco. It was actually a really rainy day, and, uh, it was quite mind-blowing. I've never been in a self-driving car that had no driver sitting in the front. Like, I have a Tesla and I turn on self-driving sometimes, but I've never experienced just sitting in the back and this thing just rides you around. Also, just like a memory I had is, like, the app to call the Waymo is like, it feels like Google Maps, except instead of just telling you how to get to a place, like a car shows up (laughs) and just takes you there, and then you can change course as you're driving, and it's, uh, it's crazy how quickly it became normal. I'm just like, "All right, we're just riding around San Francisco in this self-driving car and just sitting in the back and telling you where to go." And so... So anyway, I'm gonna ask you a bunch of questions around this, but again-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... thank you for arranging that ride. That was, uh, quite special.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
No, I, I'm glad that you were able to do that, and on a rainy day, so that's a special bonus because, again, you know, the, the technology has been performing very well, which has been very heartening for us to
- 5:30 – 8:14
About the autonomous driving vehicle hardware, software, and simulation tools
- SSShweta Shrivastava
see, so.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Few questions along these lines. One thing that I noticed that was really cool is we were trying to turn into a lane, and there was cars coming in that lane just like continuing to move.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
And the car just kind of like subtly was like inching its way out, communicating through this, like, interesting body language-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... thing of just like, "Hey, I wanna... Can someone let me in?" And-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... it's interesting there was no eye contact involved, and it's just like this, I don't know, gesture that you all have to develop.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
And so I guess the question here is just like what, what have you all learned, and what... I do- I don't know if you even work on that piece of it, but just I'm curious how you think about creating this, like, body language of the car communication system to help people understand what it's trying to do.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
We're using a lot of human driving data to train our deep learn models, so it's important to make sure that the behavior of the car doesn't seem robotic, right? It can feel quite unnatural. And, you know, from the get-go, we focused on building a fully autonomous system, so it's important to have that familiarity, that trust, uh, you know, building with the riders where they- they're not daunted by technology, they don't feel like they're sitting in a robot, right? It has to feel very human-like but in a good way, right? Making, making, making it safer than human driving, but then not making it feel unnatural. And so we have, uh, you know, deep learn models that can understand what the other road user's intent is, so stuff like, you know, which way the pedestrian's looking, right? Or what is their body orientation? Because that could tell you, you know, what... which way th- they're headed. The road signs or the gestures, right? Somebody's trying to stop the, the vehicle. The, the system can understand all those signals. So because we're using, uh, deep learn models, um, trained on human driving, but again, sort of, uh, in a good way, right? We discard the bad human driving data. Uh, we can mimic human driving behavior in a good way, and that's why you saw the behavior that you saw yesterday. Now one thing to note is, uh, we can't also just completely rely on explicit gestures and signs, right? Because a lot of driving is also social norms, right? It's, uh... If you, if you're in a particular-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... intersection in San Francisco, you know, maybe it's okay for pedestrians to cross even when they don't have a walk sign, right? Another city, another intersection might have a different social norm when it comes to pedestrians crossing the, the four-way stop sign or the crosswalk or what have you.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
And so the car also has to learn about those social norms and be able to react to it. So it's, it's, it's, uh... Like I said, you know, it's, um, we don't realize how sophisticated, how interactive, uh, and how social driving really is, and with our artificial intelligence capabilities, you know, we've been able to, uh, incorporate a lot of that into our, uh, system behavior.
- 8:14 – 11:02
Differences in working at Waymo vs. a more traditional software company
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
So before Waymo, you worked at non-self-driving, uh, software companies. Worked at Amazon, Cisco, a few other companies. I'm curious what you've found to be the biggest difference working at a company like Waymo versus a traditional software company.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
As I, as I said earlier, you know, it's a highly complex, uh, technically complex system that we have built and, and, and we're improving. And, and it's, it's, if I may say so, it's the most game-changing product that anybody would ever work on.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I don't know. Amazon's pretty cool, but I (laughs) I, I totally get you.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
(laughs) Yeah, I worked at Amazon. I'm a fan, right? Um, and they have been pretty transformational with AWS and, and on the e-commerce side. But a fully autonomous driving system, you know, you... it's-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
It's also a very, very hard problem, right? So it's, it's, it's transformational from that perspective too. I would say that, uh, the PMs here have to go, have to be able to go technically deep, uh, you know-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... compared to what, uh, the... what they would do in a, in other, you know, software products. Uh, they have to be able to get into the details as much as needed. They have to be okay with uncertainty and ambiguity. Again, you know, I think that is part and parcel of any product management role, but it's, it's even more so here, right? This is a long game, and so you have to have that tenacity to play the long game and, and be continuously improving the product and, and make this thing a broad reality, right, uh, in future. So those are some of the attributes. I would also say that, um, there is some, some level of self-selection here. You know, you have to be driven by the mission-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... to make the road safer, right? Uh, we have about 1.35 million deaths that happen every year across the world from traffic accidents, and most of that is attributable to driving errors and driver distraction, right? And I'm sure... I've been guilty of, you know, being on, on... checking my text messages while driving. I've, I've seen other drivers do that, right? With a fully autonomous, uh, technology, you know, you don't have that risk. That's a risk we're trying to minimize. So they have to be driven by that mission. One other thing is that the concept of MVP, (laughs) right? Which is so widely popular in the SaaS product management world or product management world in general, has a whole new meaning here at Waymo when you work on a product like this because, um, safety is, is, you know, top of mind for all of us, right? And we can't really cut corners on safety. There's no... You know, uh, there's n- there is... The MVP bar itself for safety is extremely high for us, right? So the core product management philosophy of sort of, you know, getting an MVP out there and then iterating with, uh, the real world deployment, it, it applies, but it's, it's just a different, um... it's a different bar on that MVP.
- 11:02 – 13:57
How Waymo builds trust with riders and the difference between driver assist and fully autonomous
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Touching again on, uh, safety and, like, human behavior, I was thinking a little bit as you were chatting about... Uh, so I have a Tesla which has self-driving car, self-driving capabilities, and intellectually I know it's probably gonna drive a lot better than I am, but I still feel like I need to, like, disengage it occasionally when I'm, like, on a curvy road. I'm just like, "I don't know about this. I don't wanna, like, leave room for error if there's something that weird that happens." And I imagine someone designing product for that weird behavior where, like, "I should probably trust it 'cause it's probably a lot better driver than I am, but I don't know. I feel like I can do a better job." Is there anything you've learned about, I don't know, human behavior or how to design software for these sorts of experiences that, uh, maybe surprised you or is that... or thought was really interesting or that was really important?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Since you mentioned Tesla, you know, I just wanna clarify that it's, um, it's a different system that we're building, right?
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Which is for Waymo we started by solving the problem of fully autonomous driving without a human driver at the wheel from the get-go.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Right? Uh, it's not a driver assist or ADAS system which relies on the human driver taking over when there's a complex situation, right? So I think that-... expectation is built into that kind of a product, right? And, and so the human, uh, you know, the folks who are using that product would also, uh, have that mindset that, "Hey, I should be ready to take over when the situation demands." Because we built the system from the get-go, uh, to, to work in a fully autonomous mode without a human driver intervention, right, at the wheel, we had to integrate this into our design philosophy from the very begin- beginning that it ha- this has to feel credible, predictable, and these riders have to be able to trust the system, right? So that has been sort of the core of the design philosophy. And so what happens is, and I heard this from you as well, which resonated with me, and I've heard this from a lot of our riders, that they feel, you know, it's, it's like, for the first five minutes of the ride, it's, "Wow," you know, "Is this thing really-"
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... "happening?" Right? But then it starts to feel very natural.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Uh, and, and you know, as if this is how it was always meant to be, right, after the first five minutes, it's like, uh, uneventful. (laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah, exactly.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
That's exactly how it's supposed to feel, but it's not happenstance that it feels that way, you know? The, the, the, the naturalness, the smoothness, uh, and, and still sort of, you know, adhering to safety at all times are things that are designed into the system. And then we make sure that the rider has visibility into what's happening, that if they're not wearing a seatbelt, the rider support would call them, right? So then they know, okay, there is a human, uh, that they can reach out to if they, if they have an issue. They can look at the monitor in the, in the car, right, to understand what the car is seeing. So I think all these little things, uh, help develop that trust in the system.
- 13:57 – 15:55
An example of how Waymo builds trust with riders
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
On that same note, what's one thing that you've, your teams have built that creates a lot of trust or maybe was a surprisingly important element in creating trust in the experience. Like, in terms of the product, especially, in, I don't know, either the app or the in, in, uh, in-car experience?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I don't know if I can point to one thing. You know, it is, uh, again, it's, this is such a holistic experience, (laughs) uh, is that I think it has to be a bunch of small things to make it feel, you know, natural, transparent, and trustworthy to the riders. And I, I can give you one example that I don't think I've mentioned, uh, in, in the discussion so far. So again, because the, the system is designed to be, you know, cautious and defensive, but still making, you know, adequate progress, in the absence of traffic, right, it will never go up above the speed limit.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Right? It doesn't go above the speed limit. It, it, uh, sticks or adheres to the speed limit. Well, it's something that a lot of our riders actually appreciate about the system. Now, it turns out that adhering to the speed limit, even without traffic, uh, sometimes is, is not the best thing. You have to go below the speed limit, and we, we realized that for driving in the, in sort of the slopes or the, the gradients, uh, you know, the street with inclines in, in San Francisco, there are many of those, right? The human brain is trained to, or the human drivers are sort of, you know, subconsciously they slow down when they go downhill-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... on those slopes, right? The autonomous vehicle doesn't necessarily have to do that, (laughs) right? If it's safe, and if it's staying below the speed limit. But, but we learned that this is th- this is the, this is a more natural driving experience, right? And this is what our riders would also expect in terms of the experience. So, uh, that's something that, that we, uh, then modified the behavior on.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
That makes sense. I would, I would want it to slow down. On the other hand, if I feel like I could trust it, I could, I wish there was a button to just like crazy mode, just go, go for it.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
(laughs)
- 15:55 – 20:38
The commercial, operational, and system behavior metrics Waymo uses
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Kind of digging a little bit into the product team's way of working, what are KPIs that you all use to track progress? I don't know, uh, e- either amongst some of the teams you lead or also just broadly progress on self-driving technology. How do you know you're making progress? Is it just like miles driven or something else?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
There are tons of these (laughs) metrics, right, that we, um, analyze on, on sort of a daily basis, weekly basis depending upon what, uh, what the metric is. But if I were to categorize them in sort of two broad categories, it'd be the commercial and operational metrics, and the system behavior metrics, right? Uh, so, so one thing, one important thing to note here is that it's not, this is, we're not in a proof of concept or a pilot phase anymore, right? This is the service that we are offering to riders, uh, you know, paid service in Phoenix and, uh, uh, also it's open to the public in San Francisco, right? So it's an actual service, and so we're tracking, you know, the, the, the commercial metrics in terms of-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... our, the trips per week, right? The, the, uh, daily or, or weekly active users, and all the funnel metrics that you can think of. Also, the operational metrics, right? The cost, right? Well, how much does this thing, uh, costing us to operate? So that's, I would say, all the stuff on the, uh, on the commercial scaling side. And then on the, on the driver performance, the driver, Waymo Driver is the, is the technology name as, as I alluded to earlier, the driver performance metrics, you know, they span across, uh, safety, the, you know, compliance to the road rules, uh, our ability to make adequate progress as in, you know, not get unduly stopped or stranded in dense traffic situations is an example.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
What are just like specific metrics there, like anything you could share, just like what is the actual goal in one of those teams?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
The goal here is to be able to drive safer than, uh, than humans, right? Now, it's, we don't really have one standard human driving benchmark, right? Safety benchmark that, um, everybody uses, right? But we do gather, um, enough of that data, right, we have access to enough of that data to, uh, form an opinion on or a metric on or benchmark on, uh, what does human driving look like? You know, how many collisions, as an example, a human driver would have every 100,000 miles?
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Hm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Right?
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
And then we want to make sure that our performance is better than that. Right? So that's...... I'm simplifying, right? And, and several things go into sort of both calculating the benchmark as well as our performance ago- against that benchmark. But that, at the core of it, you know, that's what we're trying to do. So that's on the safety side. And then I would say on the, uh, eh, the stops and stranding, which is trying to, you know, which goes in the different direction, "Hey, you can be very safe if you're not moving at all." That's not what we are building, right? (laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
We, we need to make sure that the riders get to their destination on time, so it has to be making... It has to be appropriately assertive and be making the right progress. And so, again, how, how much did the vehicle slow down unduly, right? Or f- in how many instances in a given week, uh, did it have to rely on sort of a rescue help, right? Those are the situations that we wanna avoid. And then what... How much did we slow down the traffic for other road users, right? So we, again, do extensive benchmarking and, uh, look at the priors, et cetera, and, and really understand what would an adequate performance be there and measure our own, uh, against that.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
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- 20:38 – 22:53
What are L5 autonomous vehicles and why Shweta thinks L4 vehicles are good enough
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I'm guessing you're not gonna have an answer to when do we think we'll have fully self-driving level five autonomy, so, uh, let me ask you a different approach to that question of just what's getting... What's most in the way of us getting to full self-driving where we don't have to do anything ever? Is it, like, miles driven? Is it, like, tech breakthroughs that still have to happen? Is it regulation and just cities being like, "Okay, it's fine."
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
What's the biggest blocker at this point, or bottleneck?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
So, l- let me, uh, share my opinion on the L5, right? So I think-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Cool.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
So L4 for, you know, for, uh, those who might not be very familiar with this term, you know, L2, L3 is still very much driver assist. You know, there is gets to some level of t- of autonomy but then relies on the human driver at the wheel to be able to take over in complex situations. L4 is fully autonomous without a human driver at the wheel and no expectation of a human driver at the wheel. That's what we've been focusing on. L5 would be, uh, in any kind of road, right, completely unstructured, off-roading, uh, in that kind of an environment, be able to drive without, you know, without any map, without any priors, what have you. And we believe that, you know, by offering the kind of service that we are offering in Phoenix and San Francisco and then, you know, LA through the rest of this year and other cities in future is it helps realize that, um, the, the dream of the fully autonomous driving in a big way, right, without having to go to L5. So I think that in the technology's already there. You know, L5, I'm not sure, you know, maybe that becomes more niche, et cetera, solves very specific use cases. In terms of the blocker, I would say the technology is there, but it still needs improvement, especially, you know, we were not able to drive in snow yet, right?
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Something that, that we have to tackle in future.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I- I could barely drive in snow.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
(laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I get that
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Car. Yeah, and I w- I don't like to drive in snow even though I avoid on very snowy days.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
But yeah, you know, that is something that we still have to build as a capability in driving strong in snow fine now, so, so that's great.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Makes sense. Clearly, there's a lot, a lot of little things... A lot of little things, a lot of big things, and-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... it's a really interesting point about, like, we don't need L5. L4 is great for most people. Maybe a last question along this track, and then I wanna pivot to a different area.
- 22:53 – 25:24
How to keep investors enthusiastic when it’s a long-term investment
- LRLenny Rachitsky
So Waymo's been this long-term investment for Alphabet, and many PMs often try to create buy-in and keep buy-in for large investment and large project. I know this is, like, a different scale of investment than what most PMs work through, but is there anything you've learned about keeping leaders bought in and excited and continuing to invest in a project, uh, for years and years and-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... uh, specifically just, like, tactics that keep people excited and bought into a, a long-term investment?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah, so first of all, we are fortunate that we have, uh, you know, the, the backing from Alphabet and, and other investors. And, um, you know, the autonomous vehicle industry is interesting, and I think the last year has been interesting with more consolidation happening, right? So I think the name of the game here is to, uh, is, is to show progress, right? Show meaningful progress, and meaningful progress not just in terms of technology, but in terms of commercial deployments, right? That is, that is the, the rubber meets the road, if you will, phase of, of the, of the product. And the results have to speak for themselves for our investors to have the confidence in us, right? So notwithstanding, uh, you know, what's happening to other AV companies in the, uh, in the industry, you know, it's, it's about what we are doing and then look at the progress that we've been making and where we are headed and the fact that we've been sort of, um, accelerating our milestones and blowing through our own expectations. I think these are very positive, uh, signals to our investors as well. And worked at, you know, another startup as well. It's not about... You have to do what's the right thing for the business, right? That's what you f- your focus is on...... creating value for the customers, creating value for the writers (laughs) right? You, you, you have to build a business that makes sense. And you know, and the investors see that too, right? We're not gonna do something unnatural or, uh, something that, you know, doesn't align with the business goals in order to gain any short term brownie points with investors.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Hm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I think it doesn't work that way and investors will see through that too. Uh, definitely Alphabet, you know, uh, has been our backer for, um, forever, right? So, it's, it's really about focusing on doing the... building the right business and doing the right thing for the, for the users.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I think that's a great takeaway, that if you're finding that there isn't buy-in and continued support for what you're building, uh, focus on momentum and showing success. Like it's pretty simple if you think about it. And, uh, it's hard to cut something that's just like showing success.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
And, uh, and so e- even at the scale of a Waymo, it's, uh, it's a great lesson. So that makes sense.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Absolutely.
- 25:24 – 26:39
Building successful teams and successful products
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
We talked a bit about other companies you've worked at, and so I want to kinda zoom out a little bit and I just wanna ask, so you worked at Amazon, Cisco, Waymo now, startup you mentioned. What are just some of the biggest lessons you learned about successfully building successful teams and successful products?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
In terms of the product, whether you're working for, you know, a big company or a startup, the, the core product management tenet's still the same, which is, you know, you have to work backwards from the customer problem or the user problem, right? Uh, building a technology for the sake of it, uh, uh, is, you know, doesn't really go that far, right? (laughs) So you really have to focus on the... what are you building, who are you building it for, and what problem are you solving? Right? And that, this applies in any context, right? And Amazon has this, um, great process where the PMs have to write, uh, a press release for the finished product even before they start building the product, right? That's the thing, that's the first thing that they have to do is to write that press release. Like the products about to launch today, right? What are you telling the users about that product? Really forces them to think about the, the value proposition more thoroughly, right? And, and I know many of the companies are starting to sort of look at that practice as well. But I found it very effective. Um-
- 26:39 – 27:49
Determining what you’re not building, especially before product-market-fit
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Do you do that, do you do that at Waymo or do folks do that? Is there kind of a system there or...
- SSShweta Shrivastava
The explicit PR/FAQ process that Amazon follows is, uh, you know, and I think Waymo has its own version of it.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Uh, but it is about sort of focusing on, on the, on the customer problem. Now Waymo's also a very different kind of product, right? It's highly integrated. Uh, so, and, and different types of product management flavors if you will, right? Some are more technically focused and technically deep, some more commercially focused. Uh, so they all adapt. Uh, they have their versions of working backwards from the customer problem. But that, that still remains the core tenet in my mind. The other, uh, you know, big lessons, at least working in some of the large companies that I have had, is, uh, it's, it's also very important to know what you're not building. (laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Right? And, and this one, as long as big companies I would say even in startup it's extremely important to know, you know, what you're not building, because you could very easily get swayed by customer X telling you to do this, customer Y telling you to do that, and a product that tries to be all things to all people, you know, usually doesn't end up going anywhere. So that focus, that prioritization, and being crisp about what you're building and what you're not building is, is very important.
- 27:49 – 29:33
Why large companies need to disrupt their own models
- SSShweta Shrivastava
And then w- in the context of the large companies, what I was gonna say was, um, you know, I think it's the, it's the classic innovator's dilemma, right? The, eh... large companies tend to be the market share leaders in, in their focus areas. And so the product team and the product leaders can get very incremental in their product strategy, and, and then lo and behold, you know, you can see an upstart that comes and disrupts them, right? And, and so I have definitely learned the lesson that you need to disrupt yourself before somebody else does, right? (laughs) Because it's gonna happen. It's inevitable. And large companies that are constantly sort of, you know, challenging themselves and disrupting their, uh, their own models, right, or their own product capabilities to produce even something more transformational for, for the customers are the ones that is, that, that really succeed. And I think this is where the product leaders have to bring in that mindset of, you know, are we getting too complacent or it's time to disrupt.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
That's a such a good, uh, reminder. Is there a example of you doing that or something you worked on where you had, where you got the company to commit to something that maybe could have been a, a threat from a disruptor or maybe even just seeing that happening at a company just like is there a specific project or investment that comes to mind?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
In Amazon I launched, uh, or I was the first, um, PM and then, then I grew the team around it, uh, for a no-code application development platform called Honeycode, right? So that was a brand new service. Amazon had never delved in that space before. It was more sort of more infrastructure focused and, uh, and you know, this was sort of the first of its kind, uh, service that, um, that the team worked on. So... and this has played out many times in my career and so I am a big believer in disrupting yourself before somebody else does it.
- 29:33 – 33:07
The most underrated product management skills
- SSShweta Shrivastava
- LRLenny Rachitsky
What do you think is the most underrated PM skill that you suggest people, maybe especially early in their career, uh, that they should focus on maybe that they're probably not thinking about?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I think the, the listening and, um-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... and empathy are, are the top ones. These are very important because I think th- thing... when folks think about product management we have to think about sort of the influencing without authority and, and prioritization and being able to write good PRAs et cetera, right, all those things, um, are sort of more top of mind. The listening and empathy I wouldn't say that they are underrated. I think there is, there is now a lot more recognition that these are sort of core skills if you want to be able to influence a lot without authority. Um, but I, but I think it's easier said than done. You know, you really have to come in with that growth mindset, that, you know, with that beginner's mindset, be able to absorb and just learn and listen and don't jump in with ideas necessarily, right? You take the time to formulate that opinion, uh-... uh, to really learn and understand the customer and the market, and really be true to that tenet of working backwards from the customer problem and not just, you know, say it because it's, it's become such a platitude now in the, in the product world.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah, there's a book, there's a whole book called Working Backwards now.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah, yes.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Such a...
- SSShweta Shrivastava
That is the one thing that I would say that, that somebody, uh, who's starting out as a product manager, you know, really try to follow that principle and then listening and empathy is gonna go a long way in terms of being able to, being able to do that.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
On listening and empathy, what do you think helped you most develop those two skills?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
So I, I think for me part of it was just doing this over and over again in different environments, right? In different product launches that I've led in different, uh, types of companies that I've worked with. In startup as well as big company, right, the dynamic is different, right? And, and again, the, um, you know, the, the team that you're working with in different companies have different culture. (laughs) Uh, so when you're working with, let's say an engineering leader or, uh, you know, being able to understand what are his or her constraints, right? Where is he or she coming from? What, what does impact look like to that person? And then understanding and then understanding where you're aligned, where you're not aligned are things that you have to develop and start paying a lot more attention to as you sort of rise in your career or, or go up the ladder. Uh, and I think a lot of that for me came, um, came by just being in different kind of situations and different kinds-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... of environments.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah, that's what I often say also, like a lot of this just comes from doing it again and again and again.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
There's not gonna take a course and then just, "I've, I'm a great listener, I am done."
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
It's, uh, it's-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
No,
- NANarrator
... pretty difficult.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... stuff to do. Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah, which is not easy to like, you know, it'd be nice if there was a book you read and then you become a great listener and you're great-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Well, I think one-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... empathizer.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... one tactic or one, one tip that I could-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... you know, share is, is, is just challenging your own assumptions, right? So, so I think listening-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... with an open mind within, you know, are you proactively trying to challenge your own assumptions, uh, is extremely important, right? Eh, eh, as a beginner product manager, as well as a seasoned product leader, you have to... If you're not doing enough of that, then I think you might not be listening well, (laughs) right? Or you might not be picking on sort of the, the, the cues. Then you're just if, if you, there's no conflict, if there's no contention, then uh, something is missing. (laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Right, uh, it's not-
- 33:07 – 35:19
Tips for getting promoted
- LRLenny Rachitsky
You've been promoted many times. Now you're in a place where you promote people, and I'm curious for someone that maybe wants to get promoted or is struggling to get promoted, what would you say are probably the reasons they aren't or what do you think people should focus on if they want to just get a promotion and many promotions in their career?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I'm gonna say something that might sound a little, uh, cheeky, right? But I, I think the way to get promoted is to not want it too badly, (laughs) right?
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm-hmm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
It, it is about y- you have to focus on, on sort of the, the impact, right? It is, it's about having an impact and then doing what is right for the business. So, so not sort of, you know, optimizing things for your promotion, right? Which, but y- look, we are all, um, ambitious human beings and, and it's, there's nothing wrong with wanting a promotion just to be clear, right? There's nothing wrong with being ambitious, but, but then focus on the impact, right? Are you working on the right things that will have the right outcome for the business? Because if you are and if you are giving it your 100%, that will be visible, right? And, and making your ambitions known to your, to your manager, to your leader is, is, is a good thing, right? That you should. And, and so when the right opportunity comes, you know, at least your leader or manager is aware that, "Hey, you know, this person wanted to work on something more challenging, so maybe I, I put, put her or him, you know, on that project." But it, you have to be focused on sort of really creating the right kind of impact for the company and not optimizing for yourself to get promoted. If you try to maneuver that too much, A, you know, it, it becomes visible, right? And it's, it's not necessarily, um, it's, it's not a positive signal to the organization when they can see that that's what you're trying to do, and it also distracts you from the things that you need to be focusing on. So I would say, you know, be a, yeah, improve your skill set as a product manager, make sure that you're, that y- you've made your vision on that you want to work on challenging, high-visibility projects or products, right, that really test or stretch your skills and, and then be really dedicated to that cause and, and, and work on what has the business impact for, for the company, right? Do the right things.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I really like that advice, 100% agree with all of that.
- 35:19 – 36:46
Where is Waymo and how to try it out
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I have a couple final Waymo questions and then we're gonna get to a very exciting lightning round.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Uh, just to kind of for folks that maybe wanna try out Waymo, um, so maybe just, like where's it live now? When do you think it'll roll out to new cities and then how do people try it and use it if, if they live in one of those cities, if that's possible?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
We are already in, uh, Phoenix metro area and, um, in San Francisco. So in those cities you can just go and download the app and you can use the service. We have done initial, uh, fully autonomous testing in LA and we're gonna be expanding in LA through the rest of the year. So stay tuned for more development on that front. Uh, and then we do have a list of cities that we're gonna be rolling out in the coming years, but unfortunately I can't share that list just as yet.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
And if someone lives in one of those cities, is there a way they could try to get on a wait list or try to use this stuff or is it, is it like closed doors right now?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
So it is, it is open doors in, in San Francisco and Phoenix, um...
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Got it. So you just sign up and you get on a wait list and then you might get offered.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
In Phoenix I don't even think that there is a wait list.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Oh, wow. Oh, man.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Uh, what's going on to get-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I gotta-
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... on the wait list.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
... I gotta move to Phoenix. That's cool.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Or, or just wait, uh, just a, yeah, a little while in San Francisco. But yeah, Phoenix is great, (laughs) so I, I, if you want to move there, that's, that's totally fine too.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
I would. I'm, I'm gonna start packing tonight.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
(laughs)
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Just joking. Uh, anything else you wanted to touch on before we get to our very exciting lightning round?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
No, I think we talked, uh, about a bunch of things. It's been, uh, it's been a great conversation so far.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
It's not over
- 36:46 – 42:15
Lightning round
- LRLenny Rachitsky
yet. We've reached our very exciting lightning round. I have six questions for you.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Right.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Are you ready?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Bring it on.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Okay, (laughs) here we go. What are two or three books that you've recommended most to other people?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moore and, uh, Clayton Christensen's, uh, Innovator's Dilemma are still sort of, uh, the two classics in product management that I have quoted a lot and I have recommended to, to many folks.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Awesome. I've got both in my little bookshelf behind me.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah, me too.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
What's, uh, what's a favorite recent movie or TV show that you really enjoyed?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I have an eight-year-old daughter, (laughs) so my viewing choices are very much influenced by what she watches.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Yeah.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Uh, but let's see. I, um ... Uh, yeah, I did enjoy the Top Gun, the new Top Gun movie, Top Gun: Maverick, quite a bit. We watched it in the, in the theater and, uh, visuals were just fantastic. Uh, I think it was also inspiring to see what Tom Cruise was able to do, you know? And, uh, it's quite a feat that he pulled off at this age.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Absolutely.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
And, you know, uh, it was very inspirational.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Fully agree. Favorite interview question that you like to ask people?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah, especially at the senior levels I always ask them, "When was one time that you failed, and what did you learn from it?" Uh, I've seen that, uh, folks who are, you know, who's either say that they, they've never failed or they're trying to, to guise a success story as a failure story are usually either disingenuous or have not had the depth of experience, so I ask that question and I'm looking for some real solid (laughs) examples there.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Awesome. What's a favorite recent product that you've discovered that you love?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I wouldn't say that I recently discovered it. It's on my, um, it's on my wish list, uh, to buy very soon. I ... Look, I'm all for sustainable mobility, so I am shopping for a foldable e-bike.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Mm.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
So I can do more mountain biking without doing mountain biking. That's the sustainable part for me, I guess, but yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
(laughs)
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Is there a specific, uh, model or brand that you, uh, are most excited about?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I would take recommendations from you, but I'm still-
- LRLenny Rachitsky
Okay.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
... uh, I'm still shopping. I think Lectric, uh, and there are a couple, yeah.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
All right. Uh, if folks have recommendations, leave, uh, suggestions in the comments.
- SSShweta Shrivastava
Please do.
- LRLenny Rachitsky
And, uh, what's something relatively minor you've changed in your team's product development process that you've found has had a tremendous impact?
- SSShweta Shrivastava
I wouldn't say that this is a product development process. Uh, you know, although we, uh, in different, uh, uh, parts of, phases of my career, I've definitely, uh, instituted different types of processes and tools that have helped improve the product development, but I, I will give you some. Uh, an interesting one that I used a lot in my, in my prior, uh, company and then I used a different form of it here at Waymo is, is what I, uh, used to call is the rule of seven. If there have been seven emails (laughs) in an email thread and you still haven't resolved the issue, just call the person or get in a room, huddle, resolve it live. But, you know, the, the long email exchanges that don't converge and go anywhere I feel are a waste of time for many people, so I'm like, you know, you, you've got a limit. Waymo's a bigger company, so you know, the limit's more like 10. But if you haven't resolved something within an X number of emails, please just get on a call, get in a room and, and get it resolved.
Episode duration: 42:15
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