Professional & Personal Update

-




Today marks my last day at Goibibo and MakeMyTrip. It has been an eventful journey of 4 years. I was very fortunate. I worked with the smartest people on the earth, built multiple lines of business and learnt lots during the course.

Here were my top takeaways:
  1. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish: When I had heard this line at Steve Jobs commencement speech, I only understood its meaning metaphorically. Over the last 4 years, I have worked in at least 6 different lines of business of Goibibo, more often than not working at 2 of them simultaneously. Every time I started leading a team, I learnt something new there, about product management, leadership, managing teams and being productive. Leaders like Ashish and Rajesh at Goibibo and MakeMyTrip taught me to keep looking forward and keep creating a vision of “Think about the way it’s going to be.” instead of “Remember, how it used to be?”
  2. Always be ready to unlearn: When I joined Goibibo, I was already one of the experienced PMs in the country. So much so, that it was easy to dismiss the heavy tech-first approach of Goibibo. It was unique for me in the Indian context and yet very gratifying. Working with leaders like Ashish and Vikalp helped me discover the fact that it is okay to have technology drive your roadmap, as long as you can help them steer the path.
  3. Interleave strategy with execution: This is a no brainer. At the same time, this is one of the most difficult things to do, esp if you want to do it consciously. The time working with Anshuman, at Goibibo helped me refine my strengths at Execution while teaching me to interleave Strategy by being conscious about it. This way you already know the end-state, before you take your first steps, while at the same time, not being rigid about it.
  4. Ideas are stupid: You are only as good as your execution. It helps to have great ideas. What ultimately feeds the product-led growth, though, is product execution.
  5. Your legacy is what happens after you leave: As a manager, your primary responsibility to build great teams and empower them. I knew I have learnt to build great teams when consistently customers were happy and the team were happy. Whether they come on time or not is none of my business. And I knew I am leaving a legacy when the team members stepped up in when I decided to move. It helped that I smoothened the transition in a way that no one will miss me not being there.
I will soon be sharing more about my new adventure. Till then Adios!

Popular posts from this blog

How to Effectively Read An S-1

-
Image
Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) are back in business. and with them, come tons of S-1. A Form S-1 is the initial registration form that private companies file with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) when they intend to file for IPOs. It looks like this Form S-1 Now, whether you invest or not, I totally recommend reading a S-1 because it is a gold mine! It teaches you so much not only about that specific company but also: 1. How much the company intends to raise and how they plan to spend? 2. What do they believe their moat is? 3. What is the risk they see in the future (no matter how hunky-dory the business model looks like from outside) 4. Competitive analysis of not just the company but also the industry they operate in 5. How is the company's financial performance, so that you can tie in the truths and PRs properly Reading a complete S-1 of a company is extremely time-consuming and to be honest, quite a waste of time. For example, this Asana S-1 is more than 161
Read more

Mobile Apps: Content Vs E-commerce

-
Image
My experience with the mobile apps has been mixed both as a user and as a product guy. Most of the organizations, whom apps I have used, have created the apps more as an afterthought than as a planned strategy. As a result, these apps have become more like a broken and hanging limb off their body than a part of theirs. Usually, these apps are created thinking the target users being people who are connected with the Social brand. Now the intent is great, but the direction is flawed. The mobile apps are indeed are a part of your Social business than Social brand and hence there is a huge divergence in the way people look at it. I personally believe that with screen size of phone getting larger every six months, by 2015 we should see a movement more towards mobile websites from apps, since they don't need to be installed and with a bigger screen size and HTML5 adoption, most of their current limitation will get away. However, in this blog, I am dealing with one of the most c
Read more

How to crack that Product Manager Interview

-
This post has been long due. Around a month back, I did a talk on "How to Play & Win the Product Management Career Game" which was my way of saying "How to crack that elusive Product Manager Interview". Now most of us end up reading, Cracking the PM Interview , because everyone else has read that and it is a lovely book. But the challenge with it in the Indian context is, that well, it doesn't really fit in. To crack Indian company interviews, every good PM ends up making his own "Cracking the PM Interview". The attached presentation is mine. I am kind of open sourcing it so that more people can benefit off it. Please do let me know your feedback and share it with others who you believe are preparing for PM interviews. Anyone who needs further help can reach out directly. Will be happy to help in person. How to play & win the product management career game from Ankur Sharma
Read more