The audio and video are in Spanish. These notes are a translation.
Today I spoke with Manuel Bronstein, Chief Product Officer of Roblox, the gaming platform with more than 70 million daily active users. Before this, he held leadership roles at technology giants such as Google, where he led the Google Assistant product, and YouTube, where he helped reach the impressive figure of 1,500 million monthly active viewers. His experience spans from the world of social games at Zynga to interactive entertainment on Xbox LIVE, which has given him a unique perspective at the intersection of technology and entertainment.
Youtube Timestamps*
[4:20] - Career Strategy
Manuel has had a stratospheric career, from graduating as an electronics engineer in Venezuela to becoming Vice President of Product at YouTube and CPO of Roblox.
- If Manuel had to point to a few fundamental principles that were present in his career decisions, what would they be?
Manuel has talked about being proactive in his career decisions, about not letting the tide carry him:
- For the young, high-potential people he hires, what does Manuel advise them about how to plan their career? (Strengths vs weaknesses, specializing in an industry or a function, etc.)
Product management has become an attractive path for people who come from a career in banking, consulting, corporate jobs, MBAs, etc. and want to jump into the world of startups and technology.
- Why should people NOT pursue a career in product and product management?
- What are the key skills the best product managers have? The ones that distinguish a good one from an excellent one. How can those skills be practiced? Could Manuel give practical examples?
[23:50] - Product Philosophy
Manuel has more than 20 years of experience leading successful products.
- What are the most important challenges a product leader frequently runs into?
- Does Manuel have any frameworks or fundamental principles he frequently turns to in order to analyze these challenges?
- What have been some of the biggest mistakes Manuel made leading products? What did he learn from them?
Manuel has had opposite experiences: 1) At Xbox, console creation cycles last decades. 2) At Zynga, the culture is very data-driven and about optimizing everything quickly.
- When building products, how does Manuel balance data analysis/customer feedback and intuition? When is the moment for each?
- Could Manuel explain this idea about how to market commoditized products? How does it change when you have to market a product that is not commoditized?
Usually, the advice is: ‘Do not worry about the competition, just focus on the customer, everything will be fine’.
- How does Manuel think about competition? At the level of strategy and tactics, how does the competition ingredient affect his product decisions?
[58:27]- Product Advice for Founders
Manuel mentioned that founders value that, when they tell him their idea, he understands the product quickly and anticipates the challenges they are going to face.
- What goes through Manuel’s head when he hears a new product idea for the first time? What questions or mental models does he analyze it with?
Manuel is an advocate of the North Star Metric and has used them in multiple teams of his. For a startup that is just starting out, that does not yet have product market fit:
- How does Manuel advise a startup to set its North Star Metric?
Early-stage founders are usually the ones leading product development:
- How can founders know whether they should hire a product leader or keep the role? When is the right moment?
- What should founders look for in those first hires? What questions or case studies help determine a candidate’s quality, and how do the best candidates respond?
Episode Mentions
You can find Manuel on Twitter and LinkedIn
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