Fireside Chat with YouTube Product Leader, Jules Walter

[0:00] - Hey everyone, this is Carlos. I'm the founder and CEO at Product School. Today I'm here with my buddy Jules Walter, who's a product leader at YouTube. Hey Jules. Hey, Carlos. Hi, everyone. It's good to have you on the show. You were one of the first believers in us when we were just getting started. And you did an amazing talk at Proud School San Francisco when we were still doing things in person. How are you doing? I'm good. It's great to be here. Thank you for having me. It's been great to see your own growth as a product leader, and we're going to talk about that in a second, but before i just want to learn a bit more about your first pm job, like how did you get that? Yeah, it was a journey, you know. Yeah, so some background about me. First is I'm Haitian. I grew up in Haiti.

[0:49] And then from there went to college in the US, got into MIT, which also was a challenge of its own. And in particular, the story there is that when I was in high school, One of my teachers You know, when I told I wanted to go to MIT, he told me, hey, you'll never get in. You know, nobody like you has ever got into these type of schools. You'd have to be a genius, etc., And then later I found out when I was admitted to another school that one of my friends who had left Haiti got into MIT.

[1:22] And I was like, I'm pretty sure this guy's not smarter than me. So then I applied to MIT and then, you know, got admitted there. And that's one of the key themes that you'll see with my career. over time is that I do think, um, you know, I have a role that I can play in inspiring others, in giving them the confidence, you know, so that they can pursue big dreams. So that's why I'm sharing that story. But back to your question. So after college, I went to business school. And then The job I did after business was actually a general manager job, not product. I was actually based in West Africa, running a business for a medical device company.

[2:03] And then over time, I started hearing more and more about tech, especially as I wanted to come back to the U.S., So I came back, was the founder of a startup, which didn't work out. And then as I was talking to a mentor about what I should do next, His advice was, well, first of all, I think you should move to the Bay Area. location makes a big difference in terms of career acceleration. So I followed that advice. And then the other thing was, as I was looking at various career, product management became clearly what I wanted to do, because you know, computer science background, but one but I enjoyed more the businesses stuff like you know, and I was really interested in making a change in people's lives, and that's one of the roles where you have that opportunity. But then I started interviewing with companies and they gave me the interview because my pedigree, but it was really hard you know, because they're like, well, you don't have to be a PM, you have to have been a PM You know, that's a typical thing that we hear.

[3:01] So what I did there is I ended up joining a very early stage startup. through networking, And then I joined as a very entry level PM, you know, there where they kind of took a chance on me. And then within a month, they're like, OK, you're good, you know, and then very quickly got promoted. And at some point became head of product for that company over time. So that's my story into product management. But more commonly what I see is folks usually switch within their company, which is much easier because you have like domain expertise and Um, But I do talk to a lot of folks who are trying to get in and struggle to make that transition. We see that all the time, this classic chicken and egg problem where someone with potential, they've done some product, maybe they don't have that title on their resume. And a recruiter assumes that, OK, well, then you're not a good candidate. And that's just not true. So I'm glad to see now that you are also in a position to help that next generation of product leaders. So after your startup, so the one that you join as a PM,

[4:04] then I see that you work at Slack, right? So how did you make that move? Yeah, so I was at the startup for almost two years, I believe, or roughly two years. And then I started, I Became friends with somebody who was like an early designer at Slack. and he was saying how excited um slack was as a company, how exciting it was as a company. i got really interested about the mission, which is really to make people's work nice, simpler, more pleasant, more productive, and also like just like the stage of the company, right, if you get a chance like like joining a rocket ship like while it's about to take off, like i think that's a career accelerator, and it's also just a really fun experience. so i i yeah, so i joined slack I was the first PM on the growth team. So I really started that team and then helped it scale and was there for roughly four and a half years.

[4:58] And during my tenure there, the company grew by 10x in terms of revenue. And, you know, the team that sort of I led had a massive impact at the company. So I had a lot of fun there. And then. More recently, about almost a year and a half ago, I joined YouTube to be a product leader there in order to drive a new strategic initiative on the product side. So Jules, when you say that you joined the Slack group, product growth team, what does growth mean? How is that different than, let's say, a traditional marketing approach?

[5:33] Thank you. Yeah, so The growth I'm referring to here is growth within the product function. And one way to think about it is, you know, When you have a product you have PMS that try to create new value for users and for example, a new feature that solves a problem that isn't solved already. And you also have growth PMs who are helping New users. Find that value that's already existing in the product.

[6:04] So that was my focus at Slack. And in terms of the work, it's things like understanding like how do you change the new user experience, you know, onboarding, you know, the first few days, hours or weeks. It's finding it's really thinking to that user journey over time, like in at some point, it's like we had a lot of users that were In the product but not paying for it. So it's like what would it take for someone to find so much value that they want to pay for slack? How do we change the product? How do we change the experience? When in the life cycle of the user should we sort of convey that value so the i think some of the differences there between a growth pm and a sort of traditional core pm and obviously there's other types of pms like platform pms etc is really about focusing on the marginal user versus the power user. So it's not like, hey, how do I create this feature for people who already love the product? But it's for the people who don't actually love the product.

[7:03] We've heard about it. We want to give it a shot. Like, how do I change that experience that they're like, okay, yes, I should be using Slack. So that was my focus there. I always use Slack as a great example of company adopting product-led growth mindset. So that free plan that got people from a company interested and then organically bubbled up that to a potential decision maker. I think that's a case that's been studied across so many companies and business schools. And I like what you said about the definition of growth, not just for the top of the funnel for like new users, but growth in terms of the retention and that's now becoming more of a mainstream concept. So when you think about companies like Slack, where technically you look from the outside, it's a chat. Some people may say, well, maybe there's only one product, one PM, but in reality it's a much more complex engine behind the scenes. So how do you structure the different product teams to make sure that you are covering the different use cases?

[8:06] All right. Yeah, it's something that every company struggles with. And actually, the answer changes over time, too. You know, where people go from decentralized to centralized, depending on how big you are, etc. Some things I'll say, one is, It really helps to have a clear mission, And then to have a clear strategy that aligns with that mission. And then you sort of like go down that way, you know? So for example, With Slack, there's really a strategy.

[8:37] I mean, without going into like the specifics, you know, like there's a focus on you know, the the self-serve users and customers versus the enterprise customers. And there's different approaches for each. And then you sort of then think about um the different user groups, you know, or segment, and that's how you may be able to sort of break your team down. So it's really, there's a bit of a top down approach and then just having, giving everybody their own lane and their own mission or metric that they contribute to, in a way that ladders up to that overall strategy and mission. And the rest is really specific for each team.

[9:16] Not only that, each company will have their own structure and as you said it's changing, it's like treating your org chart as a product. Yeah, and you'll see that a lot of these companies they reorg, you know, every year, every year and a half because These things only last so long, but what matters is that the strategy remains, even though the structure of the team may change over time. So now that you are in a product leadership position, what are the skills that you think that are serving you well now that maybe were less relevant when you were doing your first PM job?

[9:53] Yeah, the. the nature of the work changes over time in terms of like how much you spend how much each skill is relevant. So initially earlier in my career, a lot of it was about solving intellectual problems. You know, so I came in at Slack as the first growth PM. I didn't know anything about growth. You know, found some mentors, started learning the frameworks, you know, got really good at like, you know, having a clear goal, like understanding the user, setting up hypotheses, you know, using the scientific method to test each hypothesis, et cetera. And then over time, what happens is, you know, you get really good as an ICPM, you know how to execute, then it's like, hey, are you good at, taking strategically, you know, not just like the next experiment or this quarter's work, but like the next years or next five years.

[10:41] And then you get really good there. You become like a senior ICPM. And then you start managing, oftentimes. And then it's a completely new new game, you know? and there it's really about okay do you understand the people on your team and you know can you like manage each differently but the way that they need to be managed um and then can you influence people that you're not managing you know people in different functions not just other pms or engineers or you know the core tech team but like marketing um you know business development you know etc so that the skill goes from like those quote unquote hard skills that can be very intellectual.

[11:22] to the quote unquote softer skills, but that are real about influence, you know, communicating, And it can be a big job for a lot of people. And those skills actually take oftentimes longer. you know, to develop and then we each have our strengths, right? Like we're naturally maybe really good at the execution, but then it takes more effort to step back and think strategically. Maybe you were like, hey, Um, very focused at pushing things but not like bringing people along. So it's been a journey. And the journey continues, I'm sure. And I'm glad that you brought up the point about sometimes being what makes you a good individual contributor doesn't necessarily make you a better manager.

[12:05] and trying to learn all their skills are absolutely critical. You mentioned mentorship few times during this interview. I want to learn more about that. How did you go about, what was the role of mentorship play in your career and how did you go about finding those mentors? Yeah, so mentorship is, it was like, it was very critical in my career. And it's something I wish I had known about earlier. So I mentioned already an example of somebody, a mentor, suggesting that I move here, which was a career accelerant for me.

[12:37] um but even like when i think about the slack roll And I was able to bring a lot of impact to growth. And part of it is I had mentors who were really good at growth. One of which is Bengali Kabba. We used to have growth at Instagram, you know, and various parts of Facebook. And To your question on how do you find those mentors, My approach is, First of all, I think about what skill I actually want. So I joined Slack and I'm like, I don't know anything about growth. And I'm like, we're the best growth people I asked around. And I have a short list of people. So I know clearly what my goal is.

[13:15] And then the other thing is, once you know who you'd want to... have a relationship with, it's really about How do I... get advice from them, but with the least effort on their part. So with Bengali, I met him, I believe, at an event. you know, and then we exchanged contact, and then i sent a quick email like, hey, i have this quick question that he could have just answered by email. Instead of like, hey, can you be my mentor? Or hey, can we spend an hour or half an hour on a call, you know, even though you don't know me?

[13:51] And then, you know, and then the other thing beyond just like, those very low effort interactions for them is about following through. You know, so he gave me some quick advice. you know, I went back to work, sort of implemented that approach. And then, you know, a month later, two months later, I start seeing results. And I reach back out, hey, remember that advice you gave me? It's panning out quite well. I appreciate it. And they're like, oh, awesome. You know, so great to hear. If you need more advice, you know, I'm around. So it's like that. Once you see these things, it's not rocket science.

[14:24] But a lot of people don't think about it that way. So it's really about these little things. And then over time, people start trusting you. They see that. You're listening, you know, like you're making good use of their time. And then they're willing to give you more time. And, you know, and over time, what happens is they go from mentors to friends, you know, now Bengali is really a close friend of mine, you know, and I have others, you know, Lawrence Scripture was head of products at Pinterest, you know, and others like that. And it all started the same way. It was very like.

[14:56] Um, professional relationship but you know where i make things very easy for them and over time it becomes a friendship especially if they see that you're actually giving back too and mentoring others so that they're through you, they're having a much bigger impact. - I like that point about thinking about the mentor as well. Why would they spend time with you and how you can keep them in the loop to make, to show them that their impact is meaningful and that thanks to their advice, they're also making progress.

[15:27] And you mentioned that now you are also mentoring others. And I know that you co-founded the Black Product Managers community, for example. So how are you thinking about now helping the next generation of product leaders? yeah it's something i i'm passionate about it's a field that's unfortunately quite hard to get into and and also not diverse at all. And that's why I co-founded Black PM, so that we could have more representation in the industry. So I think about it in two ways. One is the.

[16:00] the things that i do that i'm trying to scale so it's like you know starting new organizations making sure you get a good team like black pms and then thinking about like what are our okrs How do we make a dent in the industry? So I'm on the board of Black PMs, also on the board of another nonprofit called CodePath. And CodePath, which I also co-founded a few years ago, is focused more on the software engineering industry. and we're helping college students, you know from underrepresented background, become software engineers because college CS education is broken.

[16:35] So we're really filling that gap. And then the other thing beyond that sort of skilled approach, like, you know, helping the right organizations, have impact is more like an individual approach, you know. where within Black PNs, but also just in general in the industry, like, you know, when people reach out, you know, I try, you know, to have even if it's a quick email, like some guidance, et cetera. And then, as I see people were more vested, invested and, you know, whom I can have impact through, I spend more time with them. So it's actually one of the fun parts for me where, you know almost every week you know now I'm starting to see people like oh you know like actually yesterday and today two people reach out and they were like "Hey, guess what? I just got a job as a PM at Google, or I got a job at this other company.

[17:20] And I'm now, you know, figuring out the next step. I'm so excited. These are life-changing things for folks. And to the extent I can play a little part in it, yeah, why not? It's addictive and I'm so glad to hear that and also that That was you one day, back in the day, asking for help, and now you're also providing that help. Ultimately, I think it's also rewarding. And what you are doing right now, putting yourself out there, sharing your story, I think it's also very inspiring for a lot of hungry PMs who are thinking about how to grow their careers.

[17:52] But I want to now go back to your own career because we talk a lot about how to break into product, how to grow into a product leadership role. and and then what what is what are the options for a product leader in order to continue moving on Yeah, um... There are many options and part of it is, The PM function really helps you develop a lot of core skills. that can be useful in various contexts, right? whether it's leadership communication, product sense, execution, et cetera.

[18:27] So I've seen people take many paths. I've seen PMs decide, hey, I want to go in venture because, I can help founders think through their product. think through your strategy, et cetera. I've seen people decide, hey, I want to continue on the product strategy. Ladder where a I want to become a VP or product maybe smaller company. Maybe I want to stay big. I've seen people you know, go on the management track, which is very common, especially as you get more senior. But now a lot more companies are creating paths where you can be an IC but senior.

[18:59] you know because of you i want to i just want to focus on the product you know so there's a lot of optionality in the space, obviously a number of PMs have become founders you know i've seen even like at youtube some of my peers you know were left and founded companies you know which is great too because then you can invest um so yeah so it's a lot of uh paths and it's a lot of really core skills that can help uh that you can use to add value to companies. i'm biased but i agree completely and we actually had on this podcast a former vp of product at youtube shishir who's now a ceo at coda Yeah, we brought him to a Black PM. I brought him to a Black PM event recently and he had really great advice. Yeah.

[19:45] Cool. So, um, As you think about your, you know, what are you curious about learning these days and how do you make sure that you are also investing in yourself and not just only helping others or building or working on your full time job? Yeah. One of the challenges of our jobs is that we're in a sector, and it's an opportunity too, we're in a sector that's moving constantly. You know, so you can't just like, learn and then think like, oh, I'm good, you know, then I stay there, right? Like you have to always be at the edge of things, right?

[20:18] So in terms of where I'm focusing right now, One is I've become curious about Web 3.0. and starting to learn more about what that means. I think a lot of people are still figuring out what the implications are, but I've been talking to folks will have a perspective, you know, reading about it and so on. And the other thing is, as I continue my journey around, you know, being a better leader, I've been reading a lot about psychology, emotional intelligence, you know, um, learning about myself through coaching and leadership programs, et cetera.

[20:55] So these are the two areas, WebView.0 and then learning about, you know, influencing psychology and all these sub skills that I mentioned earlier. Every time I ask a product person about what they're curious about learning, they always come up with a lot of things. And some of them are really to work, some of them are not. But somehow you end up connecting the dots. And I'm sure some of the psychology things that you are learning, some of the Web 3.0 things that you are learning, somehow will make sense at some point in the future.

[21:27] Yeah, I mean, I couldn't have predicted I would be where I'm at today, you know, in terms of industry or even location. So I think keeping a curious mind is definitely fundamental and foundational to what we're doing here, um yeah, you can't always predict how they will connect. but, yes, i i, do believe that things end up connecting. eventually So Jules, if you were to look back at your younger self and try to... give some advice about, you know, how you get, how you could get to where you are, but maybe a little bit faster.

[22:02] you Yeah, I, uh... Yeah, it's a great question, actually. When I look back at what made the biggest difference for me, It was other people. You know, I was really getting help from folks were slightly ahead or significantly ahead. Um, in terms of where I wanted to be and then trusting that advice. So the biggest thing I I would tell myself and I also tell folks is, Think about what you want to accomplish.

[22:37] find somebody or in fact many people who've accomplished a version of it successfully. and then ask them for advice. Now, the challenge is, a lot of the time the advice we get is not something we even would expect. you know and and various people are not necessarily always really open to the advice you know and here's an example A lot of folks, you know, come to me and they're like, hey, I want to be a PM.

[23:08] Oh, and I want to go to Harvard Business School or Stanford Graduate School of Business, et cetera, you know, and and in many cases that is like actually a good thing to do. In some cases, depending on what you're trying to achieve, you know business school may or may not be the best route um Or they want to go to a particular size of company, You know, so... I think for me, what has helped me, and I would have told myself earlier, is like find the people who've done it.

[23:39] and then you know ask for advice be open to advice that may not be what you would expect. Keep her curious mind. Um. Yeah, and then surround yourself with great people. That's what actually has made the biggest impact for me. That resonates with me a lot. I'm also an immigrant and had to call email a lot of people and And it's kind of a numbers game, but I was able to find a few folks that trusted me. And I also had to trust them because some of their advice were counterintuitive to what I thought. Right. And there's no substitution to putting the work. But I think that having people, at least a perspective from someone who is not biased and has had, as you said, a part of the success that you are trying to achieve, is a good data point.

[24:32] Yeah, totally. And by the way, of course, ultimately, you have to make your own decision because. people can give you sort of like the their point of view, they can give you factors to think about. but what you want is different from what they want, you know, your values or preferences. So you have to make the call. But what I really meant is more like, listen and really try to understand that perspective. even if it's very different. Well, thank you so much for your time. It's been a pleasure again to learn from you. Yeah, thanks so much, Carlos. It's always great to be chatting with you and thank you, everyone.

[25:07] Cheers.