Adriel Frederick
VP of Product at Reddit
VP of Product at Reddit leading new product incubation, former Director of Product at Lyft leading marketplace and pricing teams, and an early PM at Facebook where he was the first Black product manager and led user acquisition.
Dimension Profile
Key Themes
Episode Summary
Adriel Frederick discusses the PM's critical role in algorithmic product management, drawing from his experience building Facebook's growth team and Lyft's marketplace pricing. He shares powerful insights on how diversity drives better global product design, how to set up R&D teams that avoid organizational rejection, and how to lead product teams through company controversy by staying deeply connected to users.
Leadership Principles
- → When working on algorithmic products, the PM's job is deciding what the algorithm should own versus what people should own
- → Diverse teams build better global products because they reduce the need for external user research
- → As a PM leader, provide a buffering effect — pull the team down when overhyped, pull them up when demoralized
Notable Quotes
"The algorithms don't understand long term effects often, nor do they understand how people might respond to it, nor do they understand your intent for the product. That is our job as product managers."
— On the PM role in algorithmic product design, pushing back on 'techno utopians'
"I was the first Black product manager at Facebook... one phone number plus one device does not equal one person. Growing up in Trinidad, I just knew that wasn't true."
— On how diverse backgrounds directly improve product design for global users
"The rest of the company needs to see what you're doing as being core and critical to the mission. It can't seem like these guys are just playing off in a corner."
— On preventing organ rejection of R&D teams within larger organizations
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