Lane Shackleton
Chief Product Officer at Coda
Lane Shackleton is CPO at Coda, where he has led the product team for over eight years, previously serving as Group PM at YouTube and starting his career as an Alaskan mountain guide.
Dimension Profile
Key Themes
Episode Summary
Lane Shackleton shares his principles for great product management, centered on the idea that a PM's core job is turning ambiguity into clarity. He discusses Coda's unique approach to career levels, the importance of systems over goals, and how default-on customer engagement builds better product instincts than one-off research sprints.
Leadership Principles
- → The core job of a product person is to turn ambiguity into clarity
- → Be obsessed with the system that gets you to the goal, not the goal itself
- → Default-on customer engagement beats one-off research goals
Notable Quotes
"Moments that stretch you or moments that you feel uncomfortable in or you find yourself saying, 'Oh shit. I shouldn't be here,' those are the moments you should be seeking out."
— On how to measure career growth by counting stretch moments rather than asking vague questions about development
"The core job of a product person in general is to turn ambiguity into clarity."
— Describing his unifying thesis for what makes great product managers
"Goals with good intentions don't work. Instead of being obsessed with the goal, be obsessed with the system that gets you there."
— Explaining his 'systems not goals' principle, inspired by Jerry Seinfeld's practice of writing daily
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