Deep diving into Pipedrive’s PM community: 4 unique stories from 4 different perspectives | Part 2
Pipedrive’s product managers (PM) community is like a joint safety net for the whole team of PMs: no matter your background, professional experience, tenure, or even physical location, the community is there to support you when you need it most. But people are different, and so are their experiences. Is it possible that the community means different things for different people? Here are 4 community stories from 4 different perspectives.
To keep in touch with each other, learn, share experiences and stay aligned, Pipedrive offers a community with a dedicated guildmaster and rituals. As a reminder, you can read the first part of the story here.
As a set of unique initiatives, the community serves as an endless source of inspiration and information. Still, there are some principles that outline its essence:
- It is not only about initiatives and ceremonies
- This is the virtual space where you can learn, discuss and help each other
- There are no stupid questions
- People “vote” for the existence of the community by investing their time and involvement
- Members build the community; It isn’t built for them
- PMs are agile and lean
- Give and ask for feedback, be open to discussion
- Allow privacy and safety when needed
Despite serving as a unique mindset for the whole product organization, contribution to the development of the community is individual, and so is the expected impact. Janis Rozenblats, Vincent Jyrwa, Seda Sahradyan and Almonzer Eskandar share their experience and perspective on this topic.
Change is only natural
Sometimes it is difficult for individuals on different levels of the organization to be on the same page, especially for bigger companies and teams. Collaboration is not just about product vision but its direction, reasoning and experiences throughout the journey. It’s also more than a theoretical approach and serves as a way of thinking about your work in a creative way. Sometimes, it means that the PM community is constantly changing and adapting to the specific needs of its members.
“At some point, we felt that the product strategy roundtable discussion wasn’t as inclusive as it could be. Then, we created the 2–4–8 approach, which meant thinking about a problem or an idea for 2 minutes on your own, then discussing it with another person for 4 minutes and, finally, dedicating 8 minutes for a 4 person group discussion before sharing the highlights with the whole group openly. One thing is to have a product vision, but through discussions, we talk about how we are going to accomplish it. As the outputs and decisions are always documented, this initiative serves as a trigger for creating a plan with follow-up actions. Personally, the most tangible part of the result is even bigger than that: there is transparency, trust, respect, the feeling of being heard and getting support in solving a challenge if needed,” recalls Janis Rozenblats, VP of Product at Pipedrive and one of the main leads behind roundtables last year.
Shaped by the specific needs of its members, the natural evolution of the community develops its structure and content.
Sharing failures is liberating
Senior product manager Vince Jyrwa was the first presenter at PM F-ups. The number of PMs has grown over the past few years across locations: in Tallinn, Tartu, Riga, Prague, Lisbon and London. Consequently, F-ups’ main goal is to bring the PM community closer and normalize flops, as long as they serve as means to a learning experience that could help participants overcome similar obstacles. And in the long run, sharing stories between community members helps them avoid repeating mistakes that someone else has already made. Indeed, the concept comprises voluntary self-roasting, but in a humorous way. As a bonus, the audience’s questions help explore new aspects of what went wrong in the given situation.
“It is so liberating when you share something that went wrong, but at the same time, your peer PMs empathize with you by sharing similar stories from their own experiences. Two years ago, I underestimated the impact of a change in a feature for Pipedrive users, and I decided to roll it out to customer segments. We received negative feedback, and I learned how important it is to emphasize user testing, no matter how small or big the change. This learning is precious for other PMs as well, and we’ve come a long way since then as we have created better processes for gradual rollouts,” tells Vince about his experience at the first F-up session.
Ideally, a F-up session would be set somewhere with an open and informal atmosphere, but these days and much like similar gatherings, it’s held online. The speaker has 15 minutes to share their story and then reply to questions from the audience. Taking the stand is always voluntary, but sometimes PMs nudge one another if they realize that someone has an interesting experience in a specific product area.
PM guildmaster connects all the dots
Even though the community is roughly based on self-commitment, the PM guildmaster represents it, and his role is to connect all the dots. The role is rotational and changes every 3 months, during which the guildmaster hosts PM-led ceremonies, collects feedback and keeps the vibe to help all PMs thrive. In other words, it is a way of demonstrating seniorship by giving back the knowledge and helping team members become better.
Group product manager Almonzer Eskandar, or Monzer, as his colleagues call him affectionately, held this role during the autumn months of 2021. He argues being a guildmaster gives a team member the opportunity to give back to the community while allowing them to gain experience managing a space filled with brilliant minds and personalities.
“I took the role at a time when Pipedrive had increased its product managers counts. As there were few chances for people to really meet and get to know each other, I decided to organize an offsite. Later that year, I realized that it had a tremendous impact on the product managers. Getting to know each other in person helped us get on the same page when we started working together on the 2022 product roadmap. The communication and collaboration between us were smoother and impactful,” recalls Monzer.
Seda Sahradyan, a group product manager who took over as the guildmaster following Monzer, shares the recollection of the offsite’s impact. “This particular offsite is one of my favorite PM community memories. For the first time and after working at Pipedrive for 4,5 years, I saw product managers from all offices gathered together to simply have fun. It was great to see people connecting with each other and remind one another that we all share the same goal,” shares Seda.
Thriving together with your colleagues
No matter if you are a starting product manager or an experienced one, Pipedrive’s PM community helps unite PMs across the company. “I believe that the idea of having a community within a company is so unique. It’s too easy to fall into silos or get distracted from what is going on anywhere besides your area of expertise, but the community helps unite people across the company and inspires them to help each other, share knowledge and connect on a personal level,” tells Seda.
So what’s the real meaning of the community? Everything and anything that people belonging to this special group allows themselves to experience. But one thing is for sure: Pipedrive’s PM community helps thrive on a professional and personal level together with your colleagues.
Missed Part 1? Read it here.
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