A Product Leader’s Perspective on Relocating to Canada
Here’s a unique perspective and advice from VP Product, Jay Judkowitz on relocating to Canada.
Our Product Practice Lead, Heidi Ram, sat down with Jay Judkowitz, VP of Product at Otto Motors, to discuss relocation to Canada from the point of view of an American.
Otto Motors is a tech startup that builds self-driving robots for material handling in warehouses, distribution centers, and factories. As Jay describes it, “basically think of Waymo cars, they drive on the street on their own; our cars do that, but indoors. They do it to move things from one point to another to increase automation and manufacturing, and make supply chains more affordable in high labour countries.”
Here is Jay’s relocation journey and advice for fellow Americans looking to make the leap to the great white north.
What prompted you to start thinking about coming to Canada?
Honestly, it was the quality of life for my family. There are differences between the US and Canada; certainly legal differences, but also social construct and social safety net differences, human rights differences, the pace of life, and attitudes towards vacation.
There are a lot of different things that make it more pleasant to live here. For my family (I have two children), I felt like many of the Canadian differences I referred to provide a better starting point if you are young and inexperienced.
Even the idea of relocating can feel like a daunting process — how did you make the transition?
It helps if you’re working for a multinational. At the time, I was working for Google — I had been there four years in the Mountain View office, and Google facilitated that move. I applied for a lateral transfer into the Kitchener office, and the Google legal team did all the paperwork. I then worked in the Google Kitchener office for two and a half years before joining Otto Motors.
What differences have you noticed between the Product Management communities?
In Canada, people are still trying to figure out Product Management because the Canadian tech scene is newer and because product management is one of the last things to evolve. So you’ll see people transitioning product management by necessity. A company will need somebody to fill that gap, but they’re not always able to hire someone who’s been doing it for ten years like you would be able to find in Silicon Valley.
So in Canada, you’ve got many people sort of feeling it out. It is more of a tight-knit community — there are a lot of support groups, Slack channels, and stuff like that, so you’ll see the ecosystem trying to bootstrap itself and everybody helping each other figure it out. In Canada, you can be within a couple of degrees of separation from almost any PM in the area. Whereas, in the valley, it’s not like that at all.
What advice do you have for American PMs thinking about moving to Canada?
There are certain decisions in your life you can never really be prepared for, like being a first-time parent or moving to a new country. Of course, you’re not ready and you have no idea what you’re about to get into, but you can’t wait for every single question to be answered before a major life change — if you did, you’d never do it.
So you have to say to yourself, what are the P-0 requirements? What are the P-1 requirements? What are the P-2 requirements? What are the things that make me happy? What are the things that make my family happy? Get enough of the P0s answered, then take a risk on the rest. You can always move back if maybe the things that you thought were P2 were really P0 for you.
It’s just about ruthless prioritization of your own happiness, so figure out what matters to you, and if Canada checks those boxes, then don’t wait; just go do it.
What is your advice for Canadians looking to move to the US?
For those at Fortune100 or FAANG companies, they have the benefit of being international. Sometimes there is no substitute for working at headquarters, and if that’s what you want to do, if that’s your idea of adventure, my advice is to do it while you’re young and mobile.
There are a lot of wonderful things about the US and Silicon Valley. There are also lots of wonderful things about American companies. So try it out, but also think about the long term.
Look beyond the immediate things like salary — measure the total cost:
- Taxes
- Cost of living
- Cost of housing
- Cost of health care
- What happens if there’s an economic downturn and you’re unemployed — what are the different safety structures?
- If you have kids, what is the cost of education?
It’s all about risk tolerance and risk management. If everything’s going well, you can expect this, but if everything is going badly, where do you have the better prospects of getting back on your feet?
As an American living in Canada, Jay has been able to experience the product management world from both sides of the border — both countries’ pros and cons.
He closed up the conversation by mentioning that he’d be more than happy to share further insights on his relocation journey with any Americans considering a move to Canada — feel free to connect with him on LinkedIn.
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