A Product Chat with Yoco’s Karthik Rajeswaran
Key takeaway: Great Product Managers know to think like a user, a business owner, and an investor all at once.
Welcome to PM Nation (PMNation.co), an interview series where we shine a spotlight on personalities behind great products, learn more about how they got into product management, and provide insider perspectives into how the craft of Product is evolving. To learn more about why this got started, click here.
For the benefit of our readers, could you tell me a little bit about yourself and what you do as a Product Manager (PM)?
I’m Karthik — currently live in Cape Town and had chapters in my life as a professional cricketer, and a professional music producer.
I’m currently a professional product manager, most recently working at a startup called ‘Over’ which is focused on empowering visual content creation. My next role will be at Yoco, who are building the leading financial platform for small businesses in Africa.
As a PM, I inform our product strategy and turn that into actionable steps by weighing up customer needs, business value and technical feasibility.
So how did you land up in product management?
Whilst I studied computer engineering, I wasn’t interested in being the best engineer per se. I was more interested in using software and technology as leverage, to build great products and businesses. As such, I tried to get involved in any customer facing projects that required a combination of technical knowledge, data analysis and product design. I first made the transition from being a software developer to a business analyst, and then into product management.
Why is it so hard to get into product management these days?
It’s a role that requires a high degree of curiosity, capability, confidence and humility. That’s not easy to come by or cultivate, but it is essential to the role. Additionally, these qualities are highly sought after because of the visibility and multi-disciplinary nature of the Product role. So both the level of competition, and barriers to entry, are very high.
“ When it’s a good fit, being a PM just feels like an extension of who I am and what I enjoy doing.”
For those interested in a career in PM — what kinds of experiences should they seek out?
At a most basic level, being able to think of things you interact with on a daily basis as products, whether it’s the delivery service you use or the phone you buy, forces you to understand what went into its creation and whether it actually works for its audience.
Beyond that, I think that building something yourself is an invaluable experience. Whether it’s a technology product or something entirely unrelated, going through the lifecycle from idea to launch to user feedback is crucial to know what that process entails, and also gives you something to showcase to others.
As a PM, what do you do exactly on a day-to-day basis?
It varies greatly depending on the needs of the time, but the major activities are:
- Aligning the team’s delivery to our objectives, and ensuring we’re tracking to our roadmap.
- Scouring the VC and investor landscape, to understand what ideas are being invested in as well. Also keeping an eye on what market leaders and competitors are releasing.
- Communicating with other PMs and key stakeholders to gather and share context.
- Speaking with customers, and analyzing feedback to pull out their pain points and moments of delight.
What do you love about being a PM? What do you wish you could change?
- Love: The multi-disciplinary nature of the role. When it’s a good fit, being a PM just feels like an extension of who I am and what I enjoy doing.
- Change: Drastic changes in priority, shifting away from the core focus and long-term value creation for customers.
“As a PM…you need to be a great facilitator and bring people together to produce the best outcomes.”
So what’s one common myth about being a PM?
That your role is to come up with great ideas. As a PM, in reality, you need to be a great facilitator and bring people together to produce the best outcomes.
What is the difference between product management and project management?
Product Management is about synthesizing a variety of inputs (user understanding, internal ideas, industry evolution) to create value for your customers and thus, your business.
Project Management is about taking an idea or an initiative and ensuring it is delivered in a timely, high-quality manner, with an emphasis on organization and communication.
So Project Management is a subset of Product Management, and I think it works best when the bulk of the Project Management is handled by a dedicated person or specialist within the team.
How do you develop a vision for a product?
That’s a tricky one. I think it’s crucial that there be a compelling company vision, which translates into a clear company mission. This allows for a product vision and strategy to be developed which will facilitate delivering the company mission.
“A lot of product problems are really prioritization problems. And one of the toughest prioritization challenges is knowing when to stop or kill an initiative.”
What skillsets are essential to being a PM? What skills will PMs need in 5 years?
- Clear communication
- Strategic thinking & problem solving
- Business acumen
- Humour and empathy
- Storytelling — knowing how to craft a narrative
As for what’s needed in 5 years: specific skills will vary by industry, but a clear one is that PMs will be need to be more quantitatively minded, and be able to process and analyze data more autonomously.
What’s the most important quality a PM should have (or develop)?
Clear communication. This is going to be even more important as we work more asynchronously and remotely.
One of my great strengths is my verbal communication, but that’s meant my written communication has lagged behind and is an area I need to work on. So this one is as much a self-reminder as it is for other PMs.
“…ask yourself whether you’d invest your own money into the company or the product. The answer to that will reveal a lot about how you really feel about an opportunity.”
What’s the toughest product problem you’ve ever solved?
A lot of product problems are really prioritization problems. And one of the toughest prioritization challenges is knowing when to stop or kill an initiative.
Without giving too much away, a product that my team and I spent the best part of a year building was recently deprecated. Despite rapid early traction, generating significant revenue for the company and high retention, it no longer aligned with the broader product strategy. From being a major focus, it had become a distraction.
The solution involved making the product free and repositioning it as an onboarding channel, instead of as a paywalled feature.
What’s the best way to shine in a PM interview?
Being able to explain the ‘Why’ behind your thinking. It’s not too dissimilar to a case interview, where you’d be expected to show logical thinking to get to an answer.
Additionally with Product interviews, it helps to showcase that you’ve researched the product, how you think it can be improved, and any other ideas you may have of your own.
How do you figure out if you’re the right fit for a prospective PM role?
This is a great question, and becomes increasingly important the further along you progress in your career. You need to be able to deeply resonate with the company’s mission as well as the product itself. Hopefully you enjoy using it, find it valuable and would happily recommend it to people you know.
Additionally, get to know the people and culture. Understand who the leaders are, their motivations and whether you could see yourself working closely with them.
Finally, and this is a more general question, ask yourself whether you’d invest your own money into the company or the product. The answer to that will reveal a lot about how you really feel about an opportunity.
It’s time for the Lightning Round! What’s a good book, movie, TV series or video game you’d recommend right now?
- Book — Antifragile by Nassim Taleb
- Music — Time by S.G. Lewis
- Movie — The Irishman by Martin Scorsese
- Series — The Office (became a lockdown favourite of mine)
Favourite place for a coffee chat?
Cushty — a quaint neighbourhood here in Cape Town.
Favourite dish to pick up after a long day?
Any meal from Giovanni’s — a nearby Italian Deli.
Where do you dream of traveling to next?
Patagonia.
What’s your hidden talent?
Producing music.
I’ve been a music producer and sound engineer for over a decade. It’s the perfect combination of my passion for creative expression, and background in electrical and computer engineering. Creating digital sounds from scratch, composing songs and releasing them over the internet seemed like a natural way to create music in today’s world. I’d love to compose films scores and more ambient music in the future.
Listen to some of my compositions here: https://soundcloud.com/theomegaman
If you ever decided to get a tattoo of a brand or a logo, which one would it be, and why?
Haha — that would probably be the symbol I created for my music alias.
Karthik, good catching up!
Thanks, any time!
For the rest of our conversations with Product minds from around the world, visit PM Nation.
