MENA PMs #4: From Boeing To Chief Product Officer of RAI Digital, Lessons Through Global Product Lens | Tony Pagliocco

Our fourth guest of the Product@MENA series is Tony Pagliocco. Tony is an executive/director-caliber product management leader and coach with 20 years of experience leading product management and development and supporting the implementation of innovative products. Tony also is one of the most influential product leaders in the MENA region who supports different product communities. That said, let me give the floor to Tony to introduce himself.

Part 1: All About Tony’s Story

Shehab: Who is Tony?

Tony: When I think about who I am as a product management professional, I see myself as someone who has spent over two decades developing a deep understanding of what it takes to deliver value through innovative products and platforms. My experience spans multiple industries, including media, aviation, gaming, and professional services, and I have worked for global companies such as Boeing and Hasbro working with some of the smartest people working to solve challenges that span the globe.

Throughout my career, I have been driven by my passion for problem-solving. I love taking a complex challenge and breaking it down into manageable pieces, developing a strategy to address each piece, and bringing it all together into a cohesive solution that delivers value to the customer. I have developed a reputation as an evangelist of the product management function and how it can be maximized in the delivery lifecycle to deliver the most impact, but then again, it could just be because I’m a lifelong gamer, even to this day (note: nowadays its chess but previously World of Warcraft, and Magic the Gathering lol).

One of the things I believe sets me apart as a product management professional is my ability to lead large teams to massive success within a company yet, grow their career paths simultaneously. I lead with a servant leadership mentality, where I still get my hands dirty, find opportunities to grow my teams' skills, and work collaboratively always to try and use these opportunities to enrich each other. I believe in empowering teams to work collaboratively, effectively, and with agility because, to me being agile is not just standup and a Jira board, but instead, its a lifestyle, a culture, where you and your team control the destination, a dangerous two-edged sword heh. I hate when I lose a colleague I’ve mentored, but I love it when they take that next big, challenging step in their career.

This question is funny because it’s weird thinking of yourself in the third person, but if I had to really let people know who I am, I might as well bare it all. In a nutshell, I’m competitive, I love to win, I hate to lose, I love being the underdog, and I love to overperform when people say it can't be done. I love to deliver experiences through my products because digital products are MY art; maybe I can't design or paint a picture, but art is about the beauty, the simplicity, and the passion that goes into and that's why I love building products that solve problems and make peoples lives just a little bit better.

—

Shehab: What is your superpower? And How did you gain it?

Tony: If I had to describe my “superpower” as a product management leader, it would be my ability to see the big picture while also paying attention to the smallest details. This has enabled me to develop effective product strategies that are both comprehensive and highly focused on the customer.

I probably gained this “superpower” through years of experience working in so many different industries and being able to learn and understand different perspectives. I’d like to think by now. I’ve learned to balance the needs of the customer with the goals of the business but in a way that is different from everyone else.

One of the key things that have helped me polish this superpower is my ability to facilitate, to know when to barter, to negotiate, and when to call in favors. I don't think you’d read that in any product manager handbook, but in reality, you have to not only know how to play the hand that you’re dealt but also how to win with that hand, and I think that’s what is my differentiator of the value proposition that you get with me.

—

Shehab: Let’s go back to the start. Tell us a bit about what you studied and where your career journey began.

Tony: My career path could be compared to driving on a long road trip that had some amazing attractions, twists, and turns along the way. As someone who started out as an engineer, I saw my career as being a creator, a digital chef, you may say. I always would look to write the best code and, in essence, deliver a great meal.

However, as time went on, I saw my role change through the companies I was in. I went from cooking the food to writing the menu, deciding the specials, and finding out what type of lettuce to use in the salad (metaphorically speaking, of course). I went from building the enabler of the experience to building the end-to-end experience that our users would embark on. During this time, I was blessed to have amazing mentors who were not only razor-sharp but also extremely patient and helped teach me about the importance of empathy.

Throughout my career, I’ve worked in media, market research, gaming, aerospace, and consulting, which is unique nowadays to see someone not pigeon-holed into one domain, but the beautiful part of it is, no matter the industry, the goal never changed, which was to identify the user, learn what makes them happy, and deliver a product that will delight them and make their life better somehow. I’ve delivered projects to 30 and 30,000,000 users, and I put the same amount of passion and attention into them the same.

However, before I get off topic, I attended Arizona State University with the intention of majoring in physical education, so I could fulfill my dream of being a wrestling coach. However, during one spring break, while most of my friends went away, I stayed back on campus and discovered the internet, which was just starting to become popular.

As I started exploring the world of the internet, I became fascinated by web development and the opportunities it presented. By the fall semester, I had switched my major to computer science and began exploring the emerging field of web development.

During my junior and senior years of University, I spent a lot of my time hustling website development deals for various organizations on campus, gaining valuable experience and sales skills lol. This experience allowed me to land my first job out of college with the Astrophysics department at Arizona State, working as a sysadmin and web programmer for the space telescope team, and from there it went on a crazy, turbulent ride that I am thankful for to this day.

Thank heavens I didn't go to Mexico on Spring Break, right?

—

Shehab: Which part of being a Chief Product Officer is the most challenging for you?

Tony: As someone who has spent many years in product management, I have had the opportunity to work in a variety of roles, including most recently as Chief Product Officer (CPO) at RAI Digital. While I enjoy the many challenges that come with this role, I would say that the most challenging part for me is balancing the needs of the customer with the goals of the business. In my role, it is my responsibility to develop product strategies that deliver value to the customer while also driving growth and profitability for the business.

It’s not easy, but one of the ways that I address this challenge is by keeping a close eye on market trends and customer feedback. I am always listening to what our customers are saying and looking for ways to incorporate their feedback into our product strategy. Lucky for us, we have a time when we have so many tools that provide valuable analytics and data to help drive quick decisions. It allows for hyper-experimentation and the ability to hypothesize new strategies rapidly.

Now some of you may think that sounds like mumbo jumbo or a ton of buzzwords put together, and you may be right, but ultimately when you look at it….data is the lifeblood that powers many decisions across numerous verticals. When you can create an environment where you’re not “doing agile” but instead “being agile” or an environment where your opinion is respected, politics are put aside, and you’re moving in cadence together as a team, that’s what I love.

I’ve interviewed countless people in my time, and I’ve always said, I can teach Python, I can't teach attitude, I can teach Jira, but I can't teach passion. Give me someone hungry, determined, and who wants to go above and beyond to get their foot in the door, and I’ll give that a ton more credit than a fancy, puffed-up resume.

Part 2: Managing Product Teams Effectively

Shehab: I know RAI Digital is a hot company in the region right now. Tell us more about it. What problems do you solve? And what products are you building?

Tony: Well, thank you for those kind words, and you are right. RAI Digital is a hot company in MENA right now, but it comes off the work of one of the most skilled and unique teams I’ve ever been a part of.

RAI’s focus has always been on providing companies with the way to unlock their digital transformation and product capabilities, but in a way that falls outside traditional methods. We’ve married the best in strategy, innovation, product, and design to really build an engine that doesn’t just “build products” or “deliver powerpoints,” but in reality, this engine helps redefine the modern-day digital experience.

What kind of problems do we solve? We solve the problems that others don’t want to, and we accept that challenge wholeheartedly because we put skin in the game, we put quality before pride, and that's how we have built a portfolio of products spanning analytics, marketing, supply chain, and most recently, logistics.

Just this year, Infinite pl, a new Joint Venture between RAI Digital and Saudi Post Logistics, was created to disrupt logistics globally with the end goal of enriching the experiences of government, businesses, and residents through innovative and digital solutions. Now that sounds fancy, but at its core, it means that through this JV, we have an opportunity to reimagine what logistics look like globally. Built on top of a hungry team that is energized by having this canvas to work with, it’s truly a unique and powerful venture that I am confident is going to build amazing products and ventures while simultaneously setting a new bar for not only MENA but globally.

—

Shehab: How many product teams do you have? Do you structure your product teams around products, user types, user journeys, outcomes, or something in between?

Tony: So we average between 3–5 different teams going at any one time, working on a variety of different initiatives within RAI. Each product is different, which means we handle each team differently. It would not make sense to do it in such a way that limited our ability to be agile in changing conditions. You can be a digital factory without actually acting LIKE a factory.

With our unique dynamics and team structure, we were able to harness the best of many industries and experiences to develop a framework and methodology that is unique to Infinite pl, but also provides us with a toolbox of different artifacts that allow our team leads to be empowered, creative, and efficient.

We have our teams focused around key areas such as strategy, venture building, product delivery, go-to-market, and a few other areas that are part of our secret sauce that makes our team awesome.

—

Shehab: How do you think departmental silos affect your product teams? In what ways do you build and maintain relationships with stakeholders from different teams?

Tony: Personally, I dislike silos because they restrict transparency and overall planning of the bigger business needs. I’ve worked in silos before, and while it’s great inside your bubble, there’s a whole lot going on around your team, and if you’re not aware, you’re missing out, and that’s never a good thing.

Now you can have what I call soft silos, where your product teams are maybe grouped by a common technology, product line, or portfolio, and I feel those are not as dangerous, but they have definite chances of pitfalls if you’re not aware of your surroundings. When you work as a team, you have to be a team end to end, not just within one part of the bigger organization.

When building relationships across teams with stakeholders, I have my own approach, which is always to show that you are not afraid to get your hands dirty, provide exceptional customer service, and always keep them up to date with the latest developments. While it sounds like a lot, using various automation tools and other apps can help accelerate these actions for many stakeholders in a shorter amount of time.

Part 3: Strategy Talk

Shehab: How do you align your user needs with the company’s vision and your product strategy?

Tony: To ensure we align user needs with the company’s vision, we take a user-centric approach to product development. We start by conducting DEEP user research and understanding the pain points, goals, and behaviors of our target users. We then use this data to inform our product vision and strategy, making sure that they align with the user needs we have identified and also with what the competition is doing. The last thing we want is another “me too” product. We have to have a differentiator that REALLY pushes us over the top.

We also involve our users throughout the product development lifecycle, gathering feedback and iterating on our solutions. Using this process, we can ensure that our products are solving the right challenges but also providing the innovation that will not only meet our product strategy but exceed it. I don’t care for just meeting the bare minimum; I always want a high score.

In terms of our product strategy, we make sure to prioritize features and functionality that directly address the user needs we have identified and not features that are requested and are not supported by data. This helps our teams to create products that are not only aligned with our company’s vision but also valuable to our users.

Overall, as a team, we feel that aligning user needs with our company’s vision and product strategy is essential for creating successful digital products, and we make sure to keep this in view not only at the beginning, not only at delivery but all the way through the maturing process. Launching a product is like being a parent, and you raise them from being totally dependent on you to eventually becoming mature and being an independent and productive piece of the bigger world around you.

—

Shehab: How do you align your team on the strategy and the vision? How do you make sure that everyone feels heard?

Tony: This can be fun but very challenging. However, that being said, we first ensure that everyone has a clear understanding of the company’s vision and how the product strategy supports that vision. We make sure to communicate this information regularly and consistently to the team so everyone is on the same page. We use tools like Miro, JIRA, Teams, and such to keep these communications accessible and transparent at any moment.

I personally encourage open and transparent communication within the team, creating an environment where everyone feels comfortable sharing their thoughts and ideas. This allows us to have productive discussions about the product strategy and vision, where everyone’s input is valued and heard even if we’re not on the same page, it helps to have that discourse.

To ensure that everyone feels heard, we actively solicit feedback from the team on a regular basis. This can be done through team meetings, one-on-one conversations, or surveys. We make sure to consider all feedback carefully and incorporate it where possible into the product strategy and vision. Just as important, we track that data or feedback to ensure it gets actioned or at least monitored to be improved.

In my teams, it’s not about your title or where you have worked; it’s about what you can contribute. Some things may work, and some may not, but everyone on my team has an open season to share their views, thoughts, and ideas because it’s the only way we can grow together as one team and conquer bigger challenges together.

—

Shehab: How do you set the strategic priorities for your product teams?

Tony: When you are setting strategic priorities across a number of teams, you have first to be defining or absorbing the overall business objectives and goals. We then break these down into specific product objectives and goals that align with our overall strategy. Take something big, break it down, and then identify how and when it gets done.

Next, we conduct a thorough analysis of the market and our users to identify the most significant opportunities and pain points. Based on this analysis, we prioritize our product initiatives and features according to their potential impact on our users and business goals.

Now, in order to prioritize these initiatives, we use data-driven decision-making, such as user testing and analytics, to assess the feasibility and potential impact of each initiative. We also consider factors such as resource availability and timelines to determine which initiatives to prioritize.

After that, we then work collaboratively with our product, strategy, and development teams to define specific goals and deliverables for each initiative and communicate the priorities clearly to ensure that everyone is aligned and working towards the same objectives.

Throughout the product development process, we continuously assess our priorities and adjust as needed based on user feedback, market changes, and other factors that may impact our goals. Being nimble and agile in this process is a must. It’s non-negotiable.

—

Shehab: It is crucial for product managers to focus on strategic thinking. Is there anything you are doing to improve it, and if so, how?

Tony: I agree 100%. Strategic thinking is a critical skill for product managers, and in our team, we recognize its importance. That being said, we need to continually improve our strategic thinking skills, which is why I always prioritize ongoing learning and development for the team in areas such as low code / no code upskilling, lunch and learn workshops, and much more.

To ensure that strategic thinking is a part of our product development process, we incorporate strategic planning sessions into our regular team meetings. During these sessions, we take a step back from day-to-day tasks and focus on the big picture, discussing the long-term vision and goals for our products. We try to balance these with our usual cadence of meetings because one thing we do not want to be is a meeting-heavy culture.

The team also uses artifacts and frameworks like SWOT analysis and the Business Model Canvas to help us think more strategically about our products and identify opportunities for growth and innovation. This is where collaborative tools like Miro and Figma shine because it allows us unlimited possibilities to brainstorm, ideate, and design.

—

Shehab: How do you perform product discovery? What tools/techniques/methods do you use? Do the results affect your product strategy?

Tony: I love product discovery, I really do. It’s so much fun to do in a team like ours. Product discovery is an essential part of our product development process, and we use a variety of tools, techniques, and methods to perform it effectively. We kick off by conducting research to understand our users and their needs, and this includes user interviews, surveys, and focus groups to gather feedback and insights directly from our target audience. We also analyze user data, such as behavioral analytics and user feedback, to understand how users are currently interacting with our products and where there may be opportunities for improvement. To really make this happen, you need to live in the shoes of the user.

In addition, we use techniques such as design thinking and prototyping to test and validate new product ideas and features. This allows us to gather feedback early in the development process and make adjustments as needed at a low amount of overhead when we are using dynamic tools like Figma or Bubble.io.

The results of our product discovery process are critical in shaping our product strategy. We use the insights and feedback gathered through our research and analysis to inform our product roadmap and prioritize our product initiatives. By understanding our users' needs and pain points, we can create products that better meet their needs and ultimately drive the success of our business.

—

Shehab: How do you engage with the product teams to break the strategy into initiatives and features?

Tony: First, we ensure that everyone on the product team understands our overall product strategy and the business objectives we are trying to achieve. This includes holding regular strategy sessions with the team to review our goals and objectives and discuss how we can achieve them through our product roadmap.

Next, we work together to identify the key initiatives that will help us achieve our strategic objectives. We encourage the product teams to provide input based on their expertise and insights from user research and data analysis. We then prioritize these initiatives based on their potential impact and feasibility, taking into consideration the team’s resources and timelines.

Once we have identified our priority initiatives, we work together to break them down into specific features and user stories. We encourage our product teams to participate in this process, providing feedback and insights on how to create the best user experience and achieve our goals.

End to end, we maintain open and ongoing communication with the product teams, providing regular updates and feedback to ensure that everyone is aligned and working towards the same objectives, or else all of it brings no value whatsoever.

Part 4: Getting The Execution Right

Shehab: How do you ensure efficient execution? What methods do you use with your teams?

Tony: First and foremost, we use Agile, in our case, Scrum, to manage our development process. This allows us to break down our product roadmap into manageable tasks, prioritize them, and track progress. We also use daily stand-up meetings to keep everyone on the same page and identify any blockers that need to be addressed, but we also have them in a unique way that meets the Scrum framework but also matches our unique needs as a multi-dimensional team.

We empower our product owners to ruthlessly prioritize user stories and features based on their business value, project imperativeness, and impact on our strategic objectives. This allows us to focus our resources and efforts on the features that will have the most significant impact on our users and our business, which in turn gets us closer to our goal.

The use of the iterative development process, which involves releasing small increments of functionality and getting feedback from users before moving on to the next iteration. This helps us validate our assumptions and make adjustments as needed before investing more time and resources into a particular feature. It also allows us to pivot very fluidly when the business or customer has a sudden change or request.

My favorite activity, though, is retrospective. We have brutally honest retrospectives that allow our team to always strive at getting better. I love facilitating retros, and whenever something doesn't go as it is supposed to, I call it retro. Some might say I can be overly happy to call a retro, but my defense is they always have great results.

—

Shehab: How do your product/design review meetings work?

Tony: As an organization, we schedule regular review meetings, typically weekly or bi-weekly, depending on the stage of the project. These meetings are attended by our product managers, designers, developers, and any other stakeholders from the other internal teams that are necessary to review the project’s progress.

When we have these meetings, one of our product managers will typically present the project’s current status, including any user research findings, key metrics, and progress against the product roadmap. The designer will then present the current design, explaining any design decisions and the rationale behind them. This continues across the team so we can paint an authentic picture for all involved.

After the presentation, the team will discuss the current design and provide feedback. We encourage everyone to share their thoughts and opinions, including any concerns they have or any potential issues they foresee. We also discuss any trade-offs between design choices and business priorities and work collaboratively to find the best solution. This REALLY helps enrich our backlog grooming and estimation and update our roadmaps to be as realistic as possible.

Not every review meeting goes smoothly, but we adjust as one team. If it was an easy process, everyone would be doing and having a truly authentic session that, yes, can be uncomfortable sometimes but is necessary to really crystallize what is important and what can be put on the back burner.

—

Shehab: In a word, what makes a PRD or a user story effective?

Tony: TRANSPARENCY

—

Shehab: How do you usually guide your product team to avoid falling into the trap of product edge cases?

Tony: In both RAI and Infinite pl, I’ve found it is essential to guide the team to avoid falling into the trap of product edge cases. Off the top of my head, from recent experience, here are a few strategies that I’ve used to help my team stay focused on our core product vision.

• Be specific and define clear product goals and user personas: It’s critical to have a clear understanding of the product goals and user personas before starting the development process. You need a vision, something to aspire to, a goal to reach, whatever — but you do need it, and without the goals and personas, you’re throwing darts with a blindfold.
• Do real user research: Doing background research is great, but getting out there to talk to current and potential users is where the gold is; it also helps you from avoiding falling into the trap of edge cases. We we invest time in talking to our users and understanding their pain points and needs, we can develop features that will provide the most value to the majority of our users.
• Prioritize features based on business value: In RAI and also within Infinite pl, we use an in-house designed prioritization framework to prioritize our features based on their business value. This was curated between our strategy, innovation, and product teams, which ultimately allows us to focus on developing features that will have the most significant impact on our business while still meeting the needs of our primary users.
• Always Monitor and evaluate product usage: We track and evaluate how users are interacting with our product regularly. By monitoring usage patterns, we can quickly identify edge cases and make adjustments to our product to ensure that it meets the needs of our primary users.

Part 5: Final Advice

Shehab: What’s a lesson (or more than one) that you think would help aspiring product managers?

Tony: I believe that being adaptable and continuously learning is one of the most critical skills that aspiring product managers can develop and mature. Let me tell you why:

• The product management landscape is constantly changing: New technologies, market trends, and customer expectations are emerging all the time. Product managers who don’t keep up with these changes risk falling behind, missing out on new opportunities, and being seen as decaying.
• Continuous learning helps you stay ahead of the competition: By staying up-to-date with the latest trends and best practices in product management, you can stay ahead. The minute you slow down in a race, someone is trying to catch you, don't let that happen.
• Learning new skills helps you grow in your career: Product management is a rapidly evolving field with many different roles and responsibilities. By continuously learning and expanding your skillset, you can position yourself for growth and advancement in your career, and even an industry or role change, you get the full 360 experience; use it!
• You’ll be better equipped to make informed decisions: By continuously learning, you’ll be better equipped to make informed decisions based on data, industry trends, and this weird thing called “intuition” that you get with experience. Like any game, you make a decision based on expected value (EV), and when you have a positive EV, you go for it. Learning what EV situations are is what comes with experience.
• You’ll be more adaptable to change: The ability to adapt to change is critical in product management. By continuously learning, you’ll be better equipped to adapt to new technologies, processes, tools, etc., which will also keep you from holding back your teams because of the way “you’ve always done it” or the way you did it on some random project 10 years ago. Relishing in the past is healthy, but living in it will hold you back.

Shehab: Thank you, Tony, for taking the time to have this interview and to share with us all of these practical tips!

Tony: Thank you, Shehab!