Week 17: Onboarding, Energy Production for AI and The Emotional Dial
Your weekly roundup of all things product management, technology and work life.
Happy Friday everyone! Welcome back to The Millennial Product Manager, your weekly product manager newsletter.
I'm using this newsletter to share at least three things l've come across this week to help you build better product. Subscribe so you don't miss these when they come out:
On to this week's thoughts and updates (note: this week’s update will be brief, mostly because of item #2…):
1. We’re back to text, hopefully that’s good?!
Honestly, I love video as a medium. I love how sharp the video is that you can get these days, the new editing tools, making content super interactive, it’s all great fun. It’s part of the reason I loved my TikTok account and doing videos like this one so much:
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I’m a bit of a perfectionist though (everyone say it at once: NO WAY WE COULDN’T TELL!!!) I want the content to be good, and it just takes a ton of energy for video content to be at the great standard I love. If I didn’t have a full time job and a family, I’d love to make more video and podcast content. But here we are, and frankly it’s easier to write posts on a Thursday night disheveled after FINALLY putting the kids to bed.
So we’re back to writing. Hopefully it’s still great! But let me know if you’d like to see something else.
Speaking of being overwhelmed…
2. Onboarding into a new job is HARD
When I’ve been at a job and think about switching after 15 years of being a product manager, I will admit that I pretty much get this feeling of “UGHGHGHGH that sounds so hard I don’t wanna.”
My subconscious must be with it more than my conscious brain because that feeling is spot on. Onboarding into a new job is super hard and my brain feels like melted ice cream.
Onboarding feels harder at the more senior levels I think because expectations of you are high. Your reputation proceeds you often because you probably got the job via a good referral. And you’re getting older with more life responsibility, so it’s just harder to get immersed and ramp up.
Doing this successfully really comes down to having patience with yourself and your biology. Things will eventually click into place like they did with me today. I kept hearing about a score card and it finally clicked today that the score card is measuring missing data I care deeply about. Your brain will catch up eventually!
So if you’re out there going through this right now, I’m right there with you and I feel for you. It’s hard. There’s no getting around it, the only way is through the pain.
On to more think-y stuff…
3. AI is going to consume lots of energy
I came across this one in my Instagram feed this week:
So let’s be real for a second. The energy production problem has been a problem for some time. My first job out of college was at a power company in Texas. I learned a lot about the people at ERCOT that were scrutinized (rightfully) for the winter storm failures in 2021 and beyond.
When I worked there in 2007, the company was still into burning coal for power because coal was cheap. Natural gas was too expensive, wind was variable and would go out frequently, causing power production levels to drop dangerously close to brownout levels before something else would come online and pick up the slack. Even with nuclear units, it never seemed like we had enough power to satisfy demand.
And this was BEFORE everyone moving to Texas, Tesla, AI, crypto, natural gas prices dropping like a rock, the rise of solar and windmills killing birds. To me, it’s a small miracle everything still works pretty well.
AI though could really push this thing over the edge though. And we have to be really serious about fixing things that have been broken for a long time. I wonder sometimes if our state and city governments are taking seriously, or even have the tools to address this. We need clean, cheap power and we need it fast.
4. Let’s talk about the emotional dial
just has the most 🔥 performance content, I posted this article in a note the other day because of so much professional experience I’ve had with my emotions:
I can personally attest to the fact that expressing emotions can definitely be a tool.
For example, I find it really difficult to be a product manager if I’m not into the products I’m building. If I don’t care, I can’t be at my best. So I’ve discovered that making sure I work on things that provide any positive emotional response for me at all is a big step in the right direction.
But when I’m in the job, I find this skill of expressing emotions even more valuable. For example, being vulnerable about my frustrations with leadership expectations I’m not aligned with helps me build trust with my team. They know I share their pain, even if the next thing I’m doing is pushing all of us forward to do the work we’re not excited about.
And sometimes as a product manager, dialing up the anxiety, excitement or anger depending on your team can really move the ball forward on critical work. I find excitement is the best motivator for me personally, but that doesn’t work for everyone. You have to find the mode that works for you and your teams.
That's it for this week!
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I’ll be back around this time next week with more useful product manager things!