Transcript: "I was afraid AI would take my job. It sharpened it instead" | Shira Moyal (imagen)

Meet Shira and imagen

Eyal David: [00:00] Shira, what's up? Good. So great that you're here. So great for me to be here. We almost didn't make it in here either. Right. So sitting with us is Shira Moyal from Imagen, you're a team lead, right? Right. Tell us a bit about yourself.

Shira Moyal: [00:15] A few sentences, so we get to know each other. Yes, for the last eight years I've been a product manager. I've also gotten to lead teams. For the last five years I've worked mainly at AI-based startups, really models, artificial intelligence, algorithms and so on.

Eyal David: [00:35] And like we talked about a second before, we almost didn't make it in here for two reasons. One, the studio, and two, because of reserve duty and all that. Right. So yes, we want this to be an evergreen episode, but really, war and everything, we're not sure where it's going. Okay, so tell us a bit about Imagen too.

What imagen is: a personal AI model for photographers

Shira Moyal: [00:53] Okay, so we're a startup in a growth phase. What we do is we developed a personal AI model that edits photos for professional photographers, and actually lets them focus on what they really love, which is shooting. The model learns the photographer's editing style and edits for them, mainly weddings, events and so on, but we really cover every genre you can think of. Photography is an art, and we do it without them compromising and without it looking artificial to you, but very, very, very much the way the photographer edits. We do it in-house, a learning model, and today we also provide a range of services around everything we call post-production. I mean, really enabling photographers to do their art, and everything we can do for them. Like what other services? Photo culling, smart photo culling, retouching tools, smart ones too, again all heavily AI-based. Basically everything that happens from the moment I get back from a wedding or an event, whatever, some photoshoot, until the moment I deliver the photos to my end client. So you're basically leaving me to hold the camera.

Eyal David: [02:01] Yes. And all the rest, that's the post-production, basically. Yes, which is basically what they most want to do. I assume that's what they most want to do, that's what's left. So that's exactly where this connects, right? We actually want to talk about AI. Yes. We came to talk about how it's changing, but not how it's changing industries, how it's changing us, the industries' casualties. No, I'm joking, but the people who actually work in the industry. And I want to ask you, really, in our prep call we talked about this, what was that moment when you really questioned yourself, in the context of AI and where it's going? This will be an honest conversation, we'll say it here. We're really going to talk.

The moment AI exploded, and the anxiety that followed

Shira Moyal: [02:43] So I don't remember the point on the timeline, but... I was at Imagen, yes. Yes, yes, I was at Imagen. Yes, I've been working there three years, so that whole explosion happened when I was already there. I don't remember the point in time, again, like I said, but I remember everything exploded, and suddenly all of LinkedIn, tons of posts, did you try the tool, didn't you try the tool, every lunch turned into conversations about AI, AI, AI and what will happen now, every tool chased another tool, and I was in a kind of excitement, even a bit of anxiety. One element was like, what will happen to me, to my role, what am I worth, do they need me, don't they need me. There were lots of conversations about who'll be the first to disappear in all this, which was everyone's way of coping with the situation, a bit of dark humor. So one part was really doubting the role, how needed am I now if there are things that do everything much faster, and the second part was the constant FOMO, which is like, okay, I'm already in this, but how fast am I running, did I try what came out yesterday, what came out today, 4.0, 2.7. Which is funny. First,

Two layers of anxiety: professional identity and tool FOMO

Eyal David: [03:52] I thought about those photographers we talked about a moment ago, because at least we left them holding the camera, so let's understand for a second what it was like to hold the camera, wait, that's on you. The second thing, help us get our bearings a bit, what tools were those back then, like, those were models, you also came from inside that world, right? Like, you knew where it was going.

GenAI vs. classic models: why the difference matters

Shira Moyal: [04:07] Right, but I have to say there's a real difference between GenAI and the models I'd worked with. Being a product person for AI products is also really a bit, it's different in my view from other roles. I've worked at places that don't do it that way, that's a conversation for another day, but GenAI was different. It opened up, it's much faster, you don't need to train a model, it has a lot of advantages, it was very, very different, and there were also tons of tools in parallel. Just understanding what each thing is for, I remember a conversation like, wait, why are you using this and why that. Conversations that, by the way, are still happening today, I see them in all kinds of groups.

Eyal David: [04:46] I'm also kind of there for a second, I hadn't thought about this until now. Like in the end, I could stop my life and say, okay, I'm learning this now, I want to understand it, but you were in a 9 to 5, or 9 to 9, and that's much more complicated.

Shira Moyal: [05:00] Very, and it takes a moment, and also, by the way, seeing how organizations absorb and take this on, and whether they allow it, and how and how much and why. But first there's the personal FOMO, like you said, do I even have time to deal with this? What, come back at 8 in the evening? What did you do? That's what I did, that's the truth. What, what did you build, or what did you try? So it depends which tools you use. At first there was ChatGPT, which we all remember, and the initial instinct was more textual at the start, so of course you go for the obvious, which is all the specs, PRDs, anything you can rewrite quickly and well. That's where the prompt entered our lives, how well I ask and pose the questions. And gradually the evolution, really up to all the Base44, Lovable, things that actually let me produce somewhat more visual outputs. They broadened the canvas like crazy, and that's also where we were introduced to concepts like you have credits left, you don't have credits left, how much we abuse the tools. To this day I think that if you look now, there's also Figma Make, for example, which in my view is far from being only for designers, and you can absolutely use it as product managers too, and we do. There's no end, there's no end to it. What do you do most now? We'll go back, but what do you do most today? What do you use most? Which tool do I use most? So I still use Claude and GPT a lot, because I sit mainly in discovery, that was a step, we'll probably talk about it soon, it became my center of gravity even more than it was before. And when I need all kinds of solution discovery, or to bring things to the table for the teams I work with, then really things that let me bring a more visual aid, or for my end customers, user testing, things where you used to need to tie up a designer for two weeks to build you some

The prompt era and the first tools

The tools Shira uses most today

Eyal David: [06:44] clickable prototype, and today there's no need for that. Tell me, okay, so that's how you can really touch it, and we can give tips, maybe we'll jump ahead a bit and I'll tell you what I do. But I'm really curious, tell me, specifically this thing of, I'm a PM, for example, I hold the strategy, I hold everything, and suddenly, like you're saying, there's something that shakes me. So how did you feel? And you also have people, you're a team lead, right? Right. So it also trickles up from below, right? A lot. Because we kept talking, I remember we talked about how the middle is being erased. Right. Where did it catch you? How did you feel in that place?

Where AI hit her hardest as a PM

Shira Moyal: [07:24] I had a lot, a lot of thoughts. I got swept into it like crazy. I won't say it made me doubt the profession, but rather what's important in the profession. Very much. It also clarified a lot for me, about my teams and about colleagues in general, you suddenly notice where the important things sit, because I thought about it a lot. It put me in a place where I said, okay, okay, wait, there are now things that do what I do in three hours in five minutes. What's important and what's not. And that's one, I think these are two sides of the same thing. One, how do I quickly understand where it's worth it for me, I won't say to make a shift, but where should I put my center of gravity? And two, it also made me look at the role differently, not only at myself within the role. So you're talking about your value, and also about the value as a PM, so tell us a bit about that. My general approach is that a PM's value, and that's also how I interview, how I look at my teams and so on, a PM's value in my view sits much more on the sense, on product capabilities, on work methodologies, on understanding. It's a profession. A good product person, wherever you put them, will be a good product person. Learning the domain is the easy part. And now even more so. Because suddenly, you know, driving teams, making things happen, fine. Like, there are other roles that can do that, I'm sorry to say for a second. And execution is shrinking over the years, and now with AI all the more. Now, obviously it's important, yes? You need to get shit done, because that's the business. But that's not my value. Like, things can happen, I don't want to be the one who brings things about so they happen, and tracks timelines, and writes tickets. My value sits elsewhere, much more in my ability to ask the right questions. By the way, also when using AI tools. AI can give you, look at that, five great solutions in a second. My place is to understand which four I kill and what's good. And AI won't do that for me, right? Oh, that's great. I was just talking about this with a friend this week, last week.

The clarity: a PM's value isn't in execution

"Gold-plated balconies": the danger of building too much

Eyal David: [09:23] About how easy it is today to build a gold-plated balcony, lots of gold-plated balconies with AI. And on one hand, there's a crazy challenge here, because on one hand it's really super easy, and super easy to say, oh yes, I'll add this, I'll add that, I'll do this. And then you might really build balconies no one will ever step on, they'll be very gold-plated and beautiful, and no one will touch them. On the other hand, you really need to know where to build those gold-plated balconies, because there's so much product inflation today, more of the same gets swallowed by the noise. And only that will highlight which company really has real value to provide. Yes, and you as a PM, or you as a founder, or you of course,

Shira Moyal: [10:02] putting the spotlight on where to build now, that's like the thing now, spot on. Which always was, but now it's on steroids. Spot on. Also running fast. People love to say that thanks to AI you can run fast, you can run fast. Never mind that in practice we don't really see a change across the board of no programmers, no designers, no... We keep the people, we slightly change the... the balance, but running fast is good. The question is whether I know which direction I'm running in. Because to run fast you also need to know where to, and that's the place of a good product manager in my opinion. The connection with strategy, it puts you much more in the business areas, in strategy, in understanding customers,

Running fast is good, if you know where to

Eyal David: [10:37] and less in writing specs, explaining well, designing properly, like, less in those places. Yes, it's a more entrepreneurial place, I'd say. And just, when you talked about it, I remembered that Elon Musk gave this whole thing five years for all the digital professions, or something like that, no? Yes, roughly. But I think where I find, just, building areas and such, where I play around, where I find my value, is when the AI really scatters and goes off and adds more balconies for you, also on the technical side, and you know how to steer it: no, no, do it this way. There's still value there, I don't know how long it'll last, but beyond that, it's the business area, like you're saying. So okay, I'm going back for a second, we dove in. So really, you stopped, you understood where your value is, I remember this thing for me too,

Shira Moyal: [11:25] and the process, how long was it, was it fast, was it slow, how was it? There was no way for it to be slow. Like, we were pushed like crazy. I assume everyone experiences it, it's all the hallway conversations, it's all the LinkedIns, it's every possible WhatsApp group, every community, every meetup became about AI and how it upgrades things. I didn't feel I was given time to linger on it. I admit, and I'll be totally honest here, at first I said, fine, another passing wave. And then I understood that's not the case, so there really was even a bit of anxiety, and pretty quickly I found myself diving into all the tools, not necessarily wisely at first, very quickly out of FOMO, like, try everything, understand anything at all, so tomorrow at lunch you can also hold the conversation, so you won't be clueless. And only after you clear the noise for a moment are you even in a place to understand what the tool gives me. Like, I was so busy being in that chase that I didn't think for a moment, wait, wait, where does this upgrade my capabilities, slash, where does it help me move my work forward. Like, wait, it takes a minute, and that only came when I could turn off the noise for a second and say: you're not in a FOMO chase, sit with the tools, really explore them. No, don't try just for trying, like. I don't know much about how organizations didn't stop for a moment to do this. The opposite, we heard the opposite, right? Yes.

Eyal David: [12:44] So it's very strange. And tell me, what do you feel has changed? Thanks to? From the heights of the... Yes.

Shira Moyal: [12:51] So I think... I'll also talk really practically, from my own experience, things that actually happened. I think the whole research world got upgraded like crazy. The whole ability to analyze data, feedback, to train bots in the form of, well, in the form of personas I can work with and ask questions for quick things, validations of solutions, directions, Competitive Landscape, things I used to have to sit and research for much longer got significantly shorter. And I'm deliberately not going to the place of writing a PRD, because for me that's the obvious.

Where AI really upgraded the work: discovery, research, competitive landscape

Eyal David: [13:26] But that's it. I'll disagree with you here. Yes? At my company we do this a lot, lots of analyses. Customers? I can say that actually this area got shorter, but the time we spend tightening got much longer.

Shira Moyal: [13:39] Right, but now it gives me all the time I gained, in, okay, suddenly instead of interviewing two customers a week, I can do four. So actually it's true that my time maybe doesn't necessarily get shorter, but what I do in that time is much more valuable.

Eyal David: [13:51] I say "got longer" because beyond needing to tighten what you get, there are many more competitors out there. I find myself checking many more competitors. Right. Of many types and sizes. Right, I agree with that a lot. I'm a sucker for Competitive Landscapes.

Shira Moyal: [14:09] I think it nicely connects the business and the strategy to what's worth it for you to make the next thing, right? We're always told as product people, what do you think should be the next thing? So you have to look at the market. But you also understand, you said it earlier, apropos the gold-plated balconies, who's really worth me looking at? Like, now, right, there's a question, so anyone can spin up a product,

Eyal David: [14:26] people spin up a product in a second, the question is where the real value is. That's it, so suddenly you see the heavyweights running faster and they have capabilities, so you see, say, Adobe and such, so you say, okay, I'll check their tools, but I'll also go and check this competitor that now offers a subscription at ten dollars for what they offered until now at a hundred, so it actually creates a lot of vacuum for me to go through. Right. Maybe it's a matter of a period, like, until they disappear. For sure. Tell me, and where in the areas... there's always the... thing. Let's strengthen the areas a person is stuck in, find the places that are your bottlenecks, where did you find them for you? Where did I find bottlenecks that... sharpen it for me? That with AI you're now much better at.

Shira Moyal: [15:09] So I'll say I don't feel it improved my personal skills, like soft skills. I don't feel it improved my soft skills. I will say that sharpening messages, asking questions, there's something there. At first, when we all started working, there was back and forth with the prompts. Fixing it a thousand times. That keeps getting shorter. It keeps getting shorter not only because of the learning curve, because it really sharpened for me what I'm looking for, how I ask questions. Maybe that's also a bit of soft skills, by the way. And that's also true for our work as product managers. So I think that's one of the most significant things, being much more focused on what I'm looking for, what I need, both when I ask the tools and when I design and so on, you know. But it's not, I don't feel it's a personal improvement of mine. It simply saved me time. Do you feel the number of meetings went down? I'm really asking, I don't know. Wow, what a million-dollar question. Not for me, but meeting prep, meeting summaries, those got shorter. Apropos interviewing customers, which we talked about earlier, say in research, if you can now squeeze in four because it's easier to take the conversation transcript and do it faster, then meetings too. Presentations today. I don't prepare them manually anymore. Wow, that's actually something I, again, spend a lot of time on.

Eyal David: [16:27] That's actually where I find my time goes. Tell me, and how is it in terms of stakeholders and alignment in a world where there are also many more products and internal initiatives inside the organization, because it's possible?

How AI helps communication with stakeholders and teams

Shira Moyal: [16:40] Right. That's a good question. I think it very much, first of all it highlights the differences between departments in the organization. You have to say for a moment, not everyone is an early adopter of AI tools, and you need to look at that for a moment. And here it also comes down to where you work. So I'll say that at our place they encourage usage like crazy, and it's cross-departmental. At Imagen they'll tell you as a programmer to use it for code, in design too, in product too, and then see the combination. And I think it's very easy to catch the productivity bug, it pushes you toward it. If I don't prepare, you know, it's one person who didn't make presentations, told all of us she doesn't make presentations, and then within a second no one makes presentations themselves anymore. So I think it also aligns people well.

Eyal David: [17:22] I mean that now, just, inside an organization there are now several teams that can work on the same initiative without knowing. There are, it's funny, there are like the transcripts of all their meetings on the subject. You can look at everything, see what people are working on, tell me what... I wonder if it happens, you don't notice that suddenly, like, do you have some guards on this to make sure people aren't working on the same things? Honestly, we work in squads,

Shira Moyal: [17:51] which is also a great conversation for another day, so it doesn't happen to us, because we're really divided by area of interest, with, you know, key results we're supposed to drive, so there's almost never a situation where we're in some overlapping, and if there is, I trust the product people. But I'll say it does help align teams, specifically in the professional context. It's much easier for me today to bring things to the table that are visual, and they help and create a much, much more professional conversation than I could before, when, you know, a product manager holds everything in their head, and they know how they imagine it, because for two weeks now they've been showering with it every day and thinking about it, and suddenly, oh, wait, I can actually bring something to the table everyone can connect to, it took me three hours to prepare, at most. Why did that stay? What do you make screens in? So recently Figma Make really looks amazing and impressive, and really, really does a good job. Base, Lovable, like, whatever's totally, whatever's at hand. Like, I have, I admit I have a subscription to everything. You have to be honest about that, so that. So really, like, there's no, like, it depends on the day. No, I really dropped everything for Claude only, and Claude builds me everything. Yes. From recipes to screens. Exactly, from everyday questions.

How AI helps bring visual things to the table

Eyal David: [19:05] And you know, I think, I'm taking this back a second, I think you were very gentle about that moment, the moment we talked about. If there was, if there was anxiety and all that, it's a fucking thing. Now, I think you felt that way too, maybe me too, but you felt that way, because like we said, you're a team lead, and you went through it. If you take it back now, yes? For people entering the industry, or people who started recently, do you have some good career advice that...

Shira Moyal: [19:33] Yes. I'll say I don't feel I was gentle. Maybe I should have conveyed the message more back then. I was actually very, very much in an internal dialogue with myself, also at the level of am I, where do I stand compared to my colleagues, which is also a thing. Like, you start asking yourself questions like: did I try enough, am I trying enough, am I sitting on it at night, am I not sitting on it at night. You know, it becomes like in a degree, where you're like, who studies latest and who has all the summaries, and you say, where am I in all this? And then also what you're describing, really, about who I am, what I am, what my role is, what I'm worth. So I actually feel it attacked me from all directions, and I also think that as a team lead there's an expectation of you. There's an expectation of you to be at the forefront, at the front line, to lead some change, to be inside this thing. So I actually think it's pressure from all directions. And for those entering now, I think it really reshuffled the cards. The role has changed very, very much for them. If we remember that we used to submit home assignments that people would actually prepare, you'd really prepare them, and that's a good example, by the way. I have no problem with people submitting home assignments with AI, only the questions I ask have become different, ones where even when they're answered through AI, I try to understand whether there really is that sense I'm looking for, that inner product sense. So for everyone who's new too, focus much more on those places, on methodologies, on asking questions, on research, less on showing, you know, how I push forward and bring a solution and do prioritization. Also important, but tell me,

Career advice for young PMs

Eyal David: [21:03] again, going back to the balconies, tell me, as organizations, do organizations today have more of an interest in pushing people from within to have product understanding?

Shira Moyal: [21:15] Great question. Business understanding? Yes, business understanding yes. Product too, yes. I see it on development teams too. I see, I'll tell you, I see it in myself too, not only organizationally. Like, it's true my organization pushes too, but also me, it's very, very, very important to me that designers work with me more on UX than on UI, on a real understanding of the user, of use cases, of what a flow chart of what I'm looking for looks like, of the problem. Developers, it's important to me that they don't look at me with calf eyes and tell me, okay, you wrote a ticket, I understand it, I develop it, bye. I want them to push back, I want that when I bring something to the table, apropos, the squad setup really helps move this forward, yes? But I expect it. Like, I really want everyone to work this way. If we talked for a second about that door,

Eyal David: [21:57] like that, I don't know how easy it is today and which role is easier to get into today, but if you got into, or get into, an organization, that's actually a great door. If you want to get to product, I don't know what's out there in product today, but starting to take on those initiatives is easier today than ever. If I'm a designer and I'm preparing for a meeting with you, if I save all the mileage we'd talk through along the way and come with something tighter, because I did homework, because I sat down, right. That's completely different. Very much.

Are organizations pushing more product thinking from within?

Shira Moyal: [22:25] And do you share skills at your place? What does it look like? Yes, a lot. We also really invite everyone, I won't say to step on each other, in the end there are roles, and the reason everyone has a role is important, people bring knowledge and experience with them, but I really encourage it, and in general the organization also really encourages it. Push back, understand the use cases, join customer interviews, see where the market stands. Yes? No, it's no longer the sole domain of product. You know, I remember meetings from, say, five or six years ago, you, only you lead the meeting in the room. People sit waiting for your word, tell them where to go, how fun that was. How fun that was. No, actually. It was terrible. There are great principles in it, yes? But uh... there are also bad meetings, I had a few of those. Of course. A meeting where everyone nods is a bad meeting. It means something's wrong. Either they don't understand, or... Friction isn't a bad thing, after all. And in the end it's also fine for someone to decide in the end. I'm the product person, I know, yes? I always say, so, apropos doing, sharing skills and talking about things and letting everyone weigh in. In the end, in my view, it's actually responsibility. If you want to push back, it means you need to come prepared. It means you need to do homework, join interviews, read. It's much easier not to be like that. It doesn't require anything from you. So I really appreciate people who do understand. Still today? What does it take to consume it? You can consume it in any medium you want, in any output you want.

Eyal David: [23:45] In a second. In a second. Apropos AI tools. It can send you a condensed weekly summary of the whole market,

Shira Moyal: [23:52] there's no issue with it, yes? It's not... And even fucking come prepared to a meeting. Absolutely. Listen to a recording, really, like, right? I'm actually saying, like, you're not serious.

Eyal David: [24:00] And you know, once you'd say, watch the recording of the interview I did with a user. Watching 45 minutes isn't really a thing today. You can get a great gist of the meeting and run with it and come much more prepared, yes? So I think that's the best advice, go the extra mile. Tell me, and when you got into the tools and all these things, what about building things? Really, from 0? Have you done it? Really small things.

Have you built things yourself with vibe coding?

Shira Moyal: [24:28] Mainly, by the way, for things I wanted to push forward myself faster. Well, into the company, basically. Yes, things that are, but again, it also depends on the constraints, yes? You can't push code everywhere and so on, so in small places where it can improve things, many times actually for inbound things, with in-house systems,

Eyal David: [24:45] web things, and not very... There's something here, I'm stopping for a second, I suddenly realize. You're all under work licenses, so you're not going off and creating your own things.

Shira Moyal: [24:56] So look, I also have a personal subscription, and I'm happy to work at a place that's 100% on board with what we want to do. So I kind of feel, don't feel it, but you're right, there's that limitation that nobody talks about either. I know lots of colleagues who aren't allowed to bring AI tools into work at all, also for security reasons. For security reasons, you know, it exposes a lot of information. In the end, everything Chat gives me back, I say, ah, okay, well, I fed the beast, and more people fed it, and everyone reveals all the secrets. And we once joked that there's a reason that when you create some product, everything looks the same. Really, there's some genericness across all the movements.

Eyal David: [25:35] You know why? No, really, do you know why? Go on. Like, I'm talking now about creating with GenAI, like. Yes, yes. Yes, because they trained everything on Tailwind. There you go. Haven't you noticed everything's purple with a purple gradient? Or black, black, black. That's what a good website looks like. Yes, so like, you say, okay, everything basically looks the same, so like... And here, if we talked for a second about where, you and I talked earlier about where designers are heading, right? Yes. So right now, really, they can, they can on the business side, on the UX side, but really on the aesthetics side, it's still so much there.

The purple-gradient era: why every product looks the same

Shira Moyal: [26:08] Aesthetics are important, but wait. You don't want to create products that get lost in the noise. Right, you don't want to be generic, you want to have your uniqueness, that's true. But you and I know it's also related to the domain, there are places where actually the boring holds strong and everything's fine. Could be, but look, we talked about photographers, right? Right.

Eyal David: [26:25] Fine, you're first to market, cool, right? Yes. But now loads of competitors are springing up. Right. People need to remember your brand, they need to get an awesome experience there, like, there's no way around it.

Shira Moyal: [26:35] You're right, we always say we want to be the Apple of the... like, in the end there's some experience you're trying to achieve. You're right that aesthetics are critical, but as a role, I'd want it to be more. Do I, at the end of the day, need? Fine, I've also said a lot about discovery processes here, but obviously in the end you also need to make things happen, yes? But I wouldn't want a different weight to be there. I'm saying it's still there? Like, it's still, it's something that will probably disappear, just, because we talked about Tailwind and the... thing. Yes. It's still one of the capabilities. Right. For now, yes. You're right, 100%. But I feel more and more that spirit of change, heading to a place of: do you really understand the use case? Do you understand the user? Do you understand the happy flow? Do you understand the transition to the happy flow? Yes, and I also think that this too,

Eyal David: [27:20] has an expiration date that's pretty close for that part. Because look, as long as you're not diving into very regulatory depths, let's call it, things behind regulation or behind, honestly, very, very, very deep knowledge of your industry, onboarding is onboarding, and I probably think, you know, AI will crack it. What is onboarding? What's the best practice. Yes, well. Right. You're right.

Shira Moyal: [27:48] So yes, everything's going to the margins, I think, now. But you're thinking now, here, say, in what you gave, onboarding is onboarding, and there are best practices, and all the tools will tell you the best practices too, ask and they'll give it to you in a second. So what really is the added value of, you see, you as a team? No, so what I'm saying,

Eyal David: [28:04] there's organizational knowledge, let's say, just, so Imagen has accumulated knowledge today about how, what users are willing to put up with in onboarding, okay? Right. And we'll now connect that, behind the scenes, also to psychology insights from the 20th and 21st centuries, in digital, and connect it, I don't know, to more information sources. Now, you have some moat with this information you've accumulated so far, yes? If we connect it, then the human's role in this whole thing won't stay that big.

Where unique value really sits

Shira Moyal: [28:31] Right. Very true, I think, I agree with you a hundred percent. So I'm just saying, I won't attach myself to some generic place, there's actually value in... all the organizational value at the current workplace. If you don't look at product as a role for a moment, obviously my value today is my familiarity with the users, with the use cases, the understanding of the market, of how things work, obviously. Product-wise? Broader? Okay, one day, I don't know, if I were now working at a different company, then what, but my added value then,

Eyal David: [28:59] you see? I think, first of all, like this, first of all, it's much easier to get into companies now. Right. So again, the knowledge you've accumulated in product across lots of different products, and understood in... that's something you bring with you, right? And you add the flavor on top, like, that now it'll be much easier for you to get into the situation and start accumulating new knowledge that will help you. Right, but you're describing the ideal, in my view.

Shira Moyal: [29:23] I'll also say that as a hiring manager, I don't see it much. Years of experience and the companies people move through don't necessarily indicate skills like that, the way we'd like to say. What, if, you know, if I've worked almost a decade in the industry and worked at several companies, I should be where you're describing. I should have the methodologies and everything. In practice, I don't experience it much in interviews. I think very few people manage to go beyond "I'm very good at my current place" to "I can now copy-paste it and simply be a good product person."

Eyal David: [29:53] I don't think copy-paste, but I talked about quick ramp-up, but... I'll put it this way, first of all, I think maybe it's really something consultants get stronger at, because you need to deliver value, otherwise people won't work with you, so you need to professionalize and actually deliver results. It also really matters which companies you've worked with over the years, right? Because there are interviewees who come.

What PM interviews at imagen look like today

Shira Moyal: [30:15] Right. Tell me, what do interviews look like at your place now, I'm curious? That's a good question. Because I put a lot, a lot of emphasis on sense, like we talked about, and on discovery, it's actually not about methodology. I mean, I'm looking to see that I put a problem on the table, and the person in front of me knows how to take it apart and put it back together and show me their way of thinking, because in the end I say, okay, the day they're hired, I don't know what they'll work on, they could work on a thousand things here. Either they have it, or they have what I'm looking for, or they don't. You know, it's an X factor. So in the end, something very intuitive, even the generic question. I ask them to choose some product of their choice. I don't prepare for it, which is also, you see, also a statement. Like, come on, look, I'm not preparing with you either, and we do it in a way that in my view is very special. It's a conversation. It's not a test. I mean, I express an opinion on things that are said, we really kind of take it apart together, to simulate a product managers' brainstorm with someone else who's with me, usually one of the seniors or a colleague who's a team lead, and then we really check. You ask them, okay, this is the product you chose, cool. Come on, what's the North Star metric? Where do you think they're heading at the business level? What's the product strategy? Have you tried having this conversation with an LLM? Sure. Shall we interview it? Where do they stand today? Of course. Very generic and flat answers. That's its problem in these things, in my view. It's clear to you that it understands things amazingly and what I'm asking, but it's generic. I actually sometimes like it when people give me slightly off answers, because it's more important to me to see why they think it. To say that someone tells me something, I don't, you know, write down, that's a mistake. Why? Tell me why. And then explain. That's the... oh, cool, why does he think it's X and not Y? Those are the places I'm looking to see. That's where right or wrong lies. No matter what metric he gave me at the start.

Eyal David: [32:02] And do you see any new trends, like, in interviews? Let me explain. Do you see people coming more prepared to interviews? What does it look like?

The trend of candidates using AI tools live

Shira Moyal: [32:10] I see a lot of people asking to show me, like, working with tools. I've seen people who, live, say, like, can we work with tools, which is a bit of a strange situation, because... Why? Again. Because I have some... you can't outsource your thinking. Ah, no, it's not like it was, like, it's not for estimating things, understanding market trends and such, no? Like, it's somewhere in between, okay? That's the fog. Let's say live, yes? I can't monitor, and I'm also not interested in monitoring the prompt they write. And I see lots, lots, lots of people who understand that the sense really matters, and that's where the center of gravity is, and then they come very methodological, but almost too much. Now you tell them to prioritize, so they'll tell you, okay, so RICE. Or ICE, or whatever all the... they swap the... for you. Yes. So they tell you exactly what's needed, and make sure to show me that the answer is structured. And these are things that maybe, by the way, it's funny, because it's a mix of new and old. Like, once you'd go very methodological in job interviews, to show you master the methodologies, and it's also mixed with the new, because it's also important to them to show they have the sense. Like, they understand how you need to think. So there's some mix there that doesn't really work for me, I admit. I connect to it less. I have no problem with you taking me freestyle, but prove that you... How well would it work if I came with a product I built,

Eyal David: [33:32] and I know how to explain it, to actually answer those questions from that angle? Love that. And do you see people like that?

Shira Moyal: [33:40] I see it in the home assignment we give, again depending on the role you're interviewing for and so on, but we gave a home assignment that's very much about building something zero to one on purpose, because it... Why do you see it? And then you really see who knows how to ask the right questions, and then the use of AI is cool, because it's amplifying the ability. Ah, this is a person who understands research, understands the business, understands strategy, so their questions are right, why would I care that they use AI? In the end they're steering the AI. And it's amazing, like, you see assignments that are... If we're also talking about execution here, then suddenly you understand there's also a candidate here who can be a team of their own. Right, takes it. By the way, we have teams today, not many yet, that are made up of two people who do everything. That became possible thanks to this. Okay? So maybe not in all the core's centers of gravity, but we definitely have people who run and do amazing things and move needles and metrics, with two people who know how to run fast. Would you go back to that? I personally lead a core team, which is like the core of Imagen's work, the business, the money and so on, things that are usually heavier and involve, apropos, heavy AI models. So our use of AI comes in other places, like you can't run zero to one alone with ChatGPT or...

Home assignments: what she looks for in them

Eyal David: [35:01] Exactly, but would you go back to it now, working you and... I don't know, you and one other person and running? No. Why?

Shira Moyal: [35:08] I told you we work in squads. For me, it's not my first time, by the way, for me it upgraded my work like crazy. It doesn't replace having a team where everyone has a role, like, you have a programmer, you have a PMM, you have a data analyst, everyone sits at the same table, a designer, I'd never replace it, it's like, everyone works toward the same goal. Okay, let's play a game. Let's say that... okay, those entities stay,

Eyal David: [35:33] some of them sit at the table with you, some of them don't anymore. What difference does it make? It's not, it just again comes back to it's all me. I really put... No, it's a bit like it used to be. Well, not used to be, it's like, you know, okay, there are people who work remotely. Right. So there are agents who work remotely. What difference does it make? Would you go back now to a situation where the team is you and one other person and all the rest are agents? Because I think that's where it's heading, that synergy.

Shira Moyal: [35:58] That's exactly what I was about to say. You're kind of asking me if I'd go back, but in my view it's actually the step forward. It's really heading toward shrinking teams, even holding several scopes that aren't even related to the role, in quotes, apropos changes in the role. And it's starting to be like that. I don't want to say centralized, because it's not centralized, it's just an element of two. When I say "know how to do everything," it's like you're saying, there are agents and they know how to consult with... Because like, I mean, it suddenly clicked for me that the further we go,

Eyal David: [36:29] the skill that becomes most important is decision making. Right. Right? Exactly. What are you doing around that now to sharpen that ability?

Decision-making is the new core skill

Shira Moyal: [36:37] Um... I think it was always a thing, like, in recent years I think it was always the most important thing, and now really much more, because like we said, everyone knows how to "run fast," the question is whether it's in the right direction, and whether I know which ideas to kill and what to actually do. Like, you... There's now this thing, sorry, let me give an intro, of "because we're running really fast," so all the managers and CEOs and everyone, I hear it from friends too, so do lots and lots and lots of things and we'll do validations and move fast and break things. And that's not the point. Like, the point is to say: "okay, I can validate, I can test tons of solutions in no time, but then deciding what to go with, that's the product, that's the strategy, that's the business, that's the real decision-making." Um... and I want to say that what enables better decision-making is that today I have much more time to really focus on those questions. Where is my company going? What's the thing we want to achieve? What's the next step? Meeting more with customers, dealing much more with research, less with driving my team, the team, I mean, the working team, the scope, the engineering, with managing to get there, to get things done at the end. That's the thing you need to practice and also show in those interviews. Right. That's exactly what I also told you, that's exactly what I'm looking for, whether you can really take something apart and put it back together, and people show you their way of thinking. That too, and obviously in the end I also want them to reach a solution, because it shows, like you say, that they also know how to make a decision. But it's more than that, it's making decisions at scale and fast. Right. That's what I look at, it's not only that you were right. Right, crazy fast too. And I also want to say, making, once you'd make a decision between A

From choosing between two options to choosing between eight

Eyal David: [38:06] and B, now it's between A and H. Like, there are so many possible solutions you're told about, so out of the 15 options, come tell me which one. It's crazy, and under very fast conditions, and sometimes without much validation.

"The middle has disappeared": who's at risk

Shira Moyal: [38:21] One more word about discovery and AI: it lets you test directions much faster, really validate many more lines of thinking, and it's much easier for me today to say, give me a few days and I'll go through things, what used to take me a month, so that now I can say, ah, I have 15 ideas, I'll tell you which is best. So there's also, like, right, you need to make decisions on very short and very fast timelines. The tolerance for discovery too, it's going and saying,

Eyal David: [38:48] guys, there aren't two weeks now to go interview 100 customers, like, run. There's another thing here, yes, you said tolerance, and I also experience it from the other side, interviewees don't have patience either. Right. So you need to be very, very precise about the questions you ask, and prepare. And actually here, on the personal side, we do a podcast here, so we kind of ask questions and answer. That's another skill that I feel, wow, is also very worth sharpening. Being human.

Shira Moyal: [39:17] Authenticity now stands out many times over. I can say that interviews I did a year and a half ago for my team and interviews done today look completely different. Now the persona also really stands out. You start seeing very clearly who's reciting and who isn't. Both in the home assignments you read offline and in the conversation. You see who understands, and again, that also connects for me to that sense. You see who has it, and brings something honest and something a bit deeper, as opposed to really all those buzzwords. Okay, but we won't say all is lost, just practice. A hundred percent, the opposite, I think. For those who are new, this is the time. Always, here, I told you this earlier, you can't outsource thinking if you're new. Go deep, understand, learn. People we interview today already, you know, mid-levels and seniors, that's a whole other thing, I have a completely different expectation, but obviously everything can be learned, everything can be deepened, we've all used these tools, the point is to use them right, and like you say, decision-making, steering well, is the essence of product, whether it's my team or an AI tool. If I ask the right questions, I'll probably get something good. I think it greatly amplifies those who know, and greatly weakens those for whom this skill was weak to begin with, because otherwise I'll just get generic answers I don't know how to verify and don't know how to check. The middle has disappeared. Right. I have more gems. Yes. For example, why are they building so much in Tel Aviv, why is there so much office construction here for another ten years, when we're talking about the fact that actually... Why? Really? Mentally they'll do a third with it. More companies, maybe they're ignoring it, I have all kinds of assumptions. But I think today people are going much more toward... okay, you know what? There's actually a trend bringing everyone back to the office, so I can't really say anymore. It keeps changing. That's it, like during COVID they also said people wouldn't come back somehow, in real estate. There's no real reason today, like, yes? I, again, I'm a sucker for coming to the office, but I can understand. Interesting. I don't know which...

Why authenticity in interviews matters many times more now

For newcomers: don't outsource your thinking

Eyal David: [41:09] Yes, yes. From my gifts and such, that I can now say it as a curse too. So I want, before we wrap up, give us some recommendations, after all, discovery, things like that. What do you recommend focusing on, maybe some sources? So I, uh... tools that work for you. So okay, I'll say for a moment that within AI tools,

Recommended tools, books and frameworks

Shira Moyal: [41:32] for all of what I call the preliminary research, really any chat, Claude and so on, you can use them for competitive landscape, also train them on personas so you can create a conversation with, like, a photographer, or whatever domain people work in, feedback analysis, all of that, and even play around a bit with which directions the market is going, maybe solutions. For the whole middle, which is like, I already know more or less which directions I'm going, I'd say it's a bit more solution discovery even, and less opportunity. So really all the tools that let me do user testing in a second and build a prototype in a minute, like Base44, like Lovable, doesn't matter which, everyone uses something, and then come and do user testing can take me a week and I already have answers to everything, which is amazing. It used to take me much longer. And in general, product-wise, I really love Teresa Torres's OST, that's Continuous Discovery Habits, but not because of the methodology, because it forces me to think about opportunities, and only afterwards go down to the solutions side, because we immediately, especially when we know the domain well, immediately say, ah, I know what they want. It challenges that place. It also gives us good pushback, and also shows that you can build a tree, like there aren't only two solutions, there's more to run with. And I'll say it works well for me, also for anyone listening who doesn't have time for discovery or whose organization isn't like that. Also reverse-engineering it: even if we were handed a scope, you can challenge it at the research level. Why am I doing this? What does it serve? Which opportunity? Like, you don't have to give up product thinking. Okay, we've attacked the time issue,

Teresa Torres's Continuous Discovery Habits

Eyal David: [43:10] we said there's no such thing anymore, there's no time. Right. And I think you also have an excellent talk on this, so we'll put a link, we'll put it in the show notes. Shira, so great that you came. Wow, I really enjoyed it. Right? Really. Me too. So okay, you're coming back here in a year, we'll see where things stand. And where AI stands. Where AI stands. Maybe it'll record for us. It's editing now, so you know, cool. Yalla, so thank you very much.