Inside Linear: Building with taste, craft, and focus | Karri Saarinen (co-founder, designer, CEO)

1. Prioritize High-Level Design Early

Ensure your product has a high level of design from the very beginning, as the bar for user attention and serious consideration is now very high across most domains. This is crucial because crowded markets demand superior design to stand out against numerous existing solutions.

2. Cultivate Craft-Focused Hiring

When hiring, actively seek individuals who deeply care about product quality and craft, as this foundational value is essential for the business’s success. A product with friction or ‘paper cuts’ will annoy users, hindering collaboration and overall adoption.

3. Iterate Early, Polish Later

Instead of perfecting designs upfront, launch early versions of features to internal teams or opt-in beta customers to gather feedback and discover improvements. This approach balances the need for quick iteration with the goal of delivering a highly polished experience for general release.

4. Empower Project Team Ownership

Foster craft and quality by giving project teams, consisting of engineers and designers, full ownership over their work. This enables them to identify and implement detailed improvements, as they are intimately involved in the building process.

5. Align Founders on Quality

Founders must align on the importance of quality and craft to establish a consistent company culture. This alignment ensures that these values are instilled throughout the organization and consistently prioritized.

6. Hire Product-Minded Engineers & Designers

Reduce reliance on numerous Product Managers by hiring engineers and designers who possess strong product thinking, decision-making skills, and an interest in a broader scope beyond their specific technical role. This approach empowers builders to contribute more holistically to the product.

7. Interview for Product Sensibility

When interviewing non-PM roles, specifically inquire about candidates’ opinions on past product decisions, why they were made, and what they would have done differently. Look for candidates who can articulate reasoned arguments and demonstrate deep product judgment.

8. Leverage Design as a Differentiator

In crowded and mature markets, invest heavily in design and user experience, as it becomes a significant differentiator to attract and retain users. A strong brand and good design set high expectations and draw people to your product.

9. Build an Authentic Brand Gradually

Develop your brand authentically over time through consistent actions, communication, customer treatment, and product/website design, rather than just focusing on logos or colors. This builds a strong identity that resonates with your target audience and sets expectations.

10. Review Designs by Hands-On Testing

Conduct design reviews by personally interacting with the product, testing different states, and clicking around to identify janky animations or subtle flaws. This hands-on approach often reveals execution issues that demos might miss, ensuring the desired quality before release.

11. Implement Work Cycles for Focus

Utilize ‘cycles’ (similar to sprints) to define a focused set of priorities for a specific timeframe, such as one or two weeks. This helps teams concentrate on a few key tasks and avoid distractions from an ever-growing list of potential work.

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Avoid setting specific numerical metrics goals for individual features or launches, as product success in complex systems is not always reducible to single metrics. Instead, focus on solving problems and ensuring customer satisfaction with the solution.

13. Balance Intuition with Research

Combine user research and customer interaction (‘science’) with informed intuition and judgment (‘magic’) when making product decisions. This approach ensures a deep understanding of customer needs while allowing for decisive action without being solely driven by data.

14. Encourage Team-Wide Customer Engagement

Foster a culture where the entire team, including engineers and designers, regularly interacts with customers, answers questions, and gains a deep understanding of their problems. This shared empathy and understanding inform better product decisions.

15. Embrace Mistakes, Prioritize Fixing

Cultivate an organizational mindset that is comfortable with making mistakes, viewing them as opportunities for learning and quick correction. This encourages decisive action rather than paralysis from fear of making the wrong choice.

16. Focus on the Main Quest

Prioritize tasks that directly advance the core mission of building and improving the product for customers, consciously avoiding ‘side quests’ or non-essential activities. This ensures sustained focus and efficient progress on high-impact work.

17. Delay Non-Essential Certifications

Postpone non-critical tasks, such as obtaining security certifications (e.g., SOC 2), until they are genuinely necessary for business operations or customer requirements. This maintains focus on core product development in early stages.

18. Hire Fewer, High-Scope Individuals

Build a lean team by hiring fewer, highly capable individuals who are willing and able to take on a broader scope of responsibilities than their specific job title suggests. This fosters a more agile and interconnected team where people rarely limit themselves to ‘it’s not my job’.

19. Utilize Paid Work Trials for Hiring

Implement paid work trials as the final step in the hiring process, allowing candidates to work on a real problem with the team, gaining access to the codebase and internal communications. This provides both the company and the candidate a realistic assessment of fit and working style.

20. Segment-Specific Product Market Fit

View product market fit not as a binary state, but as a spectrum across different market segments, focusing on achieving strong fit within one segment before expanding. This allows for targeted development and maximizes impact in specific customer groups.

21. Double Down on Market Pull

When you observe strong traction or ‘pull’ from a specific customer category (e.g., AI companies, crypto companies), actively focus on acquiring more customers from that segment. This strategy leverages existing success and market demand.

22. Launch Authentically to Target Audience

When announcing your company, craft direct and authentic messages that clearly explain ‘what’ you are building and ‘why,’ tailored to resonate with your initial target audience. This helps attract the right early users and builds a genuine connection.

23. Engage Remote Teams with Shared Activities

For fully remote and distributed teams, organize engaging group activities like a baking or cooking competition via video call. This fosters team bonding, provides a fun shared experience, and can even reinforce company values like craft.

24. CEO: Delegate and Empower Leaders

As a CEO, recognize the wide range of responsibilities and actively learn to delegate tasks by hiring and empowering other leaders to take ownership of specific areas. This helps manage diverse demands and allows for personal focus.

25. Go Slow to Go Fast

Adopt the motto ‘go slow to go fast,’ emphasizing the importance of taking sufficient time to think and plan before rushing into tasks. This approach minimizes rework and ultimately leads to faster, higher-quality execution.

26. Practice Respect for People and Things

Cultivate a mindset of respect not only for people but also for the things you use, taking good care of them by cleaning and putting them away properly. This promotes a culture of appreciation and longevity.