Sanchan Saxena (VP of Product at Coinbase) on the inside story of how Airbnb made it through Covid; what he’s learned from Brian Chesky, Brian Armstrong, and Kevin Systrom; much more

1. Design Ideal End-State First

When building a product, first design the ideal ‘15 out of 10’ end-state experience without initial constraints on time or resources. Then, build the best possible, lovable product in one location or iteration, learn from it, and scale the pieces that worked.

2. Prioritize Product Intentionality

Begin product development by defining the intentionality of the product – the ideal world you want to create for your customers – rather than letting A/B tests dictate the vision. Use A/B testing as a tool to find the fastest route to that desired end state, not as a substitute for vision.

3. Embrace Little Bets & Pivot

Instead of rigid long-term career plans, take ’little bets’ by jumping into opportunities that give you energy, then pivot and learn rapidly if they don’t work out. This approach helps create a dynamic career path by adapting to new learnings.

4. Hire Content-Savvy Leaders

Prioritize hiring leaders who understand ‘content’ – knowing what to do, when, and how to win in your industry – over those who primarily know ‘process.’ It’s easier to teach process to content-savvy individuals than to teach content to process-focused ones, especially in early-stage startups.

5. Implement DRI Decision Model

Adopt a Directly Responsible Individual (DRI) model for projects, where one person is accountable for making the final decision after gathering written input from cross-functional partners. Others must then ‘disagree and champion’ the decision, fostering speed and cutting passive-aggressive behaviors.

6. Inspire Belief in Crisis

To maintain morale during a crisis, shift from feature or revenue obsession to ‘belief obsession’ by reminding employees of the fundamental mission and why the company will eventually thrive. Leaders must be vulnerable, honest, and tell stories that make the future seem possible.

7. Adopt Rapid Crisis Planning

In times of crisis where data changes daily, shift to short, rapid planning cycles (e.g., two weeks) to react quickly to urgent company needs. This allows for faster adaptation and recovery when long-term plans are impossible.

8. Trust Gut & Intuition

Don’t discount your gut or intuition in product decisions, especially when data is scarce or changing rapidly. View intuition as data that is not yet statistically significant, but built from immersion and understanding of the situation and customers.

9. Embrace Failure for Learning

Foster a team culture where the failure of experiments is celebrated as a learning opportunity, not a setback. This mindset encourages rapid recovery and helps avoid future mistakes, energizing people even when things don’t go as planned.

10. Accelerate Product Learning

Early-stage product managers should prioritize jobs that make them the fastest learners in the field, focusing on both the art (sniffing out trends) and science (data-informed decisions) of product management. No course or degree will help as much as rapid, hands-on learning.

11. Optimize Company for Learning

When choosing a company, understand if you want to optimize for ‘starter’ (getting things going), ‘zero-to-one’ (scaling initial ideas), or ‘scaler’ (optimizing established systems) learnings. Recognize where you thrive to find the best environment for your personal growth.

12. Unify Teams in Crisis

During a crisis, dissolve the concept of sub-teams and operate as one unified company, moving engineers and PMs to address the most urgent needs for survival. This ensures everyone rows in the same direction and resources are optimally allocated.

13. Founder Leads Crisis Front

Founders must be at the front line during a crisis, being constantly available, interacting, making decisions, and communicating transparently with employees. This builds trust and belief in the founder’s ability to navigate the challenges.

14. Simplify Product Strategy

A key superpower for product leaders is the ability to simplify strategy and vision, cutting through noise and complaints to provide clear, actionable direction for the team. This clarity helps employees understand ‘who you want to be when you grow up’ as a product.

15. Persist Through Ideas

Cultivate impatience with getting started on new ideas, but pair it with patience for seeing them through, as many brilliant concepts are abandoned too early. Persistence is crucial to allow ideas to mature and demonstrate their full potential.

16. Focus Amidst Ambiguity

When operating in highly ambiguous and noisy environments with little data, build conviction by staying focused on your core beliefs and ignoring external noise. Trust a DRI mindset and aligned team to move forward, even when the path isn’t perfectly clear.

17. Assess with Work Challenges

In interviews, use work challenges to assess a candidate’s depth of thinking and problem-solving approach, looking for ‘content’ (specific actions and strategies) rather than just process descriptions. This reveals how they would actually execute and contribute.

18. Probe Individual Contributions

When interviewing, ask candidates to detail their precise individual role and contributions in past projects, not just what their team achieved. This helps understand their direct impact and how they operate within a team.

19. Lead by Getting in Mud

Leaders should be willing to ‘go into the mud’ with their team, actively helping with the content of their work and co-creating solutions, rather than solely delegating. This keeps leaders relevant and helps set their team up for success.

20. Ask ‘Why’ in Interviews

A powerful interview question is, ‘Tell me the story of your career and focus more on why you did what you did.’ This helps uncover a candidate’s motivations, decision-making, and personal narrative beyond the polished ‘what’ on their resume.