Office Hours: I’m the Director of Product Management at GitLab. I’m Jackie Porter. AMA!Featured

Thanks so much for joining us @jacquelineporter!Elphas – please ask @jacquelineporter your questions before Friday, December 6th. @jacquelineporter may not have time to answer every questions, so emoji upvote your favorites 🔥👍🏾➕

Hi Jackie! So great to see you do this AMA.I am a Product Design Lead, 10 years experience as an IC and 2 years into people management. I'm working very strategically in a startup (we're few enough people that a handful of middle managers basically carry the company), and I'm currently working towards moving out of IC work and completely into the management/leadership track. What advice do you have for people moving into leadership and striving to be Directors not just in a startup but in a larger corporation – what are the top 3 skills to work on and experiences to prove in order to succeed as a leader?Thank you so much :)

Hi Jackie,Reading about your expertise is truly inspiring, thank you for sharing!I’m organizing the second edition of the AI User Conference, taking place April 15–17 at Fort Mason, San Francisco. I’d love to discuss with you the opportunity for a speaking engagement on the main or participation in a roundtable.Looking forward to connect! Also, I'll be sharing more about the Conference in a dedicated post :) Link to the website: https://www.aiuserconference.com/

Love this! Thanks for the invite and definitely interested.

Hi Jackie,Thanks for being here! I'd love to know more about your career journey, how did you get into product management? What do you love about it? What do you wish you would spend less time on in the role? Thanks!

I started my career as a program manager and shifted into a product leadership role that needed a lot of business and project management skill sets. I love that I get to tangibly make an impact on users, customers, and businesses by collecting the best requirements and use cases for delivery. I wish I spent more time connecting outside of my primary critical path of work. I find I spend so much time not really building relationships outside of the team I need to deliver products with.

hey jackie! what are some of your best async communication tips? still struggling with this as a remote team...

Hi Jackie, I have one question:What are the three most important things for you that the engineering director counterpart does?

@norazeidan - this is a fabulous question. I have had the benefit of working with exceptional engineering counterparts and terrible engineering counterparts. The three characteristics and working behaviors that I found the most useful are:1. Trust and deep belief in my role as a product lead, including understanding the customer needs, commercial opportunity, and vision. Getting to this point requires transparent, iterative conversations about how the product should work and what we are trying to accomplish. Engineering leaders who approached the vision and problem with positive intent and respected my role were able to co-create a better product that delivered superior results for our customers. 2. Ownership over their engineering vision, goals, and opinionated view on where the technology should go. I have found my ability to deliver strong results for users and customers was only possible with an Engineering lead that understood what it took technically to get there. We were then able to scale and perform with the growth. 3. Keen focus on team health. Engineering leaders that prioritize the team health, growth, and career development culture have been the most productive, committed, and energized engineering functions. It is so much easier to build a winning product when the team feels like they are winning.

Howdy! I have two questions. :)1. Would you ever hire a designer with 10 years freelance experience to product manage? Working with so many projects has afforded me the skills to tease out requirements and priorities. And 8 years mentor experience helping students complete projects. Just curious as I navigate potentially switching paths. :) currently a UX designer for a dev tool/platform. 2. What do you manage on your ranch? We have a budding homestead and love every second of it!Thank you so much! -Leah

@LeahKaySimons - your experience sound amazing and rich with different contexts and perspectives. As a practice, I focus on hiring designers and PMs with a track record of delivering exceptional or outsized business results. I believe if you can highlight that in your resume and LinkedIn profile, there is no reason for you not be considered as a viable candidate for many product organizations. It is critical to show how your interactions impacted users and customers tangibly!Re: ranch - we have cows and lots of pastures! On our property we also have 12 fruit trees and pecan trees.

Hello! Can you tell us more about idea management? How do you prioritize which features to work on?