Applying Emerging Technology to the Roadmap

[00:00:00] Michael Mordak: Welcome everybody. Welcome to the latest event in our community event series. We’re seeing these grow and become a valuable way for members to engage. With the experts who’ve been contributing to the product manager. So thanks for, for showing up today and taking part. I’m really happy. We get to share some more insight and more knowledge with, with everyone here.

For anybody who doesn’t know me already, my name is Michael Mordak. I’m the community lead for the product manager. Uh, in today’s session, we’re going to focus on applying emerging technology to the roadmap. And now we very specifically did not write AI in the title because we’re going to try to talk a bit more broadly about just technology in general.

Um, and we’ve got a great guest here today to talk to, to us about that. Um, and Sneha Nirahali, who is the head of product and UX at Sephora. So Sneha, we were just chatting about. This really cool, um, reading that, that you’ve put in your, your house recently. So you’ve been getting a lot more reading done.

What’s, what’s been on your, the top of your list? What have you been reading recently?

[00:00:59] Sneha Narahalli: So I [00:01:00] usually read like multiple books at the same time, like one, which is. Fiction, which is, you know, you don’t have to use your brain a lot and just, like, have fun. So I love medical mysteries. So I’m reading this book by Robin Cook called Pandemic.

I love Robin Cook. Um, I’m reading, um, Haruki Murakami, like, South of the Border, West of the Sun, which is also, like, very interesting writing. Both my parents are writers. So I love, um, Just good writing and, you know, deep, thoughtful, um, discussion. And the third one I’m reading is Invisible Women. It’s like, um, data bias, um, right from when humans existed in the world of how that data bias is going to impact, like the future decisions we make, which is just mind blowing on just uncovering where all the [00:02:00] data biases is.

I

[00:02:02] Michael Mordak: mean, it sounds, it sounds amazing. And I can’t imagine how differently, you’d be approaching these books, having both your parents be writers. Like that would be such a neat perspective to, to bring to it. Cause I’m sure that you’ve probably read a number of their things and you’ve probably heard a lot of, of their knowledge and insight.

Just ask.

[00:02:21] Sneha Narahalli: I My dad is a critique and his books are so complicated. I like, even to understand the title, I’m like, uh, what exactly is this? So I haven’t read, I don’t think I even read one of my dad’s books. Um, but my mom is a fictional writer. So I’ve read hers and, um, like her first book was about my dog who passed away and like the life of.

Like through his eyes, like how the life was, um, which is like, they write in like Canada, which is like my mother tongue, but it’s been translated to other languages as well.

[00:02:57] Michael Mordak: Oh, very cool. That’s so interesting.

[00:02:59] Sneha Narahalli: And it [00:03:00]

[00:03:00] Michael Mordak: sounds like a really intriguing story. Um, now I would love to just chat about books all day, but, uh, we are here to chat about products, so we’re going to get into it.

Um, really quick. Just wanted to kind of go through some housekeeping notes to the session is being recorded and will be made available shortly afterwards. And we’ll be using clips from it on our, on our website and on social, um, cameras and microphones are off by default. So you won’t appear on the recording.

Um, and given that this is an ask the expert session, we are encouraged to ask questions. So please, uh, jump into the chat and ask any questions as they come up and we will get those front and center for Um, so before we get into the, the juiciest of questions, um, I want to level set quickly because I’m sure that, uh, a lot of folks that are tuning in today, you know, read the title of this event, like I mentioned, and thought AI, how can I get AI implemented through our organization?

Um, [00:04:00] but as we chatted about, we want to zoom out a little bit because, um, It’s not just about getting AI involved in the product right now. It’s about, you know, the process, um, that’s that, that, you know, we need to have in place in order to seek out new tech, um, weigh the pros and cons and determine whether it’s going to fit in our product strategy and work within our teams.

So, um, we’re going to, we’re going to start there at the very top. So anyhow, what kind of tech should we be looking for? When trying to make improvements to our products or the way we work outside of AI.

[00:04:35] Sneha Narahalli: So I think the question I would rephrase the question to what is the problem you’re trying to solve for because tech is the way to solve something you already know needs to be solved and not the other way around.

Um, and there’s various ways to look at like what kind of tech would help solve the problem that you’re looking [00:05:00] at. Um, taking a step back. I think The first thing is maturity of the organization and where you are in terms of like the technology stack that you have. Um, and are you in the beginning of a journey or are you looking at implementing a more complex and more advanced use case?

The second is build versus buy. Are we looking at technology as an organization? Is it more a build versus buy or is it a combination? Because I have been in organizations where they were like everything is built in house versus in organizations where We don’t want to build everything like we’re going to invest in things that are strategic to us and we’re going to invest only in that.

And then the third thing to look at is now versus the future. Like, is this technology something that we’re looking at right now? Um, and will this help us support [00:06:00] the use cases in the future as well? So having, putting these lenses when you’re looking at what is the problem you’re trying to solve, the part that you go down towards varies.

Um, so it’s not like a one solution fits all. So as an example, um, I think personalization is like the buzzword these days. So, um, and everybody seems to be doing it. I, I, it’s very hard to find companies who. don’t mention like personalization. So, um, again, if you are trying to understand the problem statement of in personalization, what are you trying to solve for?

Second is, is this a strategic initiative for the company that you want to invest in? And are there areas of the solution that You would have like point solution tech built in versus like, are you looking at the solution for a problem right now? [00:07:00] Versus the end vision of where you ideally would like personalization to be.

And then you look at the kind of tech that would help solve all of these.

[00:07:11] Michael Mordak: Yeah, those are, those are really great points. And one that stood out to me a lot is the idea of building versus buying that tech. And I wonder if, um, you see a more of a trend where there is a bit more building going on maybe, uh, just because You know, again, I don’t want to make this all about AI, but I has been able to, uh, to make, you know, some of those build outs a bit easier because it can take on some of the work.

And so I wonder if you’ve seen like a trend of, of seeing more folks leaning maybe a bit more onto the build side of things, even if it doesn’t necessarily align with the overall strategy, but because there are ways now to make it a bit easier than potentially investing money into buying something.

[00:07:55] Sneha Narahalli: Actually, not really. I don’t think, um, I’m seeing a [00:08:00] trend of build. What I am seeing a trend of is, um, more point solutions for, um, customized problem statements that any company has versus a lift and shift of like the entire tech stack saying that we will come and solve all your problems. Right. I think we’ve moved away from technology solutions saying, you know, sometimes.

vendors come and ask me like, Hey, what’s bothering you? Like, what’s keeping you up at night? I mean, like, there’s so many things that’s keeping me up at night, right? Like my dog was not well, so that’s keeping me up at night. So are you going to come help solve that for me? Um, To like in loyalty or like in marketing in your stores like specifically what is the problem that you’re trying to solve for because the tech stack that is [00:09:00] foundationally there in the companies as well is being built in a way that can accommodate these point solutions and also building for a scale where you can.

Switch these point solutions as more advanced technologies come into play because you’re not married to the technology forever. You’ll have to adapt and like navigate to like more, um, recent and like more updated technology. So cool. The infrastructure you’re building is basically catering to a world which is going to change and you’re accommodating for these point solutions that are being built.

[00:09:42] Michael Mordak: No, that’s a really interesting perspective to kind of bring to it. I’m glad you dove into it. Um, now I wanted to move on to the next one, which I have here. I see this in my own work and I’m sure everybody else is seeing it as well, but we read about just a plethora of new tech of software and tools [00:10:00] that all claim that they can make our work easier and, and more streamlined.

Um, so how are you personally cutting through all of that noise to identify which ones actually have potential?

[00:10:13] Sneha Narahalli: So I think, as I mentioned earlier, um, the first, um, um, Point is understanding what even making work easier means, because the definition of like what that means, if you truly ask, like, what does that mean for you, Michael, versus what that means for me, we would love two different answers.

So when the problem is like in two different viewpoints, of course, the solution will vary. So I think the first point is to like understand, um, from each of these technology and software and whatever to understand, to understand what exactly the problem statement is and what it means for each of us and actually narrowing down [00:11:00] to the success KPIs of what success means for each of these.

Um, the second thing is. Once you do understand the value that a technology brings into the organization, is this truly a problem that is of priority to the organization? Or is this, um, is this a nice to have at this point? Given a world of unlimited constraints, if I had the leeway to like have unlimited budget, unlimited resources.

Of course, I would want to solve all the problems that I have. But we do live in a world where we have to prioritize. And that is the most important thing of like, is this a problem worth solving for you right now? And is this what the business is looking for? Right now? The third thing is, it’s always helpful.

If a technology that you’re building. It’s just not looking at [00:12:00] the individual problem you’re trying to solve now, but it’s going to help you unlock more of the use cases that you’re not thinking about in the future so that you are building for the future and it does not complicate your tech stack because the more technology you bring in, you might also be putting band aids on like the foundation that you have, which will increase your.

Development costs, your stability or support costs and just like how the technology talks to each other. So looking at always having this view, this is where like your architecture team comes into play where they’re constantly looking at is the health of my technology architecture in a way that will support the scale that the organization wants.

I think it’s the third way to like cut down through the noise and have some of these guardrails where. You don’t even have to invest a lot in exploring if it doesn’t meet like your basic criteria, that [00:13:00] it would help you achieve what you want.

[00:13:04] Michael Mordak: Oh, those are, those are all super great points. And I’m wondering when you’re, um, like for some of this new tech that’s, we’re seeing all these different, um, um, things come through, like, are you actually going out and seeking some of these new tools or, or are you kind of just waiting For things to come across your desk because you know that they will.

Um, and if you are seeking them out, where do you go to find some of these things?

[00:13:25] Sneha Narahalli: I wish it would just like land on my desk in like a bow wrapped up and said, here’s the solution. Um, there are so many ways right now that it’s kind of overwhelming at times as well to just keep up to date with what’s happening.

Um, personally, for me, Conferences play a big role, um, in just understanding. I don’t go to a conference saying that I want a technology solution for this [00:14:00] problem. I go to a conference with, um, What am I going to learn from here that I don’t know already? Or what is a problem that people are building solutions for that we are not thinking at all is a problem for us?

And third is, has the problem statement that we had thought of evolved to a new, um, stage and advanced to like a new complexity that we’re still trying to solve what a problem was 10 years ago? Because The same like whether it’s omni channel or personalization like all of these are not new things, right?

Like these have been in existence for like more than like a decade right now But the definition of what that means has evolved. So that’s one of the channels where I get to know what’s happening second, I think building a network [00:15:00] of Not like of what others are doing in the industry because through these interactions you also just talk to like really smart people who are also trying to solve the same thing.

So I believe in like a philosophy that it’s, I’m going to share my problems, right? I’m not selfish about my problems. If I have something, you can all be a part of it. Um, so I think just sharing with, um, the brilliant minds out there just unlocks new perspective. Um, there are also like a lot of vendors and, you know, partners reaching out on a day to day basis.

Um, but again, like finding the ones where they’re not asking you, like, What’s your problem? I can help you versus here is how I think we could help you solve a problem just shows the, you know, the incentive and the proactiveness that the [00:16:00] partner has come up with in saying that how they could add value.

Um, and the last thing, of course, just reading and keeping up to date with all the changes that are happening through various of these social channels, be it like LinkedIn or Instagram or like any of like products that count, like which tell, um, all of these, um, amazing, um, technological advancements are some of the ways that I hope I’m keeping aware of, you know, what’s happening.

[00:16:29] Michael Mordak: I love that. I really like brings in a lot of perspective. And I think one of the most interesting ones that set out was the like going to conferences and just having conversations with people to find out, you know, what they’re using, because I think that there’s so much more value out of. Um, like hearing their problems and then finding out how they approach to getting some of the nitty gritty information about like how exactly it solved their problem and you know what their success metrics were.

Like you said earlier, you know, you know, the tool that you’re looking for to solve your problem or like the problems that you’re having are [00:17:00] going to be very different from the ones that, That I have in our metrics for, for success are going to be different. So that’s, that’s super interesting. I love that.

And I mean, that’s also kind of one of the reasons why we do things like this is to get those real stories from folks about like, what are the problems that you’re addressing right now? Um, Oh, sorry. Uh, you finish, finish that one off. And then there’s a, there’s a question in the, in the chat there.

[00:17:23] Sneha Narahalli: Yes.

Like the interesting thing that I have found is technology is part of the problem, right? There is a lot of operational and change management that needs to happen that comes with technology that might be underrated in terms of effort. So even if you have the most amazing. Advanced technology, if your processes in the organizations are not set up for adoption of that technology, you’re setting up for failure.

And that’s as equally important as the technology itself. And, [00:18:00] um, I think right now that a lot of people are realizing that and there is, of course, the technology to solve that as well. Um, But I think that’s what I learned through some of this that you wouldn’t think is, you would think it’s easy. And, you know, it’s like, okay, you build something like people will use it, but it’s so underrated and so important on how you think about the other aspect.

[00:18:23] Michael Mordak: Yeah. And I love how you mentioned that there’s, there’s tools for that as well, because I mean, there’s just, there’s tools for everything and it just keeps piling on. And so it just becomes more, more of this conversation around how do you, how do we sort it through that noise? But, uh, this is actually a great lead into, um, a question that came in from the chat there, which, uh, Someone’s asking, when considering new tech, what have you found to be the catalyst for bringing in something new?

[00:18:48] Sneha Narahalli: So the biggest catalyst is, is it aligned with the strategy of the problems that we are trying to solve right now? That’s one. And I, when I [00:19:00] say strategy, I know strategy is also like an overused word where you use that in like all different contexts for me, it’s more, um, is this in the general direction of the area that you want to focus on because companies do have, um, I hope like strategic focus areas, um, which are not initiative.

These are themes that you want to focus on and you have initiatives within these themes that would help you actually solve that. So that’s one. Like, is this in the general direction of the strategy that we’re focusing on? Second, is this an area that is going to become a focus and is not yet a focus?

Because Let’s not get complacent that we have thought through everything. There will be areas that you’re probably haven’t thought through, and it’s a question to ask that should you be [00:20:00] thinking about it right now? Maybe you have not. Should you be? And the answer is usually yes, or it is yes, Not now, or it’s no.

So if it falls into the yes or yes, not now, again, that’s something to put in your backlog to like explore and say, we want to explore this more. The third thing is. If you know people who have had success with using this technology in a world that you are living in, or in a world that you want to live in, and you know the success stories already, I think that’s the third way where, um, it is, it is worth having a conversation to just say, okay, Let me understand like what, how did you get success or like, how did you derive the success?

And then you are, um, seeing if this translates to your organization or no. [00:21:00]

[00:21:00] Michael Mordak: Yeah, no, that’s, that’s fantastic. And there, there’s some things in there where, where you’re looking at, you know, um, kind of outwardly a bit in terms of like other folks and like what have other, other folks done and which kind of leads into a question that I got, um, from someone ahead of the call who, who, um, submitted the question ahead of time.

And so I’m going to throw this one out to you as well. But how does competitive analysis fit into your assessment of emerging tech?

[00:21:27] Sneha Narahalli: I think competitive analysis is something we do irrespective of whether it’s emerging tech or just tech in general, right? Because the definition of like emerging tech itself is quite subjective because Depending on the maturity of an organization, it might be an emerging tech for you, but it might be an existing tech, like right now, like, would you consider ML as an [00:22:00] emerging tech or is it like a non emerging tech?

I don’t know. Like, I don’t know what the definition of that is, but it’s, is it a tech that can solve the problems that we’re looking at? Yes. Like has it evolved to solve the problems that we thought about a few years ago faster at scale, more efficient? Definitely yes. Could it solve problems in a new way and unlock more insights and data?

Yes. Would the data that we get then be leverageable for the Gen AI solutions? Yes. Right. So I think it’s, um, the definition of emerging tech itself is like quite evolving. Um, so keeping that in mind, um, we do like comparative analysis for everything that we build only because we, you know that at least I believe, um, that there’s no harm in learning what’s out [00:23:00] there.

And the key thing being not being side, not being like very focused on just whether it’s a retailer or like a beauty retailer or like looking at what People consider as your competitor, but opening up the competitive analysis to a technology landscape, because there’s so much we can learn, like whether I’m in a retail company, I can learn from Spotify or like, uh, you know, so many different variations and aspects of like how technology is used, because the problem from an end customer standpoint remains the same, because as a human being, I have a goal, I want to accomplish it.

I want to accomplish it faster, cheaper. I want like minimum headaches while I’m doing it. So that kind of remains the same. So how are you looking at like competition in a way that you can expand your mind on [00:24:00] beyond the ecosystem that you’re looking at, um, has definitely opened up pathways learnings for us that I don’t think, you know, we had done so in the past.

[00:24:11] Michael Mordak: I love that. And, um, it, um, It made me think of something because you, you mentioned that the definition could be a bit subjective. Um, and you’re saying, you know, like it might be, it might be emerging to you in a way, which makes me think of when I, like, I buy a lot of used things. I’m on Facebook marketplace all the time and somebody will say, Oh, where’d you get that new thing?

And I say, well, it’s new to me. You know, so it could be emerging to you in this sense, as in like, maybe it’s just coming into your industry. And then I wanted to see if I could put you on the spot and, you know, you mentioned, um, not just thinking about how competitors in like the, the same industry as you, um, are, are coming up with or look, finding new technologies to adopt, but I wonder if there’s any examples that you have from times where you’ve maybe gone out [00:25:00] to, you know, And pulled technology from other industries, had conversations with folks, um, maybe at conferences, maybe just through your network about how they’re implementing a specific, uh, tool or software in their own practices, and then brought that into your own.

[00:25:15] Sneha Narahalli: I think, um, this is again, a constant, like regular process, I would say for us, like if you take an example of, Recommendation, right? Like you’re looking at like the term like product recommendation like product again for me as a retailer, whether it was like in Walmart or like Sears before. Like those are like actual physical products.

But if you are on Netflix, it’s still product recommendations, but the product there is like, you know, the content that you’re producing, um, in Spotify, also like content that you’re listening to. So, but the underlying technology is [00:26:00] still recommendation. So, um, learning from others on like. How this is actually built, like, what are the things that they look at?

How are they, is, is one to one personalization even worth it? Like, should we talk about, like, one to one? At some point, would you reach, you know, that curve where Maybe 80 percent of personalization is good enough. Maybe you don’t need one to one personalization. Um, another example is ranking, right? Like ranking also is such a broad technology that can be utilized in so many different things where, um, like when I was working in like The supply chain space, like ranking of drivers, like who would get the order the first, like who are the most likely that they should get, like ranking of customers?

Uh, how do you match the right customer to the right driver? So [00:27:00] again, these are things that, um, I’ve learned from like all of these other players of like how they do. Um, and you immediately know that there is something here that you can like. Learn from there’s definitely not like an immediate answer of like, here is like X, Y, Z that you can take away.

But there’s enough to say that, okay, this is an area we need to unpack more and like learn because it. The more things that retailers do, customers get used to these things and it becomes stable stakes. So even if you’re not doing it and somebody else is doing it, then customers are getting used to it.

So you will just have to like, think about it, whether you like it or no. Um, so just getting ahead of that curve and like understanding what people are doing differently. And you’re again, building the foundation that will adopt to [00:28:00] these changes. And now you’re not putting a million dollar investment and now saying, okay, I’m going to revamp this and like build this for this use case, I think is, um, you know, a few ways that I look at things.

[00:28:13] Michael Mordak: Yeah, I love that. And it’s, it’s interesting, this is almost becoming like an importance of networking and importance of, of chat, chatting with other people, attending conferences and, and building those relationships and having those conversations to find out how are folks doing things in all these different places.

Um, and I love that you brought that up because it’s, there’s, we’ve got a. The question on a bit of a flip side of that, which is, excuse me, how valuable are Forrester, Gartner and other analyst reports when evaluating tech and are those pay to play?

[00:28:46] Sneha Narahalli: Um, it depends on the question that you’re trying to get answered through some of these, um, channels.

Will they give you a solution saying here is the path [00:29:00] to take forward? Maybe not. Um, will it validate the direction that you are thinking? Would it give you exposure into aspects that you should be thinking about? Yes. But will it give you the solution to your problem? No. So that’s basically like how I feel that it has helped me.

Um, and the second thing again is it is an other channel that, um, you get to know what’s happening because they have the insight and the data into what’s A much more broader view than probably what you will have because they have a wider range of, um, insight into the industry. So again, that’s definitely like very important and like taking a very higher level look at like what [00:30:00] everybody else is thinking.

And then third, I think they bring in a very good perspective of unbiased opinion from a customer, retailer, brand, vendor, like there’s so many players that you are looking at in an ecosystems and they’re not biased against one or the other. So this unbiased view of like, this is what it is. You might not like the answer because it’s not favorable to you, but this is what we see.

Okay. I think sometimes also like reduces the bias. If you are unknowingly biased towards like a certain, um, area, I think it just reduces the bias as well.

[00:30:43] Michael Mordak: Great points. Awesome. Um, and I wanted to take a quick second because I noticed we’ve had a number of people jump into the call and a number of more attendees, uh, come into the call.

And, um, I am realizing that we had an error on our invitation link, [00:31:00] um, showing the wrong time. So, uh, I want to welcome everybody who’s just come in and I apologize for that, that error. I’m going to completely own it. Uh, but I want to welcome everybody who’s, who’s just come in. We’ve been chatting with Sneha for the last, the last, For the last, uh, 30 minutes.

And I would just want to let everybody know that there will be a recording available afterwards, so we can always go back and, uh, review the, the first half of the call, um, that being said, we’re going to keep rolling, uh, with it right now and, uh, I’ll say right here that, um, if you have any questions, this is an ask the expert session.

So please enter those questions in the chat, into the Q and a, um, and we will get those in front of Sneha. Um, and I love it. Yeah.

[00:31:44] Sneha Narahalli: I love how you owned it. And you’re like, this is reality. Like this is

[00:31:49] Michael Mordak: what

[00:31:49] Sneha Narahalli: happened. Yeah. This kind of stuff happens. Yeah,

[00:31:53] Michael Mordak: this kind of stuff happens. Um, not every time, but, uh, it does happen.

And, uh, I just, [00:32:00] yeah, I mean, I wanted to make sure that, that folks were aware of what was going on, because I know that a lot of people just came into the call expecting it to be a waiting room and then two people were already talking. Um, So yeah, so we did have a, uh, question from the chat here as well.

And this one, um, is going to be about Sephora specifically. So feel free to let me know. I don’t know about NDAs or that kind of stuff. Let me know where, where you can and can’t answer. But, uh, the question is what does the process look like in terms of ethical evaluations at Sephora when considering emerging tech?

You mentioned personalization at the beginning of the call and also machine learning. Who is responsible for advocating for the privacy and ethical considerations for Sephora’s customers during the discovery process?

[00:32:44] Sneha Narahalli: I will give like my general industry answer. Um, because again, having been in retail space for over a decade now, um, I would say it’s, it’s not that different than like all the [00:33:00] companies that I have seen and I have been with.

Um, there’s always a risk and governance Committee that looks at depending on, um, how complex or how high of a risk that the tech you’re going to bring in is to the company, like the risk evaluation itself, um, there is always legal privacy, compliance, security, one person from each of these, um, different functions, part of the committee who evaluates this, but before.

You even go into having a very rigorous process for any of the tech understanding again, like what is the appetite of for risk for that company based on what you’re getting in, how much of a risk does that tech actually bring in and then modifying the process so that it [00:34:00] doesn’t become a blocker or it doesn’t slow down the implementation, but it does give it.

the right, much needed evaluation that it deserves is how the process evolves based on what the companies are doing. Um, so first you evaluate, have like a risk rubric, which tells you like high, medium, low, or whatever. Then you say, if it’s high, then here’s the process. If it’s medium here, what is the impact?

Are you okay with that? Um, So that’s how I’ve seen like organizations navigate through, you know, the compliance and risk aspects.

[00:34:41] Michael Mordak: Um, my, my first question there is, do you think that there’s a way to scale that down for smaller organizations? You might not have the same access to legal and compliance and all that, all those other, you know, board members and committee members.

[00:34:55] Sneha Narahalli: For sure, because there’s no other option, right? Like if you say no, then what [00:35:00] would you do?

Um, I think, um, the way to scale it down is having a more tighter risk evaluation upfront so that what gets into the funnel of the process, which is, is truly what you want to evaluate, because you don’t have the leeway now to evaluate 10 things, you have the bandwidth and the resources to evaluate two or three things.

So. How much of an upfront filtering are you doing so that what’s getting into the funnel is actually worth investing time in? Um, the second thing is, again, this is where competitive analysis comes into play, where you’re looking at, has this passed through the filter of other organizations who’ve probably already done this?

So questioning, is it going to be different for us? Versus what they have done, because if it has passed [00:36:00] through the rigorous process that a larger company with more resources have already done this, what’s different for us versus them? Because it doesn’t mean just because it’s passed through that process, it’s going to work for your company.

It’s just,

it’s a different for them versus you. And then the third thing is success criteria for the process itself, right? Like how long does it take? Is it efficient? Is it actually changing the outcome of like how you would build things? Would you do it differently? Like doing a retro on the process itself after it’s done and seeing that.

Should it have been this painful? Should it, could it have been easier? Could we automate some of this? Um, and taking away the manual aspects of it, so that the investment of time and resources just comes from the brain, where you just need to think about it, and it’s not [00:37:00] about, like, entering information, copying and pasting from one system to another.

Then you, you’ll just find that it’s more efficient than, you know, what you had done in the past.

[00:37:11] Michael Mordak: Yeah. I love, I love that. The one point that really stuck out to me was that second point about, you know, seeing other, other organizations who’ve implemented it and not just, not just following suit because they’ve done it.

And it just, it reminds me, it brings to mind that, that like question that all of our moms asked us growing up, which is like, if they did it, you know, if they jumped off a bridge. Does that mean you go jump off the bridge too? No, you need to do your own risk assessment and figure it out.

[00:37:37] Sneha Narahalli: Actually, that’s such a nice analogy.

I’m going to copy that.

[00:37:41] Michael Mordak: Yeah, totally take that one. Um, and we’ve got another question that’s come into the chat here. Uh, and this one’s from Brianna and she says, Can you speak to any use cases where throughout your career, you’ve implemented new tech, um, have handled, uh, how did you handle any resistance you came up against?[00:38:00]

From your team or beta users and how long, uh, did it take to translate into results for your organization?

[00:38:08] Sneha Narahalli: So resistance for, um, building new tech, I think, um, right. That’s the question. I think building

[00:38:16] Michael Mordak: or implementing just if you were to buy something. So the.

[00:38:21] Sneha Narahalli: I would say, this is an area where everybody struggles with of, you know, the, the cost of like investment already like the sunk cost that you have put in and like when is the time to like pull the trigger of is it going to, um, should we continue or should we not.

And if there is, Resistance comes at different stages of the product life cycle, right? Like there might be resistance even from like, should we even invest in this tech at this point? And this is where, um, I know it’s easier said than done. It’s about [00:39:00] understanding if the organization is. If the customers first before the organizations, if the customers are ready for it, if the organization is ready to support this technology, and third, is it value add for the organization.

And though, if possible, and not everything is. Possibly like A B testing is definitely like one of the things where you can do a low lift evaluation, even taking it a step further, just like UX research on without even building the technology like a user testing on is this something you want to evaluate and showing that result to the organization, depending on where the resistance is coming from.

Second is. Understanding why there is resistance because I don’t think anybody intentionally comes into the table saying, today I’m just going to resist everything that comes my way. Let’s see how that day goes. So, um, understanding why, [00:40:00] because then you can like, make sure that you’re Case is able to address the problems, or maybe you haven’t thought about it.

Maybe it’s a real thing that, you know, you thought was easy, but it’s not, especially sometimes when it comes to stores and implementing things in the stores, it’s. It’s definitely more process and needs to be more structured than what you’re implementing on digital, right? So, um, and if you don’t know that you, you take, you think it’s easy, but it’s not.

So I think second is understanding that resistance. And third, if people have been in the organization, um, for long and have not seen, you know, how this could be easy, like having a success story that you can share. internally or externally saying that I understand, but here is how people have seen success.

And there’s always a process to [00:41:00] evaluate success through each part of the product life cycle. And there is a plan A and a plan B for each stage gate that you put, right? There’s a stage gate to it. Is this technology worth investing? There’s a stage gate to say, okay, we know it’s worth investing. Should it be like a 10 million versus a 1 million?

Then you have like, if it’s a 1 million, is it now or is it next? Then you have like, just knowing that people have an option to take an alternate path and it’s not like a you’ve set it down it’s set in stone and you can never change it that just like creates a lot of anxiety within people so building that process that it’s adaptable enough to um adapt to the changes i think i found it like really beneficial

[00:41:45] Michael Mordak: yeah i love that yeah i think the flexibility is is so vital um and uh Looks like Brianna is happy with the response.

I think it was a good, clean answer there. And we can move on to the next question we got, [00:42:00] which is from a Radhika. And I hope I pronounced that correctly, but Radhika is asking, how do you prioritize between new product launches and improving existing product lines? Do you think technology has helped you create better product?

[00:42:15] Sneha Narahalli: At the end of the day, um, It’s the outcome, right? So if improving something that’s already existing is giving you a better outcome than implementing new things, then you’re still looking at what the outcome you’re, um, trying to solve for the company is. And the second thing, having said that, there’s also the other side of the coin that You can continue to just build on what you have, which means you’re not going to bring in the new technology that would set you up for success for the future.

So having a percentage of the investment in, um, ensuring there’s new [00:43:00] revenue generating or like new technology that you’re exploring. And this. As I always say, comes with the, comes with the problem you’re trying to solve more than the technology that you’re trying to build, right? Because it’s being a engineer.

Like I love to say that, you know, we start with the tech, but you start with the problem and like the customer. So whether it is, um, Something that you already have or you need to bring in something new and if the cost of switching of like what you have to what you want to bring because there’s bringing in new with a world where nothing exists, which is easier than bringing in something new where something already exists, because then you’re not just looking at bringing in something new, you’re looking at replacing what’s there already.

Right. So evaluating that as well. And then, um, the third thing is like, if you have to now bring in something else [00:44:00] in the next two years, are you going to complicate the tech stack?

[00:44:06] Michael Mordak: Yeah. Oh, I love that. Um, and, uh, yeah, there was, there was one point you made, you made in there about, um, That that really stood out.

Um, but I want to move on to the next one because we got some more questions that are coming in. Um, and Radhika is thanking you for the answer in the chat there as well. Um, and Now I got Radhika’s name correctly. I’m going to try this next one here. This question is coming in from Taysa and I’ll let her let me know how I did on the pronunciation there.

Uh, this question is when we are talking about new technologies and change in process, it is impossible to not talk about Gen AI, which we’ve mentioned at the top of the call. Um, what are your comments and feedback received from the market about Microsoft Co Pilot for Power BI? And now Power BI is me.

I’m not familiar with. So I don’t know if you [00:45:00] are.

[00:45:02] Sneha Narahalli: I will refrain from answering this question because I don’t think I’m the right person to answer that question. Um, and I’m not an expert in this.

[00:45:14] Michael Mordak: No problem. Yeah, that’s totally fine. Um,

[00:45:17] Sneha Narahalli: I’m sorry.

[00:45:19] Michael Mordak: That’s okay. That’s okay. That’s, that’s the kind of thing that happens on these calls.

Um, I’m going to go back to, uh, the questions that I have in here that were, that were, uh, past me, uh, submitted ahead of the, the call, um, from a member. And, uh, this one here is how have you been able to establish best practices for assessing and emerging technology and then taking the steps to integrate this in your roadmap?

[00:45:43] Sneha Narahalli: So, um, when we are building roadmaps, um, we already have, like, a process to build a roadmap, right? Because you know what is the area that you are looking for, like, [00:46:00] what is the, um, Goal for the company for that year or for the next three to five years, what does success look like? What are the areas you want to focus on?

What are the KPIs for that area? How are you building initiatives that would move those KPIs? So that is kind of like a depending again on the organization that you are. It’s an established process. Um, then comes okay, if this is a problem you’re trying to solve, is that, is there a technology that already exists in your, um, Current ecosystem that would help solve for it.

Or do you need to invest in something new? Then it is, um, do you need to invest in something new again? Like, do you want to build it? Or do you want to buy? So when there is a product lifecycle process for it. Which I personally, we’ve called different things in different companies, like something called a discovery, where you look at like, okay, this is the problem we’re trying to solve.

Here are the features and functionalities [00:47:00] that would help solve that. Here’s what success looks like. Here is what the technology looks like. And in that point, you look at. How to build it, solution it, work with your architects and your engineering and figure out like exactly what technology is needed to help solve that problem.

That’s like your traditional way of like how you build, bring in technology through a process that’s already established. But there is another way where you see like a technology that is changing. Um, the problems that you wanted to solve or you’ve solved for in the past, that’s now happening faster and like much easier and at efficiency.

So, so you revisit and say that if I have to like change my strategy and like implement it in a new way, or if I had deprioritized something because the cost to build it was much higher, um, And the outcome was not justifying the cost, [00:48:00] but with this new technology, the cost is much lower, but you’re getting a higher outcome.

So the cost benefit analysis is a much more positive story than what it was in the past. Then you just. Change your roadmap and say, okay, you know what, like, now this is like Trump to what we probably thought we should be doing. And now you start looking at that. Um, then the third thing would be, um, this kind of like this agility to like test, learn, like see if it’s worth investing, should we like think about it so that again, sometimes process can become a blocker where, you know, you just slow things down.

We need process for structure, but. Then also needs to be encouragement of breaking the process if needed, because otherwise we’ll always be stuck to the process. So some kind of a test and lane, like agility lane, where you’re able to learn about new things so that you can pivot if needed faster. [00:49:00]

[00:49:00] Michael Mordak: Yeah, no, that that’s so important.

And I think that like, There always needs to be that process, but there also needs to be like, like you mentioned earlier, the idea of like stage Gates, where it’s like, or, or at least be able to read the context to figure out, do we need to adapt the process at this time and being like having a team? And maybe this is more of like a culture thing, but just.

that, that team idea that it’s okay to pivot in some of these processes. And like, sometimes things do require a bit of a different strategy. Um, and that’s, that gets into a larger conversation about, you know, culture and making sure that your team is prepared for that, has the mindset that it’s okay to do that.

But I think that on the one hand, yeah, you’ve got to balance it. It’s like, yes, we need process, but also it’s not. Written in stone, things can

[00:49:46] Sneha Narahalli: customer experience, right? It, if you have five steps you need to take to like reach an end goal, if you can do it in two steps, your customers would appreciate it because you’re doing it faster.

So this thing [00:50:00] applies to the process where if you’re able to reach the outcome by. Reducing or like breaking some of the steps. I’m happy to like, learn about it. I would, I highly encourage my teams to share that. I’m like, okay, how did you do that? Like, tell us so that we can all do the same thing. And that’s the new process now, right?

Because otherwise, if you’re just mindlessly being like step one, two, three, four, then it’s no longer relevant in like this new world.

[00:50:28] Michael Mordak: Yeah. No, you don’t want to get stuck in all processes. Um, we’ve been, we’ve been going through questions. I know that a lot of folks came in around the 10, uh, the, the half hour mark, but we’ve been answering questions for, for a while now.

So I’m going to just toss in, uh, or just a bit of a tangent question here just to lighten, lighten things up, let people shake it out a little bit. Um, is a hot dog a sandwich?

[00:50:52] Sneha Narahalli: I avoid carbs, so

[00:50:57] Michael Mordak: that was, that was the best answer. Okay. Like [00:51:00]

[00:51:00] Sneha Narahalli: I try to avoid, let me, it’s not like I avoid a hundred percent. I try to avoid carbs, so I don’t care if it’s like a sandwich or not.

[00:51:09] Michael Mordak: So you have no, you have no, no stakes in that game.

[00:51:13] Sneha Narahalli: No stakes,

[00:51:13] Michael Mordak: no , right?

[00:51:16] Sneha Narahalli: Bread.

[00:51:18] Michael Mordak: Well, I’ll let, I’ll let attendees do it out in the chat if they wanna, if they feel, uh. You know, really strongly about whether it is or not. I’ve got my own opinions, but I don’t need to weigh in at this point. All right, let’s jump back into, uh, we’ve got a few minutes left, um, and a couple more questions.

So this one just came in from one of our attendees and, uh, the question is what tech or tech trends are most exciting or interesting to you right now?

[00:51:45] Sneha Narahalli: Um, the tech trend that’s most exciting to me now is that the tech trends are changing so fast. Um, And I think it would be naive [00:52:00] for us to get attached to like one tech trend because that’s not going to be a trend tomorrow.

So, um, what is going to help us? Succeed is building a foundation that can adapt the variance of these tech trends that you see so that you’re actually not going to hang on to one, but you have the flexibility to change and pivot as soon as the new tech trend comes and it’s going and you’re able to do that with as much lower investment and complexity.

And time as possible.

[00:52:41] Michael Mordak: I like the, how meta that question gets, because it’s not just about one, it’s about the trend of the trends.

[00:52:49] Sneha Narahalli: Time of these trends are getting shorter too, right? So it’s just not the number it’s the time and the. evolution of this trend is just [00:53:00] getting like so dynamic that you live in a dynamic world right now and you just have to build a foundation that you can like adapt to.

[00:53:09] Michael Mordak: That’s interesting and if you go one step farther beyond that do you think that there’s a point where like what’s kind of the the next like the the breaking point of that because I mean yeah like these trends are getting so short and so short to the point where like I mean, it’s not that there won’t be trends, but like, what is the next evolution of that?

Is it that we start reverting to there’s just too much coming in? There’s too much change or how do you think people will react to that?

[00:53:36] Sneha Narahalli: I think there will be a few trends that will stay on, but evolve faster where, um, again, you don’t have to, um, build or like acknowledge everything. And as I said before, there will be tools for, maybe there’ll be like a tool that just evaluates these trends and tells you [00:54:00] like, here is what’s relevant for you.

You don’t have to worry about like all the million things. Right. So I think either we’ll adapt that this is how it’s going to be, or there’s going to be like a few, um, few of these trends that is going to sustain for long term, but will evolve. In the maturity of it itself, that you’re just building for the maturity of a single trend, which are like micro trends within the same thing.

[00:54:30] Michael Mordak: So given that answer, you might, you might not have a clear one for this one, but I was going to ask what emerging technologies you see on the horizon that product managers specifically should start paying attention to for the roadmaps. And the answer obviously can’t be AI for this one.

[00:54:46] Sneha Narahalli: I’m say build for the future, right?

Like this is where, um, if you’re building a roadmap, very tight to like a technology, then you’re already setting [00:55:00] up for failure because that’s going to change. The problem statement will probably remain the same, but the way you solve it will evolve. So if you are building a solution that’s so customized to the ecosystem that you are in, and you’re not able to take it out of the ecosystem that you have, and you’re Rebrand it to like a different, um, technology stack, then you’re already like setting yourself for failure.

So looking at the fact that today, this is the solution, like making it into like granular problems so that the point solutions might change, breaking it, breaking the monolithic problem to like more modular. customized um, solution so that you don’t have to again like change like the entire lego set but you can take a lego block and like put it in another block thinking about it in that way i think is something that all product [00:56:00] managers should like look at and like build which i’m learning myself it’s not like i’m an expert

[00:56:06] Michael Mordak: i love that and it’s such a good point because yeah we need to make sure that That it is scalable, um, because otherwise you get to a certain point where it’s blocked.

And I wonder if that maybe, maybe they will end off on this one. Um, but I wonder if that means that maybe there’s a bit of a shift where we might want to move away from more of these kind of vertically integrated tools and into more things that actually just tackle one specific process or use case and kind of have a, maybe a lot more tools in the, in the tech stack at least be able to kind of swap them in and out to make more decisions.

[00:56:38] Sneha Narahalli: Yes, absolutely. And, um, and that’s where the process comes into play of like, how are these tools integrating and talking to each other? Like what is your, um, customer database looking like, how are you collecting that now you have so many tools in the ecosystem, like how are you collecting the data that would give you the insights that’s [00:57:00] necessary.

So like evolving the foundation that’s going to support this, um, Lego block Eco structure that you’re looking at, I think, um, would be definitely valuable.

[00:57:11] Michael Mordak: I love that. Awesome. All right, folks. Well, there you have it to, uh, to everyone in the audience. I want to thank you for being here. I again, want to apologize for the, um, error on the invite.

Um, I know that a lot of folks tuned into the halfway point to the person who tuned in half an hour early and was here from the very beginning of the call. You’re awesome. Thanks for being here for the entirety of it. Um, what we’ll do is we’re going to, uh, make this recording available to everybody and we’ll send it to you in your, uh, your inbox.

So you’ll be able to see the full thing, uh, and review any of the earlier questions that you, uh, you, you missed, um, But yes, to that point, we’ve got another event coming up on Tuesday. This one is scheduled for the right time. Um, I’m going to post the link to that event in the chat here. Uh, so if you would like to attend, this one’s going to be talking [00:58:00] about, um, communicating product analytics, how to, how to, First of all, get the right product analytics and how to make sure you’re having those conversations, um, uh, and, and telling a story, building a narrative to, to derive action.

So it’s going to be happening next Tuesday. You can sign up at the link that I just posted. Um, and Galen also recently posted a link to our feedback survey. So you can let us know. Uh, how we did today. I’ve already owned the mistake. So please don’t give me feedback that it started at the wrong time. I’m aware, um, but let us know what you did today, how we did today.

And, uh, if you have any topics you’d like to submit for future sessions, then, uh, let, let us know. And we will look into those and see if we can connect you with experts who can speak about those topics. Um, so thank you Sneha for your time. It was awesome to have you here.

[00:58:50] Sneha Narahalli: Thank you so much, Michael, and I’m on LinkedIn for people who followed Michael’s mistake and didn’t get to ask a question in case you want to ask more.

But

[00:58:58] Michael Mordak: thank you. Thank you. Yes. [00:59:00] Go check out Sneha on LinkedIn.

[00:59:02] Sneha Narahalli: Okay. Thank you. Awesome.

[00:59:03] Michael Mordak: Have a great rest of the day, everybody.