Noah Weiss is the Chief Product Officer at Slack. He shares lessons on why product founders struggle to transition from direct control to decentralized alignment as companies scale.
“Most companies wait too long to introduce them, whether they call them principles or maxims or design guidelines, it doesn't really matter. But I think it's really hard. If you're a product founder and you're a founder led company, I mean, there's all types of things that are hard as you transition and scale the organization. But I think one of the hardest things winds up being when do you give up enough control that your organization starts building things that you aren't even aware of? And then how do you have enough trust that the people building it are going to build it up to the standard and approach that the company was founded on? And I think that's kind of the leap, but I think most companies wait far too long and the organization starts going slower and slower.”
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What-if
Weiss: Launching Slack Connect earlier would have driven massive network adoption
“And I think frankly, especially given the competitive backdrop there, I think if we had not rushed it, but expedited into market back before there were more products that, you know, people were starting to use or get for free as defaults. And back when I think…”
Noah WeissJun 16, 2023▶ 29:59Noah Weiss: How to Master Product-Led Growth; Scaling PLG to Enterprise at Google & Slack | E1026 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
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Weiss: Small-scale product acquisitions do not accelerate time to market
“When they were trying to actually buy a product, I think you're right. I think often the thing we've learned is that it doesn't actually decrease time to market. You might bring in expertise and that's a good reason to do it, but that's at least what we've lea…”
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Weiss: Speed is the most important feature for any product
“The most important feature by far for any product is actually speed.”
Noah WeissJun 16, 2023▶ 44:38Noah Weiss: How to Master Product-Led Growth; Scaling PLG to Enterprise at Google & Slack | E1026 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Weiss: Big tech employees rarely learn to manufacture distribution from scratch
“I think this is a knock on, I think sometimes folks have only worked at large companies is you have so much tailwind, you have so much momentum, you're so much distribution. You don't learn how to manufacture that from scratch, or you don't know how to turn th…”
Noah WeissJun 16, 2023▶ 3:29Noah Weiss: How to Master Product-Led Growth; Scaling PLG to Enterprise at Google & Slack | E1026 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Weiss: Product-market fit is dynamic and must be continually renewed
“But I think the thing I took away was that product market fit. People talk about it like it's a binary thing. You unlock it, and then you have it forever. And I actually think a much more accurate model is that you unlock product market fit, you get to maintai…”
Noah WeissJun 16, 2023▶ 4:17Noah Weiss: How to Master Product-Led Growth; Scaling PLG to Enterprise at Google & Slack | E1026 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Weiss: Slack uses manual spreadsheets to track executive quarterly priorities
“We wind up solving this like most people do at the end of the day, you use spreadsheets. So we have a Monday meeting, PD Monday meeting, as we call it, where like literally we just review in a spreadsheet, super manual process, but the top priorities for the q…”
Noah WeissJun 16, 2023▶ 22:16Noah Weiss: How to Master Product-Led Growth; Scaling PLG to Enterprise at Google & Slack | E1026 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
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