Every scaling tech startup hires a Product Manager eventually. Thanks to Lenny’s great research, we know that most teams had 10 - 15 engineers when they brought in their first PM. And surprisingly, more than half of the companies Lenny spoke to hired their first PM before finding product-market fit. But there’s no one right way to do it.
I think back to the early days of building Chewse (RIP!). We followed the trodden path, waiting too long before we hired our first PM (Of course, I now think about what a Fractional PM could’ve done for us before we were ready to hire full time). It was terribly hard to coordinate GTM teams and engineers, and, just like every pre-PM startup, we’d flub up releases left and right. It was painful. I now know that most teams go through this period.
This week, I speak with HG member David Horvath to get his perspective on what that transition moment feels like for others. David was the first PM at HackerOne, a startup that connects companies to ethical hackers who help expose their security vulnerabilities. David was a first time PM, coming into the role from managing tech partnerships at Okta — yet another generalist thriving in early stage startup chaos.
These days, David’s taking a break from full time work as he makes an industry jump into renewable energy, and ramps up his practice as a Fractional PM for B2B startups.
What strikes me most is David’s humility — he’s a great example of how true pros speak about their hard won lessons, and you’ll hear him advise over and over again to talk to your customers, build team trust, and restate the “why.” I think his reflections are universal for all startup hires, not just PMs, and I know you’ll love learning from him just as I have. Enjoy!
Drop 1. How to build trust as a new hire? Get in the weeds with customers.
“It was a totally new function, so engineers were pretty suspicious of product at first. They saw us as constraining their influence, so it was a bit of a contentious relationship as I started.
To build trust, I was trying to spend 50% of my working time in direct interactions with customers. It didn’t always get to that, maybe 30% — It’s really hard given all the meetings! That’s everything from sitting on sales calls to being on support calls with CS to being on early stage discovery and prototype feedback calls…”
Take it back to your team:
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David picks apart a few components of trust that he leaned into:
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One, develop a deep understanding of your customers. By interacting with customers, you’ll be able to quickly figure out what really matters to them. And you can then share that valuable perspective with the rest of the company.
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Two, the ability to execute and get shit done. Success begets success and your team will trust you if you continue to meet the goals you set.
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And three, show that will you put the team and business ahead of your own personal goals and ambitions, doing what’s in support of the business first, rather than working on, for example, a shiny project that might lead to promotion, for example.
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How might you define what trust looks like on your team? Could that make it’s way into performance management materials? Employee onboarding work?
Drop 2. PMs need to live and breathe the “why”
“It’s like, ‘Why are we working on this problem and not something else? Why should you care about it?’ The communication for the sales team is different than the CS team is different from engineers on your team, so you need to tailor your communication to those groups.”
Take it back to your team:
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There’s an old joke about what it is to be a leader: You just end up saying the same thing over and over, all day, every day. That thing is the “why.” It’s rarely enough to just set a goal and name it once, you need to keep restating it.
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Great PMs live and breathe the “why”: Why do anything? Why do this exactly? Why should I care about this feature, this use case, this opportunity, this squad, this mission, this company? The PM drives alignment across the team, your community, and the public.
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What recurring practices exist today that help your team hear the “why”?”
Drop 3. Tension between growth speed and product quality is inevitable — embrace it!
“Our Head of Sales and Marketing said, hey, we should expand faster! This meant expanding into this coveted enterprise segment, but I disagreed pretty strongly. This created a cycle of conversations — sales leader saying I was being too cautious, and me saying they were being too reckless!”
Take it back to your team:
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Know that this tension exists inside every startup. The more you can identify it, name it, normalize it, and build a muscle around it, the better off you’ll be at tackling it.
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When it comes to software products, “quality” means something different things to each person. PMs can sidestep endless debates on the topic by establishing an agreed-upon quality baseline (with associated metrics).
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As they figured out what Enterprise customers wanted, they realized it wasn’t just product changes — it was also GTM changes, like how quickly HackerOne could get an Enterprise customer onboarded and launched. In the end, they were able to move up market because the whole team rallied around launch metrics together.
Drop 4. Two-way-door decision? Move quickly, and let the data guide you.
“This was an existential risk to our company. Everyone was freaking out.
So I talked to our Hacker Community: top Hackers that had been with us for a long time, older and experienced Hackers… And it doesn’t always happen this way, but it became clear that we had a culprit.”
Take it back to your team:
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While David found the source of the issue pretty fast, it was a long road to resolve, including lots of internal tension about how aggressive customer SLAs should be.
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David worked with his Growth team’s fears by offering a few tactical things: He offered to roll back any major features that didn’t work, he offered to get on the phone with customers who weren’t happy with the new SLAs, and he offered to move fast.
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Beyond your Sales and CS teams, how often do other roles at your company speak to customers?
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OpsDrops is lovingly brought to you by Hello Generalist, where you can hire David and other early stage startup pros for part-time work, special projects, and as advisors. Get matched to a short-list of people to interview and hire, then get right to work as we handle the paperwork and payments.