Karla Fiske Video
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Jeff: [00:00:00] Hey, Carla. So happy to have you on today. Thanks for joining.

Karla: Thanks so much, Jeff, for having me.

Jeff: Yeah, this is fun. I'm stoked. I know. I feel like you've, you've been doing a lot of stuff with us lately, but this I'm really excited for this one. Cause I finally get to sit down with you and chat through some stuff. I think we're going to hit some cool stuff.

But, you know, I think first I, I, I always used to shy away from this question because it's one of those, you know, just seems very boilerplate. But at the same time we realized product was not, I mean, when you and I started out, like probably was not something that they didn't teach in college. It wasn't, it wasn't what it is now.

So everyone has a very unique path. So like, how did you go from, you know, how you started your career to, to where you are now? What was your path into product?

Karla: Yeah, yeah. Great question. I started out knowing I wanted to be in the digital space, but didn't, yeah, didn't have any awareness of product management. I started as a data analyst working for a hardware software company, then moved into the automotive space doing more data analysis. I think back on that time and I'm like, [00:01:00] man, I didn't, I didn't even, like, I didn't really like it, but I did it.

I had a

Jeff: We've all been there.

Karla: Right? Yeah. Great peers, like fun company. 

But I didn't really love the job. And then I was kind of self you know, I definitely had some self selection into, Hey, there's things that I want to do differently. I'm not quite sure. Let's do some exploration. And then I had really my, my leader's leader was, And so I just was moving around in this automotive.

com company and was finding like, okay, I really like this mix. Of business problems and digital solutions and like somewhere in between all of that intersection was interesting to me. And they brought in a new CMO couple years into this automotive journey and they were started hiring a couple of new leadership and they [00:02:00] brought in a director of product and he was there to build a team.

And so they tapped me on the shoulder and said, Hey, would you like to, you know, to make, make a go of this? So there were, I think three or four four of us, me and three other gentlemen. And we had the best time. Like we would Rick roll each other. Like we were, I don't know if you're a ripple, like that goes back to the era.

Yeah. But we got pragmatic marketing certified. And then that became the, really the start of my product management career. I was like, Oh, this is really interesting.

Jeff: that's awesome. It's always, you know, nowadays I think people can come in and you can be a junior PM and then associate PM and a PM and then you spend your whole career doing that. But there was, you know, a whole group of us who had the right timing where it just became much more of a thing.

And I'm always now intrigued about how people got into it. I think had I not stayed with marketing, that would have been my other, my other focus because I do love it. You know, the product team will tell you here. I can't keep my mouth out of their [00:03:00] meetings.

Karla: That's okay. It's okay. It's great. Yeah.

Jeff: but kind of to that, like you, you seemingly have had a very, you know, you rolled through marketing and kind of some of the other functions there into product management that even once you hit product though, you have done just so many different industries like your healthcare. Now you said, you know, auto, I think you did food.

That kind of bellies the question, you know, to do product well, you have to understand what's going on in the, the customers and the, you know, the process and everything. How do you enter a company like that? What's the process for when you switch? You know, cars to food. How does that, how does that work?

What does that look like? You're like, how, how can you help out? You know, how should other people look at this if they want to succeed in that kind of transition?

Karla: Yeah. Transitioning industries is, is hard. So I think, you know, first and foremost going into it thinking, okay, I have a lot to learn here and I, I want to learn it. So for me, it's a couple of different strategies. One is I love the first [00:04:00] 90 days book that's by Michael Watkins. I had a leader who was a mentor and then later became a boss.

And she referred this book to me as I was making an internal transition. And it was a, it was a big transition within Experian. And I remember like going through this book and realizing like, wow, this is, I've not really thought through a business in this way before. And that book really has been my strategy in, in ramping up in new companies, new industries and really being thoughtful even before I accept the offer.

And before I step foot in that, you know, office or virtual office, what is it that I need to know and understand about this company? What questions do I need to ask in the interview process to understand what I'm walking into? So that book can even help in the Decision making process of selecting a company or industry.

But yeah, I definitely highly recommend that book in a quick ramp up and a lot of what [00:05:00] Michael talks about is first constructing the state of the business. So is this a turnaround? Is it a hyper growth? Is it you know, stabilizing you know, kind of keeping the company operational? And then the other thing is really listening, asking questions, asking great questions, asking little questions, like anything around those you know, understanding and really digging deep.

And listening, like that's the biggest thing I think for me. And first 90 days understanding that like, I'm not gonna have the answers. I've definitely watched in my career, other leaders come into an organization and went within two weeks, have answers to all the problems that the company has. I think we all have, right.

And, what this book talks about is really like, you're not going to have the answers. Like you're not going to, you're there to help be part of solving those problems, but you're not going to have the answer. So, but what, what I could have, right, are tools in my toolbox that the organization may not have that I can share.

But [00:06:00] being really careful to prescribe solutions. When I think I have most of the information or a lot of that information. So, yeah, building internal networks is huge. For me, this was really finding my my subject matter experts in the organization and really going deep with them. So building those relationships of like, you know, they know everything, right.

And so how do I foster those relationships and make sure that I'm, using and not abusing them, right? And making sure that they feel like this is a valuable relationship for them too. So yeah, I think all of that for me has been a really powerful way to ramp up quickly. And then when I do start to provide possible solutions and brainstorming and people that have worked with me know that I'm a very highly collaborative leader.

I'm going, when I do finally approach that, I'm going to probably have something that is worth listening to at that point, because I've spent a minute trying to understand the company [00:07:00] and trying to ask all the questions that I can think of. And yeah, I think it's the other part of it too. Right. And asking questions is being humble, right?

You can't come in and be like, Oh, I got this. You know, I came from, from FinTech and that means I'm going to know direct sales. Not at all. Like, what is this? This is crazy. This is so different. So yeah. So I think just being humble to be like, I don't, I actually don't know this. So help me understand it.

You, you seem to, you know, have a lot of knowledge around this. Help me learn it. People are usually really excited to, and willing to help.

Jeff: I think people underestimate how, how much usually, especially in a good culture, people want to help and want to make you successful. But it's fine. You, you, you, you talk about kind of going industry to industry FinTech to direct sales maybe. But I, you know, I think we were talking earlier.

I've spent most of my career pretty much in, in tech and B2B SaaS and in a very specific stream. But even within that company to company, what works at one Is, is deleterious and another, and just doesn't. And even I spent [00:08:00] time at one company twice and joined it when it was a small startup and left after an acquisition and came back a couple of years later when it was, you know, five X as big as, as when I had left.

And it was interesting to see even what worked, what different, and what changed within that company. But also that networking bubble helped me scale so much faster. I knew a lot of people from, from original when I was there the first time. And that was able to help me map out where I was able to understand things a lot faster.

It helped me accelerate, but I was completely perplexed when it came to what do you mean this doesn't work? That's how we did it two years, three years ago and it worked perfect.

Karla: Yeah. Yeah. Why is this different now? Yeah, exactly.

Jeff: I think that that's so important. And, you know, when we hire people here, I tell them. You know never again in your time here will you be allowed to just learn to to not produce something just learn and understand You know be greedy and and take it as much as you can because you're never getting it again I'm gonna tell you right now

Karla: That's exactly right. And what a good leader you are to give your employees and new hires that space. You know, I think that's, yeah, that's [00:09:00] really invaluable

Jeff: But I like the way you put it. So i'm gonna i'm gonna steal some of this because it's put very well here. So but that that takes us to so you've you've been through, you know, like you said health care fintech food Automotive now you're at tebra. So healthcare You you came in and I think my understanding is, is the kind of what is temporary now as a result of kind of a combination of two was it companies or products and, and so you had kind of two big mandates to go through.

Can you, can you talk through a little bit on that?

Karla: Yeah. So tempera is is a company that is through an two emerging of two companies. So, Kareo, which had been in the EHR space and really like supplying billing companies revenue cycle management software, and really they were finding that there was this opportunity on. not only patient engagement, but also patient acquisition and sort of the up funnel for for small to [00:10:00] medium sized providers.

And there was this kind of great symbiotic relationship that was formed between Cario and patient pop and the two co founders at patient pop and the founder at Cario. And it was the sort of end to end solution for these SMB providers. So, you know, these, these doctors or nurse practitioners that are moving away from the large enterprise systems into wanting their own private practice.

So it's really kind of the target market and patient pop had the solution for patient acquisition, anything from the marketing, digital marketing around these practices to having a profile a digital profile across the internet to once acquiring a patient to helping manage that patient into integrating into an EMR.

So really it was from there that [00:11:00] acquisition or wasn't acquisition, it was a merger In that merger, there was an opportunity to to unify the platforms. So two different platforms, two different code bases, two different languages, like it was a thing. So, I came in in 22 and the, the merger was finalized at the end of 21.

So it was about, yeah, we were about six. months into this journey. And I remember going through the interviews and several of the leaders were like, you know what you're getting into, right? Like you realize this is a merger and they're messy. And I'm like, yeah, I do. I had been at Experian and maybe we'll touch on this later when there was this combining of two organizations to to create a contact center organization and I got to be part of that.

So it was an internal merger So a lot of the same change management and challenges and [00:12:00] technologies, people, process, all of it that I got to go through with all the comforts of the Experian home, so to speak. So I had that experience going into this. I thought, okay, this, you know, I can use that and apply that at this opportunity, Tebra.

So Tebra was really around unifying these platforms to create a better. Provider experience ultimately. So I got to lead that. I remember three weeks in to my tenure there, we were at this leadership offsite between products and development. And I remember my boss being like, we're going through this unification brainstorm and like, you know, sticky noting And then she's like, okay, well, this is going to be your program to take over.

And I'm thinking like, wait, what? You know, like, oh my gosh, I am three weeks into my, Healthier tech, you know, building of my experience. And I, I don't have this, you know, I didn't have that really any of that experience coming into this. And so it [00:13:00] felt very overwhelming and quite scary to be, to, you know, just to be transparent and vulnerable.

But I also was like, okay, well, there's some reason that she's tapping into me and not. Not others. So I'm going to lean into that and I think having a fresh perspective coming into the organization allowed for a bit of I don't know, bipartisan approach of like, okay, what is the right thing and how do we approach this?

So I was able to lead through that and across functional leaders So leading leaders ultimately to help go. Okay, let's assess this. Like, what are we working with? What do we think we need to move forward with? Let's brainstorm some of that. Let's dig into some of the technical design parts of this.

How would we architect this? How would this work? How long would it take? What's critical path? What's, you know, You know, what's secondary and tertiary. And so really it was a a labor of love with a lot of different hands. And then, and then that strategy, that unification strategy evolved over time. Like there were things that influenced kind of [00:14:00] where we wanted to make investments, more critical points that required more investment.

And other points that you know, that, that could wait in terms of like when and how it unified. So, yeah, it was a big program. It still is a program.

Jeff: I mean, it makes sense to bring in, you know, I've been through mergers before, and if you're not careful, there's always, you know, someone has a favorite baby you were kind of, you were kind of baby neutral

Karla: Yes! That's great. We want it. Maybe neutral. I like that.

Jeff: But you know, when I've been through before, you always, even if, even if people are operating impartially, there's always that. You know, someone gets upset, like, Oh, that person came from this department. So of course they're favoring that. So, you know, it makes sense, but it really brings in, you know, you talk about taking time to understand an org and, and feel through it and understand your kind of first team.

And they just said, Nope, three weeks in, let's go. You're up Carla. So I'm sure you still had to do some of that stuff though. So how did you, how did you find those right people and how, you know, what did that look like of, of kind of. Putting together that [00:15:00] navigational capability, knowing that all that was going on and what you're responsible for.

Karla: Yeah. I think it definitely made ramping up quite challenging because it was like, wow, I haven't, I'm digging into, learning two platforms, building the network, understanding, you know, technical limitations and sort of what was kind of what was at the table, right? Like just understanding some of that.

Yeah, it, I think for me, it was a an opportunity to, you know, I, I feel like in my career, you know, I, I have answers. Yes. And. I'm going to know we're going to arrive at the best solution, but ultimately the answers lie within within the collective. I think I really feel like that's where if we can come together and really Kind of crystallize [00:16:00] our our leadership team, that first team and really go, okay, what are we, what are we working to do and how do we get there?

And what, what is the answer to this problem? And I think the opportunity in this unification program for me was how do we, how do we gel as a first team? And we went through some of that exercise. Around the first team and doing assessments there Patrick Lincioni's five dysfunctions of a team.

And then they, he goes into another program around building that first team mentality. And so we were also amidst some of that, because remember we were two different organizations coming together. So like, we've got leaders that are like, exactly like they've, this is my thing and this is my thing. Right.

And so having to blend those leadership teams, I was definitely more of that glue that kind of combined. and, and help collaborate together. So yeah, I think for me it was I think it, what it did too, is that it also sort of delayed some of the details. Cause it was like [00:17:00] big picture and strategy and like tackling some big things, whereas smaller details within.

You know, just the platforms were like, I'm not sure of that yet. Like I haven't had a chance to dig into that yet, you know, and that was really hard as a leader to not have answers to detailed questions is like, well, you've been here six months. It's like, yes, but I've also been focusing on bigger things and those strategies.

And so. Yeah, so it kind of delayed in some of those areas as a result.

Jeff: Interesting. Yeah, I mean, it definitely makes sense when you have both sides, you know, you can be like, I think the glue to bring it together is a great metaphor there. You know, and I wonder, I'm sure your onboarding looked different as a result of that, but it almost, I wonder if that's a good way to do just complete trial by fire.

He was a huge must do project and just go and it's kind of a forcing function.

Karla: it definitely was the time like there wasn't this opportunity to slow roll that, you know, like, Oh, you've got 60 days to settle into your role. And then you'll start a [00:18:00] program. It was like week three. So it was like, cool, button up. Here we go. But then it was really, you know, it was, it was amazing.

I think for me, I tried to prioritize building those relationships, especially with my. My specific squads and so really building those and it was it was interesting because yes It was sort of the S and them or them and us right and to be that in between Was a really great place to be and then it was like hey this, you know There's a lot of really great people across the board here.

Like let's come together and you know, so yeah, I think I don't know. I think it definitely had it. It definitely was challenging, you know, from a professional, even a personal level. It's like, oh my goodness, like this is a lot. But yeah, but exciting.

Jeff: And through that, was there, you know, what, what success look like, what was, you know, was there a North star metric you were tracking or, or a set of them or, or, you know, what was kind of guiding you on that? 

Karla: With unification, it was a little tricky, honestly, to, to be [00:19:00] in, to have a North star metric. I mean, You know, like many B2B SaaS companies, we're operating off of, you know, NRR and ensuring we keep our customers you know, loyal, right? We, we want loyal paying customers, but I think it was really around in unification.

It's a little different because it's like, well, we ultimately, we want to create a platform that not only our customers. You know, need, but also that they use, right. And, and that utilization of these really kind of seeing through the ultimate merger vision, which was an end to end platform that providers can use.

So, how we, you know, our, our, how we got there really was through creating more of these seamless interactions instead of like one platform to the other platform, right? Like, how can we. Integrate and create a more seamless interaction. [00:20:00] So I think for us, it was and getting really clear on that with leadership was It was tough.

Like, I think we went through a couple of rounds of that. And if you were to talk to my peers and interview them, they'd probably say like, yeah, it was, it was tough to get there on, you know, really, what are we aiming for? What does success look like? So we started to chip away at that. So a few things were for us that we wanted.

Fewer products to manage, which sounds interesting. It's like, wait, that's weird. But really what we had, and the reason why I was one of the, you know, I was the chosen product leader over this space was because the patient experienced products in, in the two platforms were overlapping. So it really was a, like, okay, are we going to keep this one or keep that one?

Or, you know, so really how do we. Sunset the lesser product, keep the better product, right? Migrate it to a particular platform of choice. So that was a lot of, one of the reasons, you know, why I was chosen, but then also [00:21:00] to say, okay, I don't want, I want the better product to manage. We want to eventually move to a single code base, right?

Where we're not we're working in a single language. I don't, I don't know when that day will come at this point, but that's still a, still a goal. So, you know, less overhead, better integrated systems for our customers. And then ultimately that we're selling products that our customers are excited about, that are solving their problems all the way from that patient acquisition.

Through patient retention and everywhere in between. 

Jeff: And that actually brings up a very natural transition.

Talk about, you know, what success look like for that merger at Tebra. I would try and summarize this point, but I I've heard you talk about it and you, you've done it far better than I can. So I'm just gonna leave it to you, but you've talked a lot about outcomes and outputs. They're different.

So first, what do you mean by that? But then you've talked about kind of companies you've walked into that focus on one or the other and how that drives success. Accomplishment. 

Karla: Yeah, I've, I've been in [00:22:00] organizations in product management where I've seen both and ultimately where product management has the greatest impact on the company's bottom line is being focused on outcomes over outputs. And so really thinking about how product and the work that we're doing ultimately will change.

The outcome of an organization and will impact revenue, impact customers lives in a very real way versus the idea of I'm doing something. So I've, I've output a project, a program, I've launched something and. And that's, you know, I've checked the box and I can move on. I've been at a company where in particular company that had really big digital growth and they, they were in it.

Like, this was the hockey stick growth of, of time for them. And they had, they had done a really great job of [00:23:00] building a digital ecosystem, like they built it and people came, right? Like they were ready. And it was great because a lot of those critical operational foundations had been set. Which was exciting.

I think the opportunity though, in this particular organization was we weren't really measuring outcomes. So these, these projects would launch, these programs would launch, and then there would be like, okay, we're moving to the next thing and let's launch the next thing. And so one of the, when I came into the organization, this particular one, I was there to not only you know, carry and mature this product or, but also to, to really focus on what is going to move the needle for, for this particular organization.

And in that was able to lead through a. A cross functional cross functional leadership group that sat [00:24:00] outside of product actually. To really align on the digital digital metrics that made the most impact on the organization and having that collaboration across the across the landscape of, you know, a multi faceted organization.

Leadership team really allowed us to kind of debate and discuss and land on impactful metrics that we all agreed would digital would benefit from. And then it became a how can we achieve those metrics? And really, like, you know, Marty Keegan talks a lot about this and his empowered book, but I think Once it's like there's this North Star metric and there's these outcomes that we want to achieve as an organization, it becomes this enabler, really, to say, okay, teams, this is the metric you get to move.

How are you going to do it? Versus the, hey, this is the thing you're going to go do, right? [00:25:00] And the output that I need you to achieve. So those are very different. And I think. A product team that is empowered has a metric that they're chasing and they're obsessed with and they're, they're constantly trying to hypothesize and then validate or invalidate, right?

That those hypotheses through different actions and experiments to then go, okay, wait, we know how to, we know how to move this metric and we're, we're making progress towards that, or we need to retool and rethink how we're getting there. Okay. And that, you know, that empowerment is what product managers.

And really help fuel them. So, yeah, so I've been at both. I think I think it's been an opportunity to really reset and product. And so, as I mentioned, there was an opportunity to, you know, build this kind of cross functional leadership team. And once we did that, there's an opportunity to then, from this up and out, be down and in.

And in that down and in, really focusing back with the team to say, okay, these are the core [00:26:00] metrics that we want to change. How, how do you see an opportunity to change them? I think the challenge in the organization I was in at the time also was that we were working cross functionally. So there were just operational things that needed to happen.

Like I got to launch this thing or I have this thing, you know? And so like, yes, there are things that still need to be done operationally, but ultimately we should have the the space to say, is this going to change? Is this going to change the outcome of the company? Right. Or is it going to be something that I'm checking a box to do?

Because somebody, At a higher paying level told me to do it. So yeah, really then from there it was building an operating model around how do we operationalize these metrics and then getting clear on our objectives, the key results, you know, what are we going after and, and then creating visibility around that and accountability.

So yeah, that, I, that was a big enabler for the organization to go from. Cool. I'm just checking a box. I'm outputting what I need to [00:27:00] output to. Wait a second, I make an impact on this digital organization and here's how.

Jeff: It's funny, as you were talking through that, I had in my head this just sounds so much like Marty Kagan and Empowered and I feel like lately he's on a tear about, you know, the theater of product management and feature teams and all that. And it's just so interesting to see in practice the pivot to.

You know, driving empowered teams and and even to your point, you know, there are some things maybe you just have to launch. You just have to get out. But even within that, it's understanding why am I getting out? I have to get it out. But what is it meant to do so that you get it out? You check the box and you also.

Yeah, I think it's important to have

Karla: Yeah, I think, too, like, yes, you're exactly right, leaning into that around, like, there is something I have to do in launch. But then asking the question, right, of those higher, higher paid folks that are making the decisions to do the, that work like, okay, but why are we doing this? Right? And asking the, the safe [00:28:00] question, you know, around like, I would like to better understand why we're like, why are we doing this work?

And what do we hope to achieve out of it? And I think asking those questions in a, you know, in a safe environment will yield really. Thoughtful responses that can help either validate, you know, for those leaders, like, yeah, this is, I actually don't know. Like I was told to do it or, you know, or like, it's the thing we do or, you know, whatever it is to, or it's like, oh, this will increase.

You know, customers in our loyalty program, or this will increase, you know, the average you know, daily users, like whatever it is that like, ultimately we can understand. I think asking, asking the why is a really, really strong question.

Jeff: yeah, it's, it's, I tell the teams here that I work with that I want to explain the why and I want everyone to understand. And if you don't feel like that, please raise your hand, you know, sound the alarm bells [00:29:00] because while it's wonderful having, you know, we have, you know, you know, medium sized leadership team here and having a few, you know, people thinking about I'd rather have, we hire smart people.

We hire you because you're smart. That's why you're here. It'd be much better to have 10, 20 really intelligent people thinking about this than, you know, five or six. You know, I guess we can claim to be smart, but maybe half intelligent to intelligent people. At the, you know, much better to have 20 really intelligent brains all think about it, but they can't do that if they don't have that, you know, understanding of like, where is this going?

What, you know, what am I checking this box for? So that when we've pushed that, I, you know, I feel like we've seen results explode in some things we didn't even expect to happen or we didn't think of people kind of going, Oh, well, we could do this and you're gonna get way more, you know, like you said, customer retention or way more engagement or we could, we could try this and a lot of those things have been things that here at least have driven some of our biggest successes has been when the team was able to understand that and come back and, you know, tweak, you know, what they were told to do and tweak it and make it work in [00:30:00] the operating practice that they were in.

So such a good point. And this, but this brings us to, I think one of my favorite things I've heard you talk about, and it's such like a knit, I think that I've heard before, but I really want to know more about it because it sounds super interesting. Is you, you ran into a situation where that was a problem communicating the why and having everyone on the same page across a lot of people.

Had been difficult and you, you went out and you problem solved it, but the solution was, was not something I would have expected. So, this idea of the product placement is just it, it, the team, my team here will tell you, I've, I've talked about it a whole bunch. But can you tell us kind of what that background is and how, what, what is it?

Karla: I think just to take a quick step backwards, it's invaluable to have a network of external product leaders and that you can call on to work through. Kind of the day to day problems or the bigger meatier problems that you have a need to Need to resolve. So for me I had and still [00:31:00] do this relationship with someone in that sat in a Large e commerce role in digital product management.

And so we were peers different industries. And we got paired up. I can't even remember through exactly through the organization, but we got paired up and we, Kristen and I hit it off. Like it was. There was just a lot of really great sharing of problems and then possible solutions. I brought to her some of the problems that I was having in my current role and current company And she brought up this solution that had worked for her at her large You know e retailer e tailer And I thought wow, okay i'm gonna like I loved the idea But I put it in my back pocket and I kept this template this product placement template fast forward Literally six months later, I'm sitting in the office of my CTO and he's explaining to me the [00:32:00] problem like just to kind of build up into the solution.

It's helpful to understand that the situation was this digital organization for product was a problem. supporting digital product across, you know, a fragmented product organization. So you've got digital marketing reporting into a CMO, you've got digital technology and product reporting into technology.

You've got customer care and the digital support system reporting into a different Executive. So you've got this sort of fragmented digital approach. And in all of that, you've got all of these people needing things, right? All these executives and, and, you know, different functions that need digital solutions.

And so it was this compounding like list of things that they needed or problems they needed solved. And everyone has, you know, their, their, their things. And so he, I'm sitting in his office, the CTO's office, and he's like, I. I, we're getting too many escalations. Like we need to solve [00:33:00] this problem.

And I want you to figure out a way in order to prioritize this work and communicate the work. Now we were already prioritizing it, but what we weren't doing effectively and the opportunity was really how we communicated that work up and out. And he also brought up a point of like, do you have a forum by which people could debate these things across.

All of the digital stakeholders. And I thought, no, I don't, you know, I was, I built these amazing relationships throughout the organization and I was definitely the bridge builder, but I wasn't creating a forum to have all of that collective conversation. So Within a week, I was like, I have the tool. I pulled this product placement out and reformatted it.

I personalized it for the organization that I, that I was in at the time and took a go at it. And really this was a progress over perfection. So. Pulled together a list of key results at the top. What is our ultimate objective? And then how are [00:34:00] we going to get get there? And so what a product placement is and how I've utilized it is to compartmentalize the work.

that needs to get done in order to achieve the objectives and key results. So, an example of some of this is you know, you can have like certain business as usual things that need to occur, right? There are certain campaigns that always need to launch or a pro a loyalty program that has to go live on a seasonality.

Then you've got stability, scalability security. Those are things you cannot not invest in, right? Any digital you know, officer will tell you like, you gotta always be kind of chipping away at those things. Right? And then you've got these new opportunities, these things that will come up that are like, Oh, this is super hot.

Can we move fast? Right? And then you've got bigger programs that are, that need to be chipped away at. And then you've got things that are like, well, I'm, I'm thinking this might happen. Like we might have this big partnership. We might have this big [00:35:00] program. We might have this, you know, secret thing that's coming.

And then you've got work that ultimately month to month, you're like, ah, we, we deprioritize that it's not as important. So this product placemat really allows for that kind of, it's a one sheet. view at all of this work at a super high level. So it's, you know, I, it's been, it has been transformational.

So I went from having these escalations up to the CTO to within three months of meeting monthly, having virtually no noise, there was no escalations. There was now this monthly meeting where we could talk about what was coming on the placemat what had launched. The results of that launch and this ties back to outcomes like this was the forum that I could hold my team accountable to saying, Hey, you launched this thing three months ago.

Let's talk about how it's doing. We launched it last week. Let's talk about how that's doing. And really to say like, Hey, [00:36:00] marketing. You wanted us to launch this really cool new thing. Here's how it did like, you know, or give them the form to tell us, tell us how it did. Right. What were the impressions? What was the conversion?

How did the funnel look? And so, it really was a, an amazing tool in order to kind of level set across all of digital gain that alignment and be very clear on what our key results needed to be and how we would get there.

Jeff: I love it. It's, it's so fun. And for for people listening, we have we, we locked into a copy from Carla. So we'll, we'll link it in the notes if anyone wants to check it out. But yeah, I mean, I love how that just ties together everything we've talked about about how do you understand what's important in org?

How do you understand who's important and to do this placement, right? You have to have the right people. You have to bring them together and understand their priorities. You have to understand outcomes, not just outputs.

Karla: Exactly.

Jeff: such a, such a good model. I, I, this is why I was like the whole time I was just waiting to talk about this, cause I, I love this thing so much.

It's so cool. But yeah, that's, I think that's a great place to wrap up. I mean, it's [00:37:00] a kind of brings us full circle solves, you know, a great solve to a lot of problems we've talked about. And you know, Carla, I really appreciate you coming on. This is so, so educational. I felt like I learned a lot. And I'm definitely, you know, I use the pro I use that placement already.

So I'm going to keep doing that.

Karla: I love that. Yeah. Right. Like clear, clear strategy is awesome. But if we're not communicating it up and out and down and in it's really hard to gain that full, full org alignment. So I'm so glad it works. Yeah.

Jeff: Well, thank you so much for coming on. It was great to chat with you. I know, you know, we didn't get to touch on, on customer centric or customer experience centric product management, but maybe we can have you on again to talk about it later. Cause that's, that's also a cool thing, but awesome.

Well, thank you, Carla. 

Karla: Jeff, thank you so much for having me. This has

been great. 

Jeff: See you around.