BlogSat

A short love letter to ~8 years on Google Search - 8 things I’m grateful for.

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Fri, 25 Feb 2022 23:12:00 +0000

After a few weeks off, I started a new gig within Google yesterday and it hit me that for the first time in almost eight years I won’t be working on some part of Google Search. Eight years ago, I told the team when I was interviewing that I was “looking for a place to call home for a while and grow there”. My experiences here more than met that need.

I used to write a regular “10 things about…” listy column for a while at a college newspaper. So in that style here’s 8 things (one for each year) I feel grateful to have experienced/learned in this time. Also, like that column which I banged out the night before it was due, this post is something that I don’t need to do, yet I feel somehow compelled to do (and so it’ll likely be longer and less crisp than it should be :-))

It actually is awesome to work on something so many people use and love, and that positively touches people’s lives.

There’s a talk I give externally about Search and a line I often end up using is how the mission inspires everyone that works on it simply because we know that a large portion of humanity will have a better life if we do our job right. The last time I gave the talk (knowing that I likely won’t work on Search soon), I had to stop myself from choking up.

The number of times I’ve seen friends, relatives, strangers, celebrities or random people on the street (yeah, I’m curious what people are doing on their phones around me :-)), using something my team has worked on or a friend has worked on still blows me away.

And it isn’t just the number of people (literally billions), but the frequency of how they used it and just how much it means to them that still leaves me tingling when I think about it.

The insight into how people think, individually and in aggregate, is something that’ll stay with me forever.

One of my favorite parts of the job is just the understanding working on Search gives you about people in general; what people are searching for is what they’re thinking, feeling or curious about at any given point.

Understanding that at the level of queries and search journeys that people are on and how they evolve their needs and habits over time, but also at a community, country and planet level, is something I’ve enjoyed watching and thinking about so very much.

The people I learned from

You often hear people talk about the people they worked with being the best part of their job (especially when they’re leaving that job! :-)).

I think that’s true for me as well, but the thing that hit me even when I joined Search was how many people I met that had already been here for well over a decade.

There’s something specific about the people that are attracted to, and then stay with, a project like Search. There’s a sense of mission, curiosity about the world, technical brilliance, product judgment and willingness to adapt and grow that is just incredibly inspiring to be around day in and out.

And Google truly encourages a collegial, no-jerks-tolerated atmosphere that worked so very well for me.

The day-to-day product decision-making is kind of amazing

The ultimate test of Product Management is the quality of decisions you make.

Firstly, eight years gives you a lot of time to see what decisions stick and you got right, and what you didn’t. It isn’t often you get to see the implications of years-long bets you made pay off and then get to build on that bet.

But secondly, the nuance and complexity of a lot of the decisions you make on Search is especially hard. A lot of product calls aren’t binary, and you learn to think in tradeoffs a lot. You’re often weighing changes that are positive on some queries, but negative on others and that affect consumers and the ecosystem in different ways.

Making them yourself and coaching teams to make them has intellectually been incredibly stimulating, and something I enjoy probably way too much. I used to tell my teams that my favorite thing to do (that I frankly got less and less to do as my responsibilities grew) is to spend time with launch evals and side-by-sides and playing with recall sets.

The number of products and the range I got to work on has been special

The thing I hadn’t planned on was just how many different domains/products I’d end up looking at. I joined with the intent of building out TV and Movies within Search but over time took on responsibility not just for all the Media verticals (Books, Music, Video games etc.), but also Events, playing into my own strong personal interests in these verticals.

I drifted into being responsible for all Answers on Search for a while, and then the Knowledge Graph, which helped scratch my itch to go deep technically. I surprised myself building a UX framework for Search overall, and by working on voice and understanding as we built the Google Assistant. I delighted mostly myself by kicking off the Delight area within Search.

My proclivity to work on ecosystems and platforms ended up pulling me into a project that ended up building a metadata, understanding and personalization platform that powers most media experiences across Google’s software and hardware products and working with most of our media partners.

The odd part is when you’re in it, you don’t completely realize how many different things your teams have done. It took me looking back to appreciate the range of things.

The people that grew around me, even as I grew up.

Watching people on my team mature - going on to manage teams of their own, making higher quality and more ambitious decisions year after year, and being a mentor to other product managers, designers, business people and engineers has probably been more important to me than the product work.

One of the things I’ve realized over the years is that meaningful, deep relationships at work are a huge part of my day-to-day happiness. So seeing people on my team grow, as well as learning from more experienced people in the org that adapted as they took on more expansive roles has been hugely impactful on my happiness here.

A manager in a previous job once told me “you’re not here to make friends”, but I’ve always believed that you're happier when you do and so feel lucky that I’ve made so many here.

Global thinking and working with people all over the world.

I realized that over this time, the scale of the product not only meant I was thinking about people’s needs all over the world (research trips and partner summits literally on every inhabited continent), but also building with people all over the world, as we had offices distributed across the globe.

You learn so much not only when you travel, but when you work with folks how backgrounds and perspectives are completely different from yours.

This job has given me random experiences I’d have never considered possible.

On my first month on the job I was asked to join, for reasons I still don’t completely understand, a meeting with Christopher Nolan. I shared a stage with Karan Johar to talk about Search. I didn’t have a bucket list, but I made one up and put this right there. There’s a bunch of other items, big and small, that have mattered a bunch to me and made me go “Did I really get to do that?” later.

So for all of the above, and a few other reasons, I’m so grateful and thankful to all the people that I worked with and gave me the opportunity to work with them, and the chance to work the world’s favorite Search Engine. :-)

Unintended consequences: Why your songs got shorter and your videos got longer

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Thu, 29 Apr 2021 06:44:00 +0000

These are my favorite examples of unintended consequences that I happened to walk someone through last week.

Years ago, in a coffee shop, I was listening to someone at the next table (yea, I know eavesdropping on phone conversations is bad, but people should be less loud :-P) confidently telling their friend/client, "Trust me. You need to make the YouTube videos longer - over 15 mins. That's what they prioritize. Just drag out the content."

I couldn't help grinning. I'd recently stopped working at YouTube then, and so while I knew that person was not exactly right, they were not completely wrong either.

It's conventional logic now among the creator community that you do better on YouTube if your videos are longer. It's why when you search for [Peppa Pig] on YouTube for you kids, the first few videos you get are either long-running livestreams or videos that are an hour long, and if you're listening to music you can often end up in a compilation video instead of individual songs. All the systems at the time were, famously, optimizing for watch time as the team focussed on a watch time goal.

When the decision to set watchtime as the goal and optimize systems towards it, no one quite anticipated the impact it would have on creator culture and incentives (or how quickly), and the kinds of videos that would get uploaded. Everyone anticipated people would watch longer, but didn't anticipate how it would change what got uploaded, and correspondingly how that would change usage of the product.

The even starker example is of streaming (specifically Spotify) on songs - basically top songs have gotten shorter (here's a really great podcast about it).

And it didn't just changed the length of the songs, it changed the structure - the threat of the "skip" and the fact that artists are paid based on if a certain length of the song the streamed, meant the incentive was now to hook the listener early and keep them listening - something no one could have anticipated when working on a streaming service.

What're the unintended consequences of your next product change?

Avengers Endgame: how trivial passions can nudge a career

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Tue, 27 Apr 2021 05:44:00 +0000

The Internets reminded me that today was exactly 2 years since Avenger's Endgame was released. I remember that day vividly for a few reasons

I woke up before sunrise (way before the alarm went off).
I wore this (now that I think about it) borderline appropriate T-shirt and then..
.. showed up before 7:00am to watch that movie at Century Shoreline before going to work.

This is still the only movie that has a scene that can make me tear up consistently every single time (I know, I know - it's ridiculous).

That day was interesting from a work perspective for another reason. Along with a few other people at work (and with some crazy last-minute negotiating), we'd pulled together the Thanos Easter Egg on Search. It was typical of a lot of Easter Eggs on Search at the time, in that it wasn't really anybody's job, but we pushed it through because we loved the idea enough to do it. My day job on Media experience on Search helped me justify it a little bit I guess. :-)

We expected it to do like some of the Easter Eggs we'd put in before, but this went crazy viral. Like more Search traffic than the actual movie viral - it also ended up being one of the most positive press stories for Search that year.

It also planted the seed for me to take a job later that year leading Delight for Search that involved creating many, many, many more Easter Eggs as well working with the Doodles team.

The experience stretched me in many ways - creatively, taught me to work with even more diverse functions (brand marketing, artists, creatives etc.) and think about things I just hadn't before.

And as I look back, it was mostly because of a movie I was really, really excited to see and a reaction I had in a brainstorming session that was "Omg, we have to do this!"

I often coach people on my team to think about what they want to learn or to be, and plan their career moves accordingly, but sometimes, just sometimes, it can pay to just follow your passions and instincts at work. Who knows - it might shape your career?

20 years to the date!

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Tue, 15 Sep 2020 06:30:00 +0000

I'm bad at remembering dates. Like, really bad. :-)

Anniversaries, birthdays - you name it, it tend to forget it.

So it's always amused me that of one of the few dates that I do remember is the one that I landed in the United States - Sep 14, 2000.

I wouldn't have remembered the date under most circumstances, but a few years after I got here my dad, who was actually pretty good with dates once remarked that Sep 14, 1975 was the date he and my mother landed in Tanzania from India for the very first time. He would then go on to build most of his later career in Africa, and he thought it was a remarkable coincidence that 25 years later his son would land in the United States on the exact same date. Somehow that conversation has always stuck with me, and since then this particular date.

Exactly 20 years ago, my cousin picked me up from the airport and a couple of days later dropped me off to grad school. The photograph is from a few months later that Fall quarter. I expected to live in the United States a long time when I got here, but that was about it. I was still too young and too unsure of what that would mean and of what my life would be like. I'm still quite unsure, just no longer young.

Dates don't mean much - except when they are natural markers that encourage you to look back, and to look forward. Twenty years feels like an insanely long time, but looking back at that photograph it doesn't really feel that long ago at all.

So today, I found myself looking back a lot - remembering, reflecting, feeling very lucky, feeling some regret - but mostly just being very grateful for the life I've had here so far. I've spent just under half my life in this country, and it's where I've made most of my memories and where I've put down roots with my family.

It also had me thinking a lot about what I want the next twenty years to be like. This time I have slightly more of clue than I did twenty years ago, but only slightly :-)

With all the ups and downs that will inevitably transpire, here's hoping to making the next twenty as meaningful - no, even more meaningful - than the last twenty.

The NBA Strike: Courage, cascades and what people are willing to sacrifice

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Fri, 28 Aug 2020 08:17:00 +0000

I've been incredibly impressed and inspired by the NBA (and subsequently other leagues) strike over the last 2 days to protest the shooting of Jacob Blake. Partially, it's because I'm an NBA fan and because I was moved by these incredibly personal and heartfelt takes from Doc Rivers and Chris Webber, but I realized it was a few other things as well.

The first was that this strike seemed to start with just a few people on a single team that cared enough and were brave enough: the Milwaukee Bucks. Their act seemed to give impetus and courage to everyone else who otherwise would have tried to carry on as usual. Protesting matters - it may not be sufficient to drive change, but it's the only way to drive forward...and it generally takes just a few, committed people.

This cascade, and how fast it spread - the other teams in a few hours and other leagues and atheletes within the day - was inspiring. All driven by (probably, I don't know for sure) a few folks on a single team supported by teammates and staff.

The third, was what people were willing to sacrifice. You could argue, as unfortunately a lot of cynical people have, that NBA athletes are in a position of privilege and so their protests carry less meaning. I find this incredibly annoying. To me the measure is what you're willing to sacrifice as part of your protest.

Each of the players (particularly the ones that started it) took a risk by deciding not to play. The Bucks clearly were ready to take a loss to mark their protest. They were up 3-1 in the series and heavy favorites, but still this was incredible risk. In a different league or circumstances, it may have had much more severe consequences.

The even more remarkable sacrifice was apparently in the players meeting where the Lakers and Clippers in an informal poll voted to discontinue the season. Given how consumed and vocal Lebron has been about trying to win a championship this season (and the Clippers too), it's remarkable that he was willing (even if he changed his mind later) to walk way from it all. They may be in positions of privilege, but I'd venture most people in the world wouldn't come close to sacrificing as much in their position. It's a remarkable demonstration of character.

It takes conviction and sacrifice to do that. I've been so impressed by how specific the NBA Players asks have been since then - they've taken direct action and don't seem to be satisfied by just expressing anger and a desire for change, but are trying to figure out what they can directly do to drive it.

Did people change what they watched/read/listen to around Black Lives Matter? Will it help?

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 29 Jul 2020 07:59:00 +0000

To do my job I often have to think about and dive into the sea of collective human consciousness and intent that is the Google query stream.

I often think about it in the context of media - it's both professionally required and personally interesting. A few weeks ago I noticed a few things, that I tried to confirm last week through Google Trends.

When the latest incidents of violence against the African-American community sparked both emotions and a movement across the United States and beyond, one of the things that struck me was how many conversations I was having with friends and colleagues around understanding system racial injustice better and how often movie and book recommendations came up as a way for people to understand issues better as well as build empathy.

There were also a flurry of articles recommending books, movies and shows on the topic. So I was curious. Did people change their media consumption habits at all?

They did.

Here are a few examples in the US. You see a distinct change right after the week of George Floyd's murder at the end of May, peaking the next week and in some cases persisting at a slightly elevated level of interest even afterwards.

Multiple people told me about 13th, a 2016 documentary directed by Ava DuVernay about the unjust practices in the US prison system. You can see how the interest spiked even beyond the initial release of the documentary four years ago.

13th

You see spikes even for more popular and older stuff like Fruitvale Station and Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing.

Fruitvale Station

Do The Right Thing

Just Mercy which was released in January, and then made available to stream for free in June, saw the most interest, almost as much as when it was first released - which is extremely unusual for a recent wide-release.

Just Mercy

You see similar spikes in shows, even more mainstream fare

When They See Us

Dear White People

...and of course in books around the subject too.

Between the World and Me

So You Want to Talk About Race

The graph that surprised me the most (but maybe shouldn't have) is the one for Childish Gambino's This is America

This is America

You see similar spikes for people trying to learn about Dr King, Malcom X and Rodney King.

So why do graphs with spikes matter? And why do they make me more hopeful?

They are evidence of interest - interest in educating oneself or trying to feel more connected to a cause. They are indicators of people open to changing their minds, and with it possibly trying to change things around them.

And some of this interest, hopefully translated and will translate into action, which will translate into change.

Even if the insight is right, it's all in the execution: TikTok and Quibi

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Fri, 12 Jun 2020 07:46:00 +0000

I'm spending a lot more time on TikTok recently, and so found myself reflecting a little longer than usual after reading this great article by Ben Thompson on TikTok and Quibi.

I won't repeat all his insights, but the thing that stuck with me is his comment that Katzenberg's thesis that led to the founding of Quibi was right. It definitely was. I remember thinking at the time that he was definitely right on the trends. The thesis was roughly

There was a lot of entertainment consumption shifting to phones.
There was an opportunity to innovate there.
Shorter content was probably part of the answer as people's attentions and habits

However, the set of decisions and the execution the team decided on was informed by their backgrounds and assumptions. They innovated on format (vertical/horizontal) and on length (all content is under 10 mins) and then bet big on premium content (celebrities, high production value and great scripts) to attract users and a regular schedule to ensure retention. The business model required a paid subscription strategy.

The insights into consumers behavior are definitely all correct, but the execution they bet on is... well it's early and time will tell.

As Thompson points out, you could end up building TikTok off the same thesis and insight.

The execution would be completely different- short is much shorter (seconds, not minutes), and that with the right incentives, product affordances and early creators you could turn the entire planet into awesome creators and the right algorithms into amazing curators. You could build that short, mobile entertainment system in a completely different way.

The other execution challenge is that the stakes are a lot higher for Quibi (massive fundraise, hard to pivot the product to find product/market fit) vs. the opportunity Tiktok (and it's various predecessor apps) had to tweak and find what works and respond to users.

Insight is critical, but execution is everything.

Can Netflix own childhoods? And do they want to?

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Tue, 09 Jun 2020 05:06:00 +0000

A line about Disney that has really stuck with me over they years is "Disney owns your childhood".

Across the "original" Disney characters and stories, Pixar, Marvel and Star Wars (and now even more with Fox acquisitions) - a single company owns a lot (not all, but probably close to a majority) of the IP that I really care about - that I associate with happiness as a child and as adult.

I assumed the same would be true of my son (6) and daughter (3), and to some extent it is. It's not just what they watch and read. They absolutely loved going to Disneyland and love a lot of the characters - my daughter goes to be with a Minnie doll. So I assumed when I got Disney+, they'd be watching a lot of it - surprisingly that isn't case!

We watch "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" occasionally and the Cars shorts, but probably because my son doesn't like the idea of sitting down for a whole movie that much, we just don't spend that much time on the service with the kids. Oh Disney still has him - he loves building legos of the Millennium Falcon and the Guardian of the Galaxy ship and loves those characters and pretend playing with the Avengers in particular. Buzz Lightyear is one of his favorite characters - though he literally begs us not to try to show him Toy Story (some parts are too scary apparently)! And he absolutely cannot be convinced to watch Frozen (huge bone of contention with his sister who is known to sing "Let it go" spontaneously :-)).

So while the Disney characters have him, their shows clearly don't. So what is he watching instead?

He (and his sister) are watching a lot of Netflix.

I remember being so impressed by the ambition of Rovio (the makers of Angry Birds) many years ago where they simply came out and said "We want to be the next Disney" - and even though the Angry Birds games are still around and the movies and shows are pretty funny (currently heavy in our kids rotation), it's unlikely they will ever meet that goal.

On the other hand, a combination of smart licensing of kids content and some originals has meant we mostly turn to Netflix to entertain (and kinda, sorta educate?) our kids.

The percentage of kids content we watch that are Netflix originals is much lower than for adult content, but they are definitely adding more and more - which leads me to wonder if they focus on it, could they create the best kids characters and content?

And if they succeeded, just how much more successful could they be with greater lifetime stickiness and increased revenue opportunities through merchandise, partnerships (and maybe even parks and cruises?)

What's impressed me most about Netflix over the years is their ability to continually add to their "core competencies".

They went from the best DVD delivery service to the best online streaming provider to the best recommendations/UI to the amongst the best content producers.

It's not that much of a stretch for them to go for owning childhoods. It'll be interesting to watch. Me (and my kids) will be interested bystanders. :-)

What do you think?

“Decades in Weeks” and “Both Jordan and Will Perdue played basketball”: 2 observations while educating a Kindergartener

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Sun, 17 May 2020 09:56:00 +0000

Here's trying to get back into the writing habit again...

Just 2 observations, and 2 quotes, as I try to get back into the flow

"Both Jordan and Will Perdue played basketball for the Bulls"

- I wish I remembered

When I worked at YouTube, I watched at lot of Sal Khan's videos, but more out of curiosity and not deliberately with the intention of learning something. Now that I have a kindergartner whom we're trying to homeschool, I find myself trying to teach him basic math almost everyday. We started using the Khan Academy videos a few weeks ago, and I find myself so impressed everyday by the choices Sal Khan makes and how engaging the videos are. My son seems to follow along so much better than when I try to teach him things, and makes solid progress every single day on the exercises.

It reminded me of the quote above (I read it a long time ago and can't find the source). It's also because I'm obsessed with The Last Dance right now. Jordan was, well... Michael Jordan (this Obama quote about him sums it up, if you're the best in the world at anything you're the 'Michael Jordan' of it) whereas Will Purdue was arguably the least celebrated player on the Bulls at the time.

It made me realize just how much the gap can be between someone mediocre (me) and someone who's very good (Sal Khan) at even something as basic as addition and subtraction...

... which brings me to my second quote:

"There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen" - Lenin

Everyday now for the last few weeks, my son's kindergarten teacher sends a morning message with what he should try to work on for the day, with generally one or two videos of her covering concepts and ideas. She reads and encourages them to write poems, shows math problems, helps them learn new words etc. etc. They have Zoom calls twice a week where she engages the entire class of ~20 kids even as we deal with flaky wifi in our house. She emails me every week if I haven't posted any updates, and even shares specific videos for my son. It's like she's been doing this forever.

What's amazing to me is how fast the change happened. Our school district wasn't expecting the lockdown. We got an email on Thursday saying the school was still going to stay open next week (with special protocols continuing in place) and then on Friday morning they announced it was the last day of school. So the teachers didn't have that much time to prepare - and remember these were kindergartners they are teaching. In the first couple of weeks, it was apparent all the teachers were struggling. It was clear his teacher (who is an amazing teacher - I volunteer regularly in my son's class so get to see her and her aide in action) wasn't comfortable with technology - she had bad Internet at her home and was still learning to use the school tool system. She was clearly conscious and figuring out how to use the camera in the first few videos.

Fast forward to just a couple of weeks later and she's making incredible videos, and her and teachers in adjoining rooms are sharing content, and are delighting my son while helping him learn - as are the Music teacher and others. We email back (or post in the system) videos/audio of him reading/writing and post photographs of his work. I'd argue that because we're pushing him everyday using online tools, he may actually be further along in some dimensions than he would've been at school.

It isn't the same as going to school, but it's definitely been a very different experience than I'd expected. Some of this change for him and for his teacher, who for now has as much in common as an expert YouTuber as a teacher (she makes multiple videos a day after all!) is permanent.

Sometimes the job is just amplifying someone else's idea

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 03 Apr 2019 06:23:00 +0000

Something I'm pretty excited about will launch soon (well, hopefully pretty soon!)
What stood out to me on this one was how we decided to do it, and my role in it.

My largest contribution to this project, was towards the end of a meeting going

"Hey before we run out of time, can we get back to that idea that X had?"

We did, and we made the decision to pursue it.

It's unlikely this would have happened without me asking that one simple question, and that person's great idea and the enthusiasm with which they then pursued it would have been lost.

Increasingly I find the most effective thing I can do in meetings is make sure that everyone's voice is heard and that the right ideas are amplified and pursued.

Representation, or why I'm insanely excited about the Black Panther movie!

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 07:42:00 +0000

Black Panther is releasing on my birthday. I'll actually try to watch it on that day.

I'm easily excited about movies, but I think this may be the most I've been looking forward to a movie in a long, long time. I've been watching the trailer twice with my son each night before putting him to bed for the last week.

And it's also the first time I remember I've been watching out for early reviews and being relieved it was a good movie. (Phew, looks like it's really, really good - I'm not allowing myself to read the reviews yet).

Now, obviously there's a cinematic argument.

The Black Panther is a great character - and was so well introduced in the Civil War movie.
The trailers look really good.
the soundtrack is probably most interesting I've heard in a long, long time
..and the guy who directed Creed is going to direct a superhero movie!!!! Come on!!

But here's a much simpler reason, I'm rooting so hard for this movie - how it represents Africa and Africans.

I was born in Tanzania, and lived there and then mostly in Nigeria till I was 15. My parents then returned to Tanzania, so I continued to visit often. For a large part of my life, I've thought of it as home.

So of course, stereotypes of the place annoyed me... and I'm Indian, so growing up I'd have some people asking me if there are elephants on the road in India and then Indian asking me if there were lions walking around the streets in Africa. Stupid, even if well-intentioned, questions about Africa feel personal and annoying.

So a universe where African aren't caricatures set in a country that's incredibly futuristic, is one that I'm incredibly excited to see.

Yup, you can hate Silicon Valley now

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 01:32:00 +0000

When I read Susan Fowler's post last year, I was shocked. I couldn't believe a company of that size would tolerate such behavior - especially in Silicon Valley, where I thought people were supposed to be nicer! These were supposed to be my people. I knew most of them were increasingly not like me, but still...

We discussed the post that week in my team meeting at work, and I brought it up in all my 1:1s the next week. What shocked me even more was the reaction of the women in my team - they didn't seem surprised that something like this could happen, or that it was crazy that the behavior was tolerated. While I know that men find ways to treat women terribly in all sort of different ways and places in society, I thought modern workplaces at least were safe.

Over the next year, as revelation on revelation mounted and my own awareness grew - of the discrimination, the systematic preying on women, and the cover-ups that seemed the come from these companies, it was pretty clear to me that as an industry and culture, we're really, really broken. There's a culture emerging (or rather has been around for a while, but is just being uncovered) that's toxic and disgusting.

I haven't read either Brotopia or Reset yet, but I did read the excerpts that were out and a lot of the commentary about the books, as well as heard a couple of interviews of both the authors. The stories from Ellen Pao's Reset in particular simply left me shocked and tearing up. The Brotopia excerpts just seem to suggest this behavior seems so, so normalized and widespread.

An industry is never defined by the majority of people that work in it. I still think that a majority (even if it's not as large as majority as I thought) of people that work in Silicon Valley - most men in Silicon Valley even - aren't terrible people. They're trying to get stuff done, and live their lives. They know they're lucky to have jobs that don't suck and pay well, and they appreciate that.

But here's the thing: it doesn't matter.

An industry or culture is not defined by how most people act. It's defined by how it's leaders act, what they permit, and how it's most vocal actors behave. It's important not just because that's how most people outside the industry perceive the industry, it also signals to the majority of people within the industry that the behavior is ok.

Oh, Travis breaks laws and behaves badly to help his company win. Why shouldn't I? Maybe that's what I should've been doing all along. Did you hear what happened at that offsite? I guess that sort of stuff is ok here.

I remember about how I thought about Wall Street at different points in my life, particularly when I was young. Without knowing a lot of people there, I just assumed most people there were greedy, and exhibited terrible behavior towards women and minorities. That's what the movies seemed to say, and some of leaders I read about seemed awful and corrupt. But like people here, I now actually think most of the people in the industry were probably ok people. It was their most vocal bits and leaders that were the problem and that influenced everyone else and public perception.

And that's where Silicon Valley is now - too many of it's leaders behave badly, people seem out of touch with others, and there's a toxic culture in a lot of sub-pockets. There's still a lot of good people. Some of them genuinely think they're making the world a better place (which is silly - but that's a different post); most really at least don't want to make it worse for others, but that just doesn't matter.

The damage is done, and it's not clear it can ever be mitigated until the industry itself is less relevant or eclipsed.

This has already seeped into popular culture - tech billionaires in the movies and in other fiction, have already been seen as evil enough to try to take over the world and kill people. Now they'll prey on women, break laws more flagrantly and hate poor people as well. The young scriptwriter that used the make her villain a Wall Street banker is going to (rightly) make him a tech CEO.

Tech has that place in people's psyche's now - full of people that are greedy, evil and willing to bend the laws of both the land and of decency to satisfy themselves.

As an industry, we deserve to be the thought of that way too.

So it's sad, but I think ok to hate us now.

Materials from my Product Management workshop

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Mon, 05 Feb 2018 17:21:00 +0000

One of the things I've really enjoyed doing over the last year is teaching and presenting on the work I do more. I do it mostly because I enjoy doing it, but once in a while you hear back about the impact it had and feel better about the fact that you're taking the time to do it.

Last year, I conducted a workshop on Product Management (write up about it here). Within the last week, 2 people got in touch to tell me how that workshop actually helped them - one who used it to have a better summer internship and the other on how it helped him interview better and get a job offer because of it. 3 others also got in touch over the last month to ask about the materials since they're conducting trainings of their own.

The materials themselves aren't perfect (my slides are really meant for presenting and not great reading material in themselves), but I figured if it might actually still help some folks - either to prep themselves or conduct these kinds of workshops.

I borrowed ideas from a few different colleagues for these, so thanks to them for their ideas/materials.

So here's links to the bootcamp deck, and the exercise handout.

Hope they're helpful!

People are selfish, shameless and free-riders.. and other lessons from a playground. :-)

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Tue, 21 Nov 2017 08:23:00 +0000

Almost every weekend I end up at a playground in a park near where I live. It's a really nice playground in a really nice neighborhood, with really nice kids. A lot of their parents though, are terrible people.... which probably means many of these nice kids will grow up to be at least somewhat terrible people as well.

Yeah... I'm having that kind of day. :-)

There are days when I think people are amazing - kind, generous, compassionate and civilized enough to take care of each other or at least not hurt each other. And then there are days when I'm reminded how we're ultimately just animals - barely evolved enough to not try to take advantage of each other in every way possible.

So back to this playground, where humanity comes every weekend and continues to disappoint me. I should mention I love this playground. I take my kid there every weekend, and there's nothing I enjoy more than watching all kids and families hang out. Kids that are joyful often bring out the best qualities in adults, so it really lifts my mood being there.

The playground has one of these things to the left.

Simple enough - some kids climb up on the ropes, others just sit on the disc at the bottom, some older kids generally try to spin the whole thing around and there's tons of excitement and joy to be shared. The system takes care of itself - kids know when to get on, when to jump off. They slow down when a kid cries and often stop when they see a little one trying to jump on. It holds a lot of kids - I've seen upto 10-15 hang out on it just fine.

Every time I see a bunch of tweens run the operation, it warms my heart that the planet is in good hands. They don't just have fun, they seem to watch out for each other and the younger kids.

...and now we get to the parents.

Often there's a lot of kids and so you need an adult to help out with getting the thing to spin, or getting a kid in or out, or something else and here's where you get to see people's baser instincts.

A little free-riding is fine, but help out once in a while!: I've seen this happen a few times now but it continues to surprise me. On the first day my son discovered this thing, he really wanted to hang out on this thing. He was there about 20 mins, which meant I was there pushing the thing for most of those 20 mins. Here's the thing - there were very few bigger kids that day which meant parents had to do all the pushing. Over the 20 mins, about 50 kids must have showed up. All their parents were nearby - just 2 other parents over that span of time helped out.. and one of them was a very pregnant woman!

All the other parents were around - sipping their lattes, chatting with their friends, staring at their phones, occasionally shouting at their kids so that they could take a quick photograph - literally everything but helping out with pushing their own kids and all the others. At about ten minutes in, when I was the only parent there, I thought it was time to run an experiment - I stopped pushing and stepped back a bit. Two nine-ish year old girls got down and started to push. One even shouted "Mom, come help me!" Her mom literally looked the other way. I shook my head and helped her, and she jumped back on.

My 4yo seems to care more about the swings and slides these days, so I don't spend as much time on that every week, but the behavior is pretty consistent. There's generally a parent or two that jump in (generally their kids are amongst the youngest) and everyone else sips their damn coffee.

At least have the decency to pretend to help out! That happens once in a while, and I find it pretty amusing - the parent that comes in and gives one push and then steps back fast. But it's better than nothing!

Bend the world for my kid; screw the others: And it gets better. It's bad enough that a lot of parents don't feel the need to help. But a bunch feel like when they are parenting, the rest of the world doesn't matter.

Last week a couple of kids climbed to the top of that thing. Their parents decided it wasn't safe for the thing to spin while those kids (pretty grown up by the way) were standing at the top. Now that is reasonable - every parent has their own ideas of what's safe. So one of the parents held the thing still while these kids climbed up. Here's the problem - three younger kids got in wanting the thing to spin. The parents just ignored the kids. My son jumped in too. I waited for a few seconds, and then told him a little loudly "Hold on. The spinning will start soon." This was a cue for a parents to start a negotiation with their kids about coming down or sitting. There was no urgency or acknowledgement of the fact that a bunch of people were waiting. They continued their practiced, calm "watch-what-a-great-parent-I-am" tone. A little girl lost it, and said "I'm going to spin it now" and started to try turning this thing. This dad deliberately held the rope making it harder for her to turn it. "Don't worry - I'm controlling it", he smugly announced to his wife.

Eventually the kids got down and sat on the disc. Two other older girls jumped on started spinning the disc. I helped out until my son was done with the thing. The dad that stopped everyone else having fun so his sone could climb down? He was sipping his damn latte with a smug look on his face while his son sat on the disc.

When I think about society and how messed up it is, I now often think about these parents in the playground. If we can't do the right thing trying to take care of each others kids, what chance do we ever have of doing the right thing at all?

Measure f-ing everything, and assume f-ing nothing!! - Or how mentoring ruined lives :-(

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Thu, 27 Jul 2017 05:31:00 +0000

I've been really enjoying the Freakonomics podcast of late. This episode and the lesson we should take a away from it, was a stark reminder of one of the most important things we should be doing - but often don't - in building products or making any decisions: measuring the impact of absolutely everything we do, including the things that seem obviously good.

I recommend listening to the podcast if you have the time, but here's the summary. Stephen Dubner describes the Cambridge Sommerville Youth Study. The impact of social intervention programs in general is hard to measure and so they seldom are. This was the first attempt at measuring the impact over a long period of time.

It's a great story and there are a few good take-aways, but here's the main one: troubled or at-risk youth that received mentoring (good mentoring!) had worse life outcomes across every dimension than the kids that were left alone. Despite the recipients saying that the mentoring was incredibly valuable and helped them, they were actually worse off across a bunch of measured dimension.

Everyone's assumption: mentoring troubled youth will help them in life was wrong - at least the kind of mentoring that they were doing then. They were able to actually measure and determine this only because computers were just starting to become available and the person leading the research was determined enough to figure out how to use them.

This isn't unusual. A lot of things can seem obviously good especially to people working on them, but most don't really do the work to understand (or measure) the long-term impact of the changes they're making. Sometimes it's because they don't feel the need to - a lesson learned in this Steven Seagal classic. Other times it's because it's really, really hard to measure these things.

This is a great reminder that the impact can be very, very different from what you expect or what seems "obvious". It can even ruin people's lives.

So, find a way to measure everything. Always.

Beware the friends you keep... and that your leaders keep.

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Tue, 18 Jul 2017 03:12:00 +0000

I ended up catching up this season of the Revisionist History podcast this week.

This episode (The Prime Minister and the Prof) was my favorite of this season by far.

Here's the episode summary:

"How does friendship influence political power? The story of Winston Churchill’s close friend and confidant — an eccentric scientist named Frederick Lindemann — whose connection to Churchill altered the course of British policy in World War II. And not in a good way."

I won't say too much about the story in case you want to catch the episode. Gladwell takes his time to reveal the story with lots of great audio clips, an interview and a great background score.

I'll just say that it's a stark reminder that we should judge our leaders not just by their actions and words, but by the company they keep and the judgement those people show. For the simple reason, that a lot of authority will naturally be given to those people.

Churchill's blind trusting of his friend had devastating and far-reaching consequences. It's also a reminder that a lot of people are pretty terrible - that humanity isn't something that can be taken for granted and that they will often act in petty and self-serving ways that have devastating consequences.

Fun job perk: finding interesting stuff! This week - Desiderata

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 06:43:00 +0000

One of the fun perks of my job is that on many days simply the act of doing my job means I learn or find a lot of interesting stuff. Product managing on Search often involves search query debugging, and you often stumble on to really interesting stuff.

Last week it was this poem: Desiderata.

"With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.Strive to be happy. "

I find myself going back to read it again all of this week.

Also caught Baby Driver this week - though that would've probably happened even if I didn't work on Search. :-)

Teaching: I realized why I love it, and why I really need to do more of it.

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 05 Jul 2017 06:00:00 +0000

Ever since I can remember, I've imagined a version of my life where I teach.

I was never really sure why. I just knew it was something I'd probably really enjoy. I'd done enough of training and presenting at conferences over the last many years that I knew I really enjoy getting up in front on a crowd. I'd also guest lectured occasionally and recruited enough to know I really enjoyed interacting with students.

Then in April, I ended up lecturing at 3 schools - Chicago, Stanford and the University of Michigan. The topics were completely different at each of the schools, and I left each lecture exhilarated. In two of those cases, I was also exhausted - but that's another story. :-)

There were a few reasons why:

The creative itch: This applies to presentation of this type in general. but the foreword of this book really summed it up. The author taught a class because he was clear that it helped him scratch a creative itch that he had that his job as a lawyer didn't.
The subject matter: In each of these cases, I felt like I knew a lot about the things I was going to lecture on, but each still required some preparation and research on my part. I still love the process of putting it all together. And of course, I took up to the very last minute to noodle on the material.
The audience: There's something about talking to people that are still in school that I really respond well to - perhaps it's because they're so focussed on learning or that they're trying to improve themselves, but the audience really gets me pumped.

April was so much fun that I'm determined to try to do more of this going forward.

Filters, slices and context color everything. Or how I got to "omg. wtf. I guess Steve Ballmer is pretty cool"

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 31 May 2017 06:04:00 +0000

I ended up listening to two long interviews of Steve Ballmer over the last couple of weeks. The first was on Bill Simmons' podcast where the conversation was primarily around basketball and the second was on the Freakonomics podcast where they talked about a bunch of things - his USAFacts site, philanthropy, tech etc.

From each of these, I came away thinking - "Wow. This is a pretty smart, passionate and likable dude". Why is this surprising?

Well my quick impression of him before listening to both of these "Man, how was this guy CEO of Microsoft for so long" and well, a lot worse to be honest.

And then I thought about why I thought this.

I hadn't really heard him speak (in-person or watched a video) for any length of time
objectively, even with all the missteps in his later years at the helm it's hard not to evaluate him as a pretty successful executive and CEO

A few years ago, I was talking to two people who'd worked at Microsoft and seen him in action at close quarters. I started to compare him to another exec with a business background and their immediate reaction was "OMG. Steve was actually really great."

So why did I think he was a bit of a buffoon?

Slices: Well, the first is slices. I rarely ever saw a large sample of him speaking or how he dealt with things. I just saw slices (clips, quotes, videos) - like his infamous "Developers, developers, developers" moment, or some of the things he happened to say like laughing off the iPhone. It's easy to jump to conclusions if that's all you see.
Filters: I re-watched the entire "Developers, developers, developers" thing as well as the video above. You know what - they're actually not that bad.
If I'd watched them in isolation without pre-existing commentary i.e. an article that said "look at the ridiculous CEO" or a share that said "look how wrong he was", I'd actually have come away with a much more favorable impression.
Context: And finally context. I was in school studying computer science when Windows vs. Linux, and what those operating systems embodied seemed like the most important platform war in computing and everyone in school was on the Linux side.
It was hard not to assume the worse (and man there actually was enough of it) on the other side.

Take all that away, and my reaction was "Huh, makes sense he was in the position he was". His backstory and what he's doing now (USAFacts and the most enthusiastic NBA owner in history) even makes me root for him - just him, not the Clippers. That would just be insane.

So what do I take away?

Watch out for the limited slices we see on things, the filters we see them through and the context we might already have - which may actually lead us to incorrect conclusions.

Originals may have been the most dangerous thing I read this year

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Fri, 26 May 2017 06:59:00 +0000

I've been trying to get back into the reading habit. I finished the Originals (rather quickly) in March and I think it may be the most dangerous think I read this year.

There's a number of ideas in the book, but the one that really resonated with me is Adam Grant's endorsement of procrastination (his NY Times write-up here).

My quick summary is that he finds that often waiting till the last minute to finish any work results in the best output. You still need to start early, but waiting to finish means you've been mulling the project for a while and iterating on it mentally. I've found this to be so true for things that I work on - in particular presentations and talks.

Starting early means, you have a framework in mind and start the wheels turning how what you want to say, but by holding off on finishing the thoughts you don't commit to your initial ideas and are more open to exploring other avenues. I find by the time I'm putting together the final talk (generally the night before), I'm actually on the third or fourth iteration instead of flushing out the first idea.

I can't say I've been doing this strategically - I just naturally like to keep pondering things and need deadlines to finish them - but social science research that proves that this is actually a good idea means I'm just going to keep doing it with more confidence.

So if you're waiting on a preso from me or collaborating with me on one... I apologize in advance. :-)

May I need more silence and lesser stimulation...

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Sun, 07 May 2017 07:03:00 +0000

Even by my low standards, this was a long blogging break. Last month though, I got introduced as a "blogger" to an audience I was speaking to which was a reminder that I really miss this. :-)

I've always known how important it is to avoid interruptions and seek silence while working, and how seldom I ever actually do this - I generally am juggling multiple things and projects at a time, and when I'm at my desk generally have headphones on with either loud music or a TV show playing in the background. While driving, I always have a podcast on or start a phone call.

But this Friday, I was in a situation where I was without a phone or a laptop for nearly half the day. I carry 2 phones generally - one had just died and the other ran out of charge by 11am. The end result: I found myself a lot more connected in the conversations I was having with friends and thinking more deeply even in the little moments - in the car, walking, even waiting in line. I frankly enjoyed my own thoughts more than I've had in a while.

I realize just how much I need to do it as a regular part of my day.

Whimsy when I changed my profile picture...

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 07 Dec 2016 20:14:00 +0000

I changed by profile picture at work.

Later in the day, two people on my team had changed their profile pictures to these.. :-)

It made my day!

I changed my profile pic again today. Let's see how fast anyone catches on this time. :-)

Rocking the boat, in order to rock - or why I keep annoying the teleprompter people

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Wed, 07 Dec 2016 06:22:00 +0000

I haven't had to use a teleprompter much. I've been on stage or video maybe 3 or 4 times where I've used one.

Each of the times, I realized I was annoying the heck out of the person turning the script because I consistently was saying things not in the teleprompter script - sometimes changing phrasing and adding a few words; or even worse changing around the order of sentences. I did this every single time too - so on multiple takes or different rehearsals for a talk - I did something different each time. Also - I'm awful at rehearsals, but that's a different story. :-)

In general, I know I do this for most of the talks I give (most are without teleprompters!) - I know the points I want to hit, but generally make them in different ways; very often I've made up talking points right on the spot. It generally works out well. At worst, it comes off a little raw. Most recently for subject for a talk at Pubcon for subject matter I knew well, I decided to keep the same slides but changed literally everything I thought I'd say 30 mins before that talk was about to start.

I'd decided that I was doing this because it made me appear more spontaneous. I hate watching speakers that seem super-scripted. I can't help feeling that sticking to a script makes you come across as stiff, and not genuine - even if you are. I figured a free-flowing, less formal style just suits my personality better.

But as always, Hidden Brain taught me something new - that there might be more behind this.

The episode (#53: Embrace the Chaos) basically talks about why many people have done their most amazing work when they were off-balance. My favorite example was the jazz pianist whose most sublime recording was when he was playing a piano that was too small and had a whole bunch of other problems with it.

In addition to the improvisation which may force exploring new directions, the argument was basically that the additional tension forced great attention which allowed people to perform at an enhanced level.

A few years ago, I started saying before talkswhere time bounds were less of an issue, "Please interrupt me and ask questions. I find talks go better that way." I'd found that for some reason that was always true.

I now realize why - the interruptions both

kept me on my feet and more alert through the talk
forced me to think fresh each time - making me better not just then, but for the future.

So the next time you're doing something - particularly something you've done a lot before - consider rocking the darn boat!

Are your teams at work built for soccer or basketball?

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Mon, 28 Nov 2016 04:18:00 +0000

I figured the holiday was a good time as any to try to revive the blogging habit.. again. :-)

I devoured the Revisionist History podcast over a couple of weeks of driving last month (highly recommended!) One of the analogies Gladwell made stuck with me though, especially since I was thinking about team dynamics at the time.

Caveat emptor: Gladwell simplifies and glosses over quite a bit in making his point - he does this a lot; but I understand why he needs to. Nuance makes the intellectual candy harder to digest.

He talks about talent in the context of basketball and soccer. He cites research which shows that to win the most basketball games it completely makes sense to just focus on getting the best player(s) you can. Conversely, to win the most soccer games your best shot is to have the fewest weaker players on the pitch. If you follow both sports, this'll seem intuitively right to you. The dynamics of the game - on the margin - support one strategy over the other.

He goes on to make the argument that despite knowing this, soccer team owners do the suboptimal thing and are infatuated with getting stars and prioritize it over bolstering their roster overall. There are of course business reasons to do this, but anyway... that's a whole different post. You can read more about Gladwell's argument in the context of education here.

But it got me thinking about what approach made the best sense in the context of teams at work - do you optimize for getting the absolute best people on your team ("the stars") or ensuring that you have the best team overall (i.e. make sure your weakest team member is still pretty good and plays well in the overall picture)? Most teams and companies, of course, try to do both to some extent. However, teams, and the people that try to build them, definitely tend to favor one philosophy over the other - even subconsciously. It affects how and whom they recruit, retain and reward.

I realized as I thought through past teams I've been on that I've seen both sides of this. I also realized there really isn't a perfect answer - it depends on the problem you're working on, the size of the team, the team itself and the situation you and the company/org you're part of are in.

But I still like the analogy - think explicitly about what game you're optimizing for while putting your team together. Does it look more like soccer (few chances to actually score and win; can't afford mistakes; requires everyone working together well and waiting for openings) or basketball (a transcendent talent(s) can cover other weaknesses)?

Everyone's struggle is real... at the very least to them

noreply@blogger.com (salgar) — Fri, 15 Jul 2016 05:41:00 +0000

A couple of weeks ago, while in line waiting to pick up some food I'd just ordered, I overheard two conversations - I don't make a habit of this, but it's hard to not hear things when you leave your phone behind. :-/

My first reactions as I heard both of these conversations was annoyance at the protagonist in one and admiration for the other. Both conversations stayed with me for a while, but it took me some time to realize that was unfair on my part to be annoyed at the person that I was annoyed at.

So about these conversations:

The first was between someone working there and a friend. She was sympathizing with her friend who'd be starting a new job leaving this place. "Oh, it's minimum wage again?", she said with concern in her voice. "Yes, but it's fine", said her friend. The job was closer to where she lived so she thought she'd make about the same and she might get home a little earlier to her daughter some evenings though the hours were less predictable. It was clear she was sad to lose the job she had, but was grateful about the job she'd gotten. She was being optimistic and putting on brave face.

This conversation was happening to the left of where I was standing. The second conversation, happening on my right, was between two guys - apparently much better off. Rather the monologue by one of these guys was about how hard it was to make it all work now that his stock investments had fallen. He talked loudly about how he was struggling with wether he should still get rid of his swimming pool since he hardly used it and add an extra garage for his cars - he had a few cars apparently. This decision had kept him up last night and he'd gotten into a fight with his girlfriend about it.

Something about the juxtaposition of the conversations really annoyed me and I left thinking "Yup. This is why it's so easy to hate Silicon Valley techies. We're oblivious to how lucky we are and obsess about such rubbish."

Until a week after when I was getting stressed about something and was about to start complaining about it. Something I learned to do a long time ago before complaining, was think about how lucky I am compared to most people on the planet (if you're in a position to read this - it's likely you are too). It generally stops me from complaining and let's me either relax or focus on what to do instead. That day my mind immediately drifted to the woman in the first conversation, but then immediately to thinking about how different was I really from the person in the second conversation complaining about his small garage?

I realized in the grand scheme of things - not that much. There's a fundamental set of needs that we have in order to survive and live with dignity, but everything on top of that are constructs and challenges we create for ourselves.

The stresses of the person worrying about his cars were as real to him, as were the stresses of the person worrying about her new job and the unpredictable hours. The former had a much bigger safety net, but that's not something they even realized in the moment.

From what I can tell, especially when it comes to our own situations, most people tend to focus on our challenges and seldom our advantages. It takes a comparison to others situations to remind us of how well we're really doing - and most people don't bother thinking about others until something jolts them to do so.

In other words, always be kind - even to the jerks that don't realize they aren't being. Their struggles may not be real to us, but they are to them...