AMA: DocuSign Director of Product Management, Hiral Shah on AI Product Management

Overall I believe that all PMs can be AI PMs since AI PMs also have to be equally customer obsessed as traditional PMs. However, I do believe AI product management role can be a bit different than a traditional PM role. Some differentiations and questions to think about it?➡ Technical Understanding: Can you explain how a machine learning model works, in layman's terms? Or, how would you handle the situation where the model is giving unpredictable outputs?➡ Data Management: Can you provide an exa ...Read More

Getting user feedback is a very important element of building any AI feature. Without the user input, you cannot improve your AI, which means you cannot improve your product. Treat the AI feature similar to any product feature, you need to be nimble, agile and adaptable. There are a number of ways you can gather this feedback and depending on that you can incorporate it in many different ways In feature feedback: Think about this as the thumbs up or down you do on your chatGPT or ask it to re-ge ...Read More

While I don't believe there are a lot of different types of AI Product Managers, in some large organizations I see two types of AI Product Managers - 1) application focused and 2) AI foundation focused. It also varies based on the size and maturity of the organization. The Application focused AI PM is thinking a lot about how can you leverage the AI to deliver the best customer value, which customer problems can be solved better if we applied AI and then focus on the adoption of AI. The Foundati ...Read More

Having a software engineering background is a plus when you want to become an AI PM. This helps you build rapport with engineering, data science quickly and help translate the technical details in a more user friendly way. However, even as an AI PM, you still need the core Product management skills, which are needed to be acquired in various roles. For example even as a software engineer, you can come up with ideas, pitch and build it to and see what's the impact. Be data driven to track every m ...Read More

One key thing would be to have empathy for your fellow data scientists. When working with data scientists, remember that simply asking for Level of Effort won't suffice. Feasibility and effort are often exploratory in the AI realm. So, change the language you speak to foster successful collaboration!Shared Understanding: As a PM, it's crucial to ensure that data scientists understand your goals and objectives. Clearly communicate what you're trying to achieve and the assumptions that need valida ...Read More