Product Momentum Podcast

ITX Corp.
  • 5.0 (31)
  • Technology
  • Updated Semimonthly

Amazing digital experiences don’t just happen. They are purposefully created by artists and engineers, who strategically and creatively get to know the problem, configure a solution, and maneuver through the various dynamics, hurdles, and technicalities to make it a reality. Hosts Sean and Paul will discuss various elements that go into creating and managing software products, from building user personas to designing for trackable success. No topic is off-limits if it helps inspire and build an amazing digital experience for users – and a product people actually want.

  1. 3d ago

    Mike Belsito: Why Timeless Product Skills Matter in an AI-Driven World

    Mike Belsito has spent years at the center of the product management community. As the founder of Product Collective, a leader at Mind the Product, and now Head of Product Evangelism at Pendo, Mike has built a career around learning from product professionals and sharing those insights with the broader industry. In this episode of Product Momentum, Mike joins Sean and Dan for a discussion that is absolutely top of mind for today’s product leaders today: while artificial intelligence is transforming how products are built, timeless skills such as curiosity, judgment, and taste remain essential. In fact, he argues, these capabilities will become even more valuable as technology accelerates the pace of product development. Navigating AI Through Human-Centered Product Skills In doing research for a new book, Mike engaged many product leaders who had experienced previous periods of technological disruption – e.g., the rise of the internet, telecommunications, and mobile computing. Now dealing with AI-driven opportunities and uncertainties, many leaders point to the same enduring qualities that helped them and their teams adapt during earlier transitions. Rather than focusing solely on new technologies, they emphasized the importance of human-centered skills that guide decision-making and product strategy. “It’s kind of relying on the same timeless characteristics that we’ve always thought were important,” Mike says. “And even today, we still think are important, which are things like curiosity, judgment, taste.” Balancing Output and Outcomes Our conversation with Mike also explored a growing tension within product organizations – a theme also covered in recent Product Momentum episodes. As AI enables teams to create more content, code, and functionality faster than ever before, Mike cautions against using increased output” as a measure of success. Product teams have spent years shifting their focus from user satisfaction to delivery metrics to business outcomes, Mike continues. “That mindset remains critical, even as AI changes workflows. But how do we make sure that it’s not just about the output – that we’re actually building the right things?” For product managers, designers, and engineers, the challenge is ensuring that speed does not come at the expense of delivering business value. Curiosity as a Practiced Skill Among Mike’s more surprising research discoveries was how often leaders highlighted curiosity as a skill that can be developed intentionally. Rather than viewing curiosity as an innate personality trait, many described it as a practice that strengthens through deliberate effort. It’s an insight that brings important implications for today’s product teams. Learning, questioning assumptions, and seeking new perspectives become competitive advantages in times like these when the technology landscape evolves so quickly, Mike adds. “I wasn’t thinking of curiosity as a practice or as a muscle to be flexed.” As AI continues to reshape product development, Mike offers a practical perspective for product leaders. Technology will continue to evolve, he says, but the ability to ask thoughtful questions, exercise sound judgment, and focus on meaningful outcomes remains fundamental. Those timeless capabilities may ultimately determine which teams are best equipped to thrive in an increasingly AI-driven future. [03:45[ What is product evangelism? Being Pendo’s Head of Product Evangelism is a new role for me, one that I’ve just stepped into weeks ago. Pendo has a unique point of view on how it helps product people, and it does that through its software, and now it’s all kind of software. [06:25] Mike’s new book project — the origin story. I wasn’t planning on ever writing a book again. The publisher [Wiley] reached out kind of out of the blue and told me ‘we think you have a pretty unique point of view.’ [09:41] What’s exciting you right now? What’s keeping you up at night? Essential questions Mike poses to every product leader he speaks with, in every conversation. [14:44] Rewarding outcomes over outputs. Many product folks came up in a world where we all celebrated outputs. Like, how much did we deliver this week? But then it came to a point where we said, ‘hey, it actually shouldn’t be about outputs…it should be about outcomes. And it’s even beyond outcomes for your customers — it’s about outcomes for businesses too. [17:29] Creating the right thing > Creating for creating’s sake. We have to remember that it’s not just about creating for creating sake, it’s like making sure we’re creating the right thing. [20:47] Curiosity, taste, and judgment. We used to believe that these were innate personality traits. But lately, as I have conducted research for my upcoming book, I am learning from other product leaders that these are muscles that can be strengthened, and they are muscles we must flex regularly. Want to hear more from Mike Belsito? Be sure to join us as he emcees the 2026 ITX Product + Design Conference, June 24 & 25 in Rochester, NY – for the fifth consecutive year! “I’m honored to return as emcee for the fifth year in a row. This event continues to stand out because of the incredible community it brings together and the energy in the room each time we gather. I’m proud to be part of something that keeps growing in impact and connection.” – Mike Belsito The post 189 / Mike Belsito: Why Timeless Product Skills Matter in an AI-Driven World appeared first on ITX Corp..

    26 min

  2. May 27

    Prerna Singh

    Prerna Singh helps organizations build better products and stronger communities. As the founder of Scrappy to Scale Advisors and the former VP of Product and Design at Meetup, she has guided startups and mission-driven organizations through rapid change, customer discovery, and product strategy. In today’s episode, Prerna explains why human connection and disciplined product thinking matter more than ever during the AI boom. While AI may accelerate product work, she says, successful teams avoid the must stay grounded in curiosity, customer insight, and authentic community building. Sense of Community Addresses the ‘Isolation Problem’ What started as a casual gathering for fractional product leaders, Prerna’s Product Breakfasts quickly evolved into a broader support system for people navigating uncertainty and AI-driven change and the professional isolation that often comes with it. Many product professionals, she says, now feel overwhelmed by the pace of technological advancement and the pressure to keep pace. “I don’t think there’s any catching up,” Prerna adds. “‘Catching up’ implies that there’s an end goal to this. And there isn’t. So that’s where I think Breakfast is the evolution of people coming together to share what they know and helping reduce that anxiety that isn’t just a knowledge gap. It’s also an isolation problem.” First Principles, Supported by Human Interaction Product professionals need environments where they can safely discuss their own vulnerabilities. The ability to openly admit uncertainty about AI and its impact, to exchange ideas, and learn together is the hallmark of authentic, in-person interaction. “The IRL connection isn’t going anywhere,” Prerna continues. “We need that human-to-human interaction to have an outlet for where those vulnerabilities are gonna go. Otherwise, they’re just contained within us and we’re just spiraling in our own heads.” Avoiding the Trap Starts with Better Discovery Prerna’s extensive background in user research informs her belief in the importance of first principles in product management. AI tools, she says, make it deceptively easy to jump directly into solutioning without fully understanding the customer’s needs and the business’ problems. In her fractional product manager role, Prerna listens “for the thing that clients return to when they stop performing.” “‘We need AI’ is a common mantra,” she says. “But what’s interesting for me is the kernel of truth that frames that statement. And it’s not what they want. It’s what they can’t circle back to – like there’s a hidden customer insight that we’ve maybe navigated around.” Lean into Discovery, Prerna concludes. Product teams must remain disciplined about validating assumptions, conducting research, and identifying the real customer need before building anything. “Avoid the trap of jumping into solutioning.” [05:26] Origin story of the Product Leaders Breakfast. The original concept for Product Breakfast started from a place where it came out this concept of isolation. In the last 2-3 years, we’ve heard so much about AI and the way that it’s affecting our jobs. [09:36] Don’t feel like you need to ‘catch up’ to AI’s impact. I don’t think there’s any catching up. Catching up implies that there’s like an end goal to this — and, well, there isn’t. [12:00] The IRL Connection Remains Essential. This is precisely why the IRL connection isn’t going anywhere. We need the human-to-human interaction to have an outlet for sharing vulnerabilities; otherwise, they’re just contained within us and then we’re just spiraling in our own heads. [18:28] What it means to be a ‘fractional product leader’. The fractional product leader brings in a wealth of experience and is able to quickly understand the organization’s problems, the culture, the team and embed themselves as a force multiplier to help that organization achieve its goals. [26:43] AI’s support of user research and first principles. When we approach these challenges with a level of curiosity, we avoid using the first answer as the final answer. We need to dig beyond the surface level truth with user research. And this is actually where AI has been super-helpful because it’s allowing me to ingest lots of different signals to cut through the noise and figure out what that right signal is. [28:09] Spend time in the problem space. I think the trap is jumping into solutioning. This is another first principles thing where I think, again as humans, we have this tendency to want to jump right into solution as soon as we see a problem without spending time interrogating the problem. The post 188 / Prerna Singh: Avoiding the AI Build Trap with Better User Research appeared first on ITX Corp..

    33 min

  3. May 13

    AI Native: Reimagining Product Roles and Development Cycles, with Adam Creeger

    Adam Creeger is the CTO of Slate and creator of iLoom (pronounced “il-LOOM”). His leadership experience at Meta, Greenhouse, and Frame.io not only informs Slate’s transformation into an AI-native organization, but also shapes the way AI influences product strategy, engineering workflows, and operational models. Throughout his conversation with Sean and Dan, Adam argues that becoming AI native is not about layering AI features onto existing products. Instead, it requires companies to rethink how software is designed, built, and operated – from the ground up. His perspective offers a practical framework for product leaders navigating AI-driven transformation. Here’s what else we learned: ‘AI Native’ Requires Organizational Reinvention AI native organizations are willing to rethink every layer of their business, Adam says. Rather than adding AI features superficially, AI native organizations redesign workflows, team structures, and customer experiences around AI capabilities. He emphasized that AI transformation changes not only products, but also how people contribute inside organizations. “To be AI native requires this deep exercise in re-imagination and not just imagination,” Adam continues. “In an AI native company – from the day-to-day operations to the ‘who does what’ – the roles and the owners of things are going to look very different.” AI is expanding participation across teams, enabling designers, support teams, and non-engineers to contribute directly to product delivery. That shift signals a major change for modern software organizations. AI and the Future of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Our conversation then turned to an exploration of how AI is already changing the traditional software development lifecycle. Years ago, Agile development emerged because humans had historically struggled to fully reason through complex systems before implementation. “I’ve realized that Agile was really a mitigation of a few things, mostly that we humans are limited in our abilities to reason through abstract concepts,” Adam says. “So when we thought about a software project, we didn’t have the ability to see around corners and understand the problems we’d face – until it was real, until you really started playing with it. Turns out that many of those challenges are very solvable by AI, allowing us to go much deeper into the problem space without ever writing a line of code. In addition, AI-assisted planning allows teams to revisit some waterfall-style thinking, but with dramatically faster iteration and validation cycles. Product Managers’ New Role: Communicate Context Importantly, AI is actually elevating the role of product managers, Adam offers. Rather than acting primarily as tactical decision-makers, product leaders can (and should) focus on providing context that enables teams to make informed decisions independently. “More than ever, the product manager has become a role about providing context,” he adds. “PMs should be elevated to a much more strategic role, understanding the long-term vision and helping to translate that to engineers.” Adam also feels that PMs should be using AI to communicate ideas about the product vision much more effectively. That evolution creates a faster and more collaborative product environment. Teams can evaluate real implementations earlier, gather customer feedback sooner, and align around outcomes instead of specifications alone. [05:54] What it means to be ‘AI native’. Conceptually, it’s same as digital native from when the internet was born many years ago. In the abstract sense, I see AI native being about the folks and the companies that are either just starting in the age of AI where everything they do is shaped by the existence of AI and their ability to use AI. [15:08] Is waterfall making a comeback? Oh man, this is one of my favorite topics. Growing up in the industry, waterfall was always like the evil thing. But with AI-assisted coding or agentic coding, you can go really deep, create a much bigger scope, and deliver it much more quickly…and it resembles more of a waterfall mentality. [21:51] The PM’s primary role: providing context. The product manager more than ever has become a role about providing context. The most powerful thing PMs can do in an organization is provide context to other people. [25:49] Exploring Adam’s iloom tool, and how it can help. Hear a quick story from Adam about how he used his iloom tool to create — and demo — a new product feature during a call with his customer success team. [28:47] Swarms. What are they, and how do they work? A swarm is a number of AI agents working together in a very collaborative way with the potential of real-time communication between them. [35:03] Avoiding ‘AI slop’ to defend and elevate a brand’s quality bar. Slate is creating a tool that makes it very difficult to create AI slop. This is a valuable proposition to brands that care deeply about what gets produced in their name. The post 187 / AI Native: Reimagining Product Roles and Development Cycles, with Adam Creeger appeared first on ITX Corp..

    45 min

  4. Apr 29

    TiPS: AI-Enabled First Principles + Core Product Skills Spark Adoption

    Welcome to TiPS – the Topics in Product Series – a new podcast format powered by ITX and the team at Product Momentum. The TiPS mission is to engage the same important product space issues that you confront every day – but this time through the experiences of ITX product managers, UX researchers and designers, engineers, security analysts, and the rest of the team. In this inaugural TiPS episode, Dan Sharp is joined by Sean Murray and Andrew Knoblauch to reflect on a recent Product Leaders Breakfast, hosted by Prerna Singh. Together, they draw on insights from event attendees to discuss how AI is being applied inside real organizations. The central theme was clear: successful AI adoption depends less on hype and more on first principles and core product skills that drive disciplined product thinking, incremental progress, and strong decision-making. Here’s what we learned: Top-Down ‘Do AI’ Directive Is the Wrong Reason for Integrating AI The integration of AI into software development is no longer the proverbial “hammer in search of a nail.” The days of doing AI for AI’s sake are behind us. Today’s product leaders focus on making incremental improvements tied to bona fide business problems. As Sean points out, our response to the ‘do AI’ directive should be: “’Where do you want to see improvement? What outcomes are you looking for?’ I think back to our conversation with Teresa Torres, about applying best practices in the initiation and discovery phases of the SDLC so that when we actually get into building something, it’s gonna have some sort of relevant business value.” It’s a more grounded approach that reflects a broader industry need to align AI efforts with tangible outcomes.. Building Stakeholder Trust Through Incremental Change Trust emerged as a critical factor in AI adoption, but not only in the technical sense. Instead, as attendees discussed, trust is built gradually through careful implementation and organizational alignment. Andrew explains that product teams build trust not by tackling the biggest, riskiest challenge – but by prioritizing low- to medium-risk opportunities while involving stakeholders early, especially those in Legal and Compliance. “This idea of building trust among others in your organization.” Andrew continues. “We do this every day with our clients and with our own teammates. We learn about people’s concerns, what they care about.” The conversation reinforces the idea that AI should be introduced as a collaborator within workflows, not as a replacement for human judgment. Decision Quality as the True Differentiator One of the key threads weaving through our conversation was a return to foundational product principles – specifically, the importance of decision-making. While AI fluency is valuable, it does not replace the need for strong judgment and clear thinking. Teams that succeed will be those that consistently make informed, high-quality decisions, Sean says. “The biggest differentiator moving forward is gonna be decision quality…your ability to consistently make good decisions.” In this context, AI becomes an enabler, not the driver, of product success. The conversation at the Product Leaders Breakfast (hosted by Prerna Singh) reinforces a familiar but essential message for all product leaders. AI does not replace core product skills; it amplifies them. Teams that stay focused on problem definition, stakeholder alignment, and disciplined execution will be best positioned to realize its full potential. The post 186 / TiPS: AI-Enabled First Principles + Core Product Skills Spark Adoption appeared first on ITX Corp..

    24 min

  5. Apr 23

    Confronting Cognitive Bias in AI Models, with John Haggerty

    John Haggerty brings more than 25 years of product leadership experience at companies like Datasite, Prodege, and Highway.ai. As co-founder and CEO of BiasHawk, John leverages his expertise in product management, behavioral psychology, and AI to develop an AI-powered platform that acts like a behavioral clinical psychologist to diagnose cognitive bias and heuristics in other AI models. In this episode of Product Momentum, John joins Sean and Dan to explore how AI is reshaping product work while also introducing new risks. John’s message is clear: as AI accelerates execution, product leaders must confront the invisible risks that come with AI and double down on critical thinking, context, and judgment to deliver quality decisionmaking. AI as an Accelerator, Not a Replacement AI is dramatically compressing the time required to execute product work. Tasks that once took months can now be completed in hours. As we discover every day, speed does not eliminate the need for thoughtful product management. John argues that it merely shifts where product managers can and should focus their energy. “As AI expedites the execution process,” John says, “it also allows us to automate the areas of our work where we really need to be involved in cognitive thinking, reasoning, and creativity.” The Hidden Risk: Bias in AI Decision-Making Large language models inherit the same cognitive biases found in human thinking, John adds. These biases influence not just outputs, but the reasoning behind decisions we make. “It’s not what the decision is or what the output is, it’s more about how the AI model arrived at it.” This distinction is critical for product teams. Without understanding how AI arrives at conclusions, teams risk introducing flawed logic into their products, especially in high-stakes areas like hiring, healthcare, and financial management. Monitoring AI: A New Responsibility for Product Teams To address these challenges, John launched BiasHawk – an AI platform designed to monitor and evaluate AI systems for cognitive bias. The goal is not just testing outputs, but continuously assessing decision quality over time. “We all understand that these systems are designed to evolve. They’re designed to change. They’re designed to drift. But who’s monitoring that to make sure that decision quality stays where it’s supposed to be.” As AI continues to evolve, the role of the product manager becomes even more critical — not less so. Execution may be faster, but judgment, context, and ethical responsibility remain firmly within our human domain. John Haggerty, in his own words: [06:50] AI is compressing execution time, allowing us to automate some of the tasks that we do as product professionals: cognitive thinking, reasoning, creativity. [10:22] There’re lots of really good AI tools out there right now, but what there isn’t out there is anything that tests the fairness of our decisionmaking. [16:04] Great. You’ve used AI to improve productivity by 20%. But what happens when that breaks? What if there’s bias and heuristics in these LLMs. Who’s catching that? [17:55] Critical AI systems have the same blind spots, the same bad habits, that we as humans have. And why not? They’re built off of the flawed content we created. [21:41] I don’t think a LLM could ever get depressed. But we have standard behavioral assessments that we could administer to an LLM — to find out where it falls with these biases and with the decision-making process it’s using. [27:40] As humans, we’re make mistakes. Because AIs are built on what we know, those same mistakes are being repeated. Now we have AI learning from AI, and those mistakes are being amplified. [30:59] The ‘why’ will always need to come from a human. At the end of it all, that’s what Product is. The post 185 / Confronting Cognitive Bias in AI Models, with John Haggerty appeared first on ITX Corp..

    34 min

  6. Mar 31

    Connecting Product Teams with Go-To-Market Outcomes, with Margie Agin

    Margie Agin is a seasoned go-to-market advisor for B2B technology scale-ups. She brings deep expertise across digital marketing, IT, and cybersecurity. As Founder and Chief Strategist of Centerboard Marketing as well as a former leader at companies like Cisco and Blackboard, she has built a career translating complex technical products into effective market strategies. In this episode (which marks her second visit to Product Momentum), Margie’s message is clear: go-to-market (GTM) is not a one-time event or a siloed function – it is an ongoing, cross-functional system that must connect product teams and broader business goals. GTM: A Shared, Continuous Responsibility It’s time to redefine go-to-market as a shared, continuous responsibility across teams, Margie says. Product managers in particular often feel disconnected because their fellow stakeholders in the organization misunderstand go-to-market as either a launch event or solely a sales function. Margie reframes GTM as “a coordinated cross-functional engine that spans product, marketing, sales, customer success, and even finance.”  It’s a perspective that challenges product teams to actively engage in downstream outcomes and collaborate beyond traditional boundaries. Business Context Drives Product Contribution Fundamental to making this critical connection between product team and business outcomes is embracing the product’s fit within the broader business and portfolio strategy. Margie reiterates a message shared by recent guests that product managers need to look beyond their individual product scope and consider how their work contributes to company-wide goals like growth, positioning, and revenue. “Think about your product within the context of the business and how it fits into the whole portfolio,” Margie urges. Know Your Targets: Clarity of Audience and Signals Improves Outcomes Rather than trying to boil the ocean by targeting broad customer segments, teams should focus on specific attributes and behaviors that indicate a strong fit. Defining a precise ideal customer profile and identifying meaningful signals of readiness bring a level of clarity to your message that enables more effective messaging, prioritization, and sales efficiency. “It [your target] can’t just be like, everybody that has money,” Margie says. “It has to be somebody with a defined problem and defined attributes – beyond just industry or size of company.” For product leaders, this reinforces the need to deeply understand customer context and bring that insight into go-to-market planning. In the Age of AI, a Strong Point of View Still Matters Finally, even as AI accelerates execution, it does not – indeed, can not – replace the original thinking and nuanced messaging. Teams must still define what makes their product unique and why it matters. AI can enhance delivery, Margie adds, but it cannot generate true insight or perspective. “The difficult part is always what the difficult part has always been, which is figuring out what you have to contribute to the conversation that is unique.” Margie Agin, in her own words: [04:23] When I think of go-to-market, I think one of the most important aspects is that it is connected across different teams. [08:22] Go-to-market is all about connecting the strategy to the execution to make sure everyone is on point with the strategy. [08:53] Product teams need to think about how their product fits into the context of the organization’s whole portfolio. [11:30] As a company matures, its go-to-market strategy lands in one of three buckets: problem-market fit, product-market fit, and platform-market fit. [19:29] We can’t try to boil the ocean and sell to everybody, right? Target customers can’t be ‘everybody who has money.’ Customers have to have a defined problem and some defined attributes, beyond just industry or size of company. [23:58] That type of deep, nuanced thinking…that human work…I don’t think at this point, is something that is solved by AI. [26:40] AI can execute a lot of work on your behalf, but only you know what ultimately you want the result to be. Andrew Knoblauch leads Sales, Partnerships, and Acquisitions at ITX. He believes the best technology partnerships start with genuine relationships, and that understanding a business deeply is what turns a software engagement into lasting value. Andrew connects organizations with technologists and product leaders while remaining invested in delivering strong business outcomes. The post 184 / Connecting Product Teams with Go-To-Market Outcomes, with Margie Agin appeared first on ITX Corp..

    33 min

  7. Mar 17

    Rich Mironov: Using 'Money Stories' To Communicate Real Business Impact

    Product Momentum welcomes Rich Mironov back to the pod to help us drill down to the bottom line – literally. Rich is a Silicon Valley veteran and longtime product management advisor. He’s spent decades helping C-suite executives and product leaders connect their work to business outcomes. In this episode, Rich reinforces a single, powerful theme: product managers must translate their ideas into clear financial impact. It’s not enough to build great features – success comes from telling compelling “money stories” that resonate with executives and drive decisions. Here’s what we learned: Why Product Leaders Must Speak the Language of Money Rich makes no bones about the yawning communication gap between product teams and executives. Product managers focus on features, processes, and operating models – while executives focus on revenue and outcomes. As he explains, “Any sentence that comes out of the mouth of a product leader that doesn’t have a currency symbol in it is one that the rest of the executive team can’t hear and doesn’t care about.” As he reframes the role of product leadership, Rich explains that it’s not just about building the right thing – it’s about articulating how that thing makes money. The Power of Simple, Structured “Money Stories” At the core of Rich’s approach lies simplicity. He advocates for building “money stories” using just three numbers – two we know, one we estimate – to quantify potential impact. “A money story has no more than three numbers in it…two of the numbers you know, and one of them you’re going to reach into the air and make up or estimate.” This framework isn’t about precision, Rich explains. It’s about enabling better conversations. By introducing even rough estimates, product leaders can engage sales, marketing, and executives in meaningful dialogue. The goal is to create alignment around opportunity size and business value, and shift the focus from abstract ideas to tangible outcomes. From Features to Impact: Driving Better Product Decisions On the pod, we’ve been talking a lot lately about “impact.” Rich’s approach, covered concisely in his recent book Money Stories, also highlights a critical shift in mindset: product managers must own the financial performance of their products. Without that, they risk being sidelined from strategic decisions. “If you can’t vaguely explain how the thing you do makes money, you’re just a cog in the process.” This means knowing basics about your product – core metrics like units sold, pricing, and revenue – and using them to guide decisions. It also means prioritizing revenue-generating opportunities over less impactful work and being cautious with cost-saving narratives that may have real human consequences. Bottom line: product leaders who connect their work to measurable outcomes are the ones who influence strategy, secure investment, and drive meaningful results. Rich Mironov, in his own words: [06:07] “Any sentence that comes out of the mouth of a CPO that doesn’t have a currency symbol in it is one that the rest of the executive team doesn’t care about.” [06:48] “A money story has no more than three numbers in it… two of the numbers you know, and one of them you’re going to reach into the air and make up.” [11:01] “It’s not important whether we get it accurate. It’s important that we build some consensus.” [11:40] “If you can’t vaguely explain how the thing you do makes money, you’re just a cog in the process.” [12:09] “PMs should socialize their plans with peers; say something like, ‘I know this is wrong, but let me walk you through my logic…’ and then sit back and listen.” [24:18] “One thing I always recommend when socializing ideas: Bring a bucket of humility with you.” [29:29] “AI is real. It’s gotten investments like we’ve never seen. But it’s all going to come crashing down soon. There’s no way to avoid it. There’s nowhere to hide.” The post 183 / Rich Mironov: Using ‘Money Stories’ To Communicate Real Business Impact appeared first on ITX Corp..

    41 min

  8. Mar 3

    How ‘Sense Shape Steer’ Helps UXers Design AI Solutions, with Bansi Mehta

    In this episode of Product Momentum, we’re joined by Bansi Mehta, founder and CEO of Koru UX Design, an enterprise healthcare UX agency supporting some of the US’s largest healthcare technology companies. We discussed the busy intersection of artificial intelligence, product management, and UX Design. Bansi’s Sense – Shape – Steer framework helps guide UX design teams as they integrate AI into their products – and avoid the trap of AI’s drive toward mediocrity that limits individual creativity and expertise. Here’s what we learned: Avoiding the Trap: AI Solutions’ Race to Mediocrity AI’s ability to rapidly generate hi-fi prototypes and voluminous content brings great benefit, but also significant risk. The risk manifests in mediocrity – i.e., solutions that drive to the mean. This sense of “good enough” stifles designer creativity and diminishes the quality – the Delight – of the final product. “The speed of AI makes it easier than ever to churn screens,” Bansi says. “But it’s designed to deliver to that average mean that allows us to say, ‘that works, that makes sense.’ And that’s really the trap….these days, there’s less patience in the industry for discovery and research.” Introducing the Sense – Shape – Steer Framework To combat this new reality, Bansi developed the Sense – Shape – Steer framework to help teams navigate the complexity of building AI-powered products. Sense. Understanding the Problem/Opportunity.“Sense is where you’re really creating that sense of what is worth solving,” Bansi explains. “It’s the intersection of what the user needs, what insights we have in terms of their challenges, and the opportunities that are present. But we mustn’t stop there. We then look to see what AI can do for us. And where we see the intersection, that’s the sweet spot.” Shape. Designing the AI-Enhanced User Experience.We emerge from the Sense step with rich insights into our user’s desired experience, Bansi continues. “And as we approach Shape, we do so with an emphasis on the kind of UX challenge that we are trying to solve – from the user’s perspective. Using a storyboard, we proceed frame by frame to define the user’s journey, the problem that we are trying to accomplish.” Steer. Implementing, Evaluating, and Iterating.The Steer step comes once you have built something and you launched, Bansi says. “This is where we define and clearly articulate our AI eval criteria that we’ve said are critical for product success,” Bansi adds. “I’ve seen products make it or break it depending on whether they got their AI evals right. It’s one thing to hypothesize that your solution will work. But it’s a completely different thing when you actually try to build sophisticated agentic AI layers where there’s multiple configurations and prompts.”   Broader Insights, Future Outlook The conversation underscores the notion that while AI accelerates development and content generation, it also requires subject matter experts in UX and Product to demonstrate greater vigilance than ever to maintain quality and relevance. The Sense – Shape – Steer framework calls on product teams to think first about user needs before considering whether and how to integrate AI. Our episode with Bansi Mehta feels like the capstone conversation to recent episodes with Nesrine Changuel, Teresa Torres, and Oji Udezue, where we examined bringing Delight to the user experience, re-engaging Discovery in the development process, and adjusting to the Speed of today’s AI-driven development. The post 182 / How ‘Sense Shape Steer’ Helps UXers Design AI Solutions, with Bansi Mehta appeared first on ITX Corp..

    32 min
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5
out of 5
31 Ratings

About

Amazing digital experiences don’t just happen. They are purposefully created by artists and engineers, who strategically and creatively get to know the problem, configure a solution, and maneuver through the various dynamics, hurdles, and technicalities to make it a reality. Hosts Sean and Paul will discuss various elements that go into creating and managing software products, from building user personas to designing for trackable success. No topic is off-limits if it helps inspire and build an amazing digital experience for users – and a product people actually want.

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