Product Leaders Should be Good People Managers with Jean McCabe, Chief Innovation Officer and Chief Product Officer at Agio

A big shoutout to all product leaders. Welcome to the Product Leaders Podcast by Fireart with your hosts, Dima Venglinski and Tolik Nguyen. Every episode is a deep dive into different aspects of product leadership to enhance the end-user experience.

In this episode, Tolik is joined by Jean McCabe, Chief Innovation Officer and Chief Product Officer at Agio, an IT management and cybersecurity service. They discuss the role of people management in product organizations, and explore topics such as the differences between managing product teams and UX teams, the ROI of UX teams, how to manage OKRs, and the importance of people management skills for a successful career in product management. Tune in to hear their insights on these topics and more!


Topics we discuss: 

• The difference between managing product and UX teams
• Looking at OKRs through a different lens
• Why PMs need to add people management skills to their toolkit 
• Why transparency is key to building healthy organizations

Hot Takes and Key Highlights:
The Difference Between Managing Product and UX Teams
The difference between managing product and UX teams is down to the difference in personalities, motivation, and driving factors of the two professions. PMs, in general, are more ambitious, and find accelerated growth a key motivator. People in UX tend to be more creative and intrinsically motivated. For them, the quality of their work is more important than meeting quantified OKRs.
“Measuring the performance of UX teams on business outcomes is a slippery slope”.
Looking at OKRs Through a Different Lens
Jean mentions that she is not a fan of using OKRs for her teams because OKRs are often rehashed business goals and not an accurate representation of employee performance. A better way to use them is as a tool to identify focus areas for the employees. She cites the example of her company where, last year, the overall goal was client retention, while this year it is enhancing gross margin. These overarching goals become focus areas, and individual goals pivot around the business goals.
“Every department can contribute to the overall business goal, and that goal becomes our North Star”. 
PMs Need to Add People Management Skills to Their Toolkit
Jean highlights that people management is an individual skill often undervalued and under-resourced. Since PMs need to collaborate with people in different business verticals, it’s important for them to learn how to manage and deal with different personalities. The ability to identify strengths and weaknesses and make people better at their jobs is a skill that companies need to teach. This is a trick most companies miss, as even while hiring for a people management role, most companies do not ask questions on this topic.
“At most interviews, you will be asked questions about your function. You do not get questions about how you manage people, how you make people better, how you interface with your team, and how you make the team more cohesive”.
Transparency is Key to Building Healthy Organizations
Jean qualifies transparency as the ability to handle tough questions honestly. For example, she mentions that while inflation in the US was ten percent last year, not everyone at her company got a ten percent raise. A candid conversation with someone who got a five percent raise and hence a net pay cut is important for building trust. Managers often fear sharing company financials with employees for fear that it could cause panic. But the panic is driven by incomplete information and a lack of transparency.
“When you say, this is jus