Product Rising

Women In Product

Meet product and technology leaders who are shaping what comes next in a world driven by AI, rapid innovation, and global complexity. Every week, we explore the ways bold women and men are navigating change, leading with impact, and redefining the future of product leadership.

  1. 6d ago

    Moritz Sudhof: Why Being a Skeptic Creates Better AI Outcomes

    What separates people who achieve remarkable results with AI from those who struggle to get reliable, accurate, or useful outcomes from the exact same tools? In this episode of Product Rising, host Shannon Peavey sits down with Stanford researcher and BigSpin AI founder Moritz Sudhof to explore one of the most overlooked challenges in AI adoption: the human factor. Drawing on research conducted with Stanford professor and Bigspin co-founder Chris Potts, Moritz shares surprising findings from the analysis of tens of thousands of real-world AI conversations. Their work reveals that the difference between successful and unsuccessful AI use often has less to do with the model itself and more to do with how people interact with it. Why do expert users encounter more AI failures than novices, yet achieve dramatically better outcomes? Why do so many users unknowingly accept flawed outputs? And what skills, behaviors, and product design choices can help close the growing divide between AI power users and everyone else? This conversation explores the emerging field of AI fluency, the risks of treating AI like an oracle or a vending machine, and why the future of successful AI products depends on designing not just the model, but the interaction between humans and machines. Moritz is part of our exclusive Product Rising series on AI Ethics, Safety & Responsibility, where host Shannon Peavey speaks with researchers, builders, policymakers, and practitioners working to shape a future where AI delivers meaningful value while preserving human judgment, agency, and trust. Whether you're a product leader, founder, builder, manager, or everyday AI user, this episode offers practical insights into how to get better outcomes from AI and why your own behavior may be one of the most important variables in the equation. CHAPTERS 00:00 Why Some People Get Better Results from AI 01:22 Moritz's Journey: From Language Research to AI Products 03:42 AI Is Not a Human Replacement 06:49 The Coaching Experiment That Changed Everything 09:14 Same AI, Different Outcomes 10:43 Designing User Behavior, Not Just AI Behavior 12:13 The Research Behind AI Fluency 15:14 The User Fluency Paradox 17:01 Why Expert Users See More Failures 19:18 Invisible Failures and Silent Mistakes 21:12 The Skills Every AI User Needs 21:55 Embrace the Skeptic Mindset 23:22 The Biggest Misconceptions About AI 25:42 The Vending Machine Problem 26:16 The Growing Divide Between AI Users 28:08 Introducing Bigspin 30:47 Bringing Product Builders Back Into the Room 32:33 Why AI Adoption Isn't a Tool Rollout 34:45 Passengers vs. Pilots 36:24 Improving Your AI Outcomes Today 37:49 What Product Builders Should Demand 40:16 Advice for Product Leaders Building AI Products 42:00 We're Designing Interactions Now 43:15 Final Thoughts and Where to Learn More 📚 Resources Bigspin AI https://bigspin.ai/ Stanford University https://www.stanford.edu/ BetterUp https://www.betterup.com/ Where to find Moritz Sudhof: Moritz Sudhof on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/sudhof/ Where to find Chris Potts - Chris Potts on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-potts-505611321/ -Chris Potts at Stanford https://web.stanford.edu/~cgpotts/ Where to find the paper Chris and Moritz authored called “A Paradox on AI Fluency” - https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.25905  Where to find our hosts: Shannon Peavey https://www.linkedin.com/in/spmad/ Elizabeth Ames https://www.linkedin.com/in/elizabethames/ 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/ Product Rising on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/product-rising/id1584224561 Product Rising on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/7bcyVhpdhw0hbiRr6O4h1U Product Rising on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLijcNLDj_QE2ge6Wqeh0MLx_qMKwot--9

    44 min

  2. Jun 16

    Lacey Picazo on the Nuances of AI in Healthcare

    How do we introduce AI into high-stakes human environments without losing trust, safety, judgment, or effectiveness? This episode features a conversation with Lacey Picazo, CEO and founder of ZoCo Design, a research and design consultancy focused on helping organizations build human-centered digital products and AI experiences. Lacey, a professional product designer by trade, is a serial entrepreneur with strong opinions on the ways customer behavior interplays with AI and can change depending on the application or the environment.  With host Shannon Peavey, Lacey discusses a case study where her firm worked with mTuitive, a leader in digital pathology and cancer care, in order to illuminate the way behavioral science, workflow design, and human-centered product thinking can shape whether AI succeeds or fails in clinical environments. Rather than treating AI adoption as a purely technical challenge, this episode explores how clinicians and patients respond emotionally, cognitively, and behaviorally when AI enters decision-making processes, and why “more automation” is not always better. This is a thoughtful discussion about innovation, responsibility, understanding the rewards - as well as the risks - of a future that is reckoning with finding the right formulas for human-machine collaboration. Importantly, it also addresses the ways we can support the next generation in an AI-shaped world. Lacey is part of our exclusive new Product Rising podcast series, where host Shannon Peavey explores the world of AI Ethics, Safety & Responsibility . 00:00 Intro to the topic: AI enters healthcare 01:33 Why healthcare is different from other industries 04:05 Consumer product thinking doesn't always work 05:54 The stakeholder problem: patients, providers, payers, and more 07:02 Trust is kind of a big deal 08:29 Today it's easy to build, but still not easy to get adoption 09:55 Tempted to skip testing? Don't. 12:16 Why human behavior matters more than product features 14:23 Understanding clinicians as users 18:09 Where AI creates hesitation and bad friction 20:09 Professional identity: "Am I the kind of person who uses this?" 21:14 The mTuitive cancer care case study 24:21 Challenging assumptions before building 26:18 How clinician research actually works 28:31 What clinicians really want from AI 30:44 Will resistance to AI fade over time? 32:31 Finding the balance between efficiency and safety 34:23 Why some friction is actually good 36:40 Are companies overestimating automation? 38:35 The skill every AI product leader still needs 40:05 How to build customer intimacy in the AI era 42:56 Ambient listening and the unintended consequences of AI 44:22 The food bank story: how fear shapes behavior 45:58 Slow down: AI's hidden human costs 46:55 Closing thoughts  📚Resources: ZoCo Designhttps://zocodesign.com/ ZoCo Design’s mTuitive Case Study https://zocodesign.com/case-studies/mtuitive-case-study mTuitive https://www.mtuitive.com/ Melissa Perri https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissajeanperri/ Teresa Torres https://www.linkedin.com/in/teresatorres/ Women in Product’s Podcast Episode with Teresa Torres https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/continuous-discovery-with-teresa-torres/id1584224561?i=1000672408840 Shreyas Dosi’s Maven course https://maven.com/shreyas-doshi/product-sense?promoCode=MAVEN100&promoCode=MAVEN100 Where to find Lacey: Lacey Picazo, ZoCo Design https://www.linkedin.com/in/laceypicazo/ Where to find our hosts: Shannon Peavey https://www.linkedin.com/in/spmad/ 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/ Product Rising on Apple Podcastshttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/product-rising/id1584224561 Product Rising on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/7bcyVhpdhw0hbiRr6O4h1U Product Rising on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLijcNLDj_QE2ge6Wqeh0MLx_qMKwot--9

    46 min
  3. (Replay) Marty Cagan on AI Product Coaching

    Jun 9

    (Replay) Marty Cagan on AI Product Coaching

    Marty Cagan joins Carmen Palmer for this episode in our monthly series, In The Lead.  Marty is a renowned product executive and author, and is widely considered a thought leader in the field of Product Management. He is the founder of the Silicon Valley Product Group (SVPG), where he advises companies on how to create successful products using the practices of world-class tech organizations.  Marty is the author of influential books on the topic of product management and product teams including  Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love  Empowered: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Products. Transformed: Moving to the Product Operating Model  Recently Marty and the team at Silicon Valley Product Group (SVPG) have been exploring the use of AI LLMs as product coaches. As always Marty has strong views on the adoption of AI technology enabling true product builders, the increasing importance of true empowered product managers, and how AI Models can assist in the transition by coaching PMs and Product Leaders.. In The Lead is a monthly series on Product Rising sharing thought provoking conversations with a wide range of industry leaders hosted by Carmen Palmer, CEO of Women In Product.  Your AI Product Coach 00:00 Reckoning for Product 03:11 GenAI Changes the Stakes 07:11 Feature vs Empowered Teams 09:57 Build to Learn vs Earn 12:18 Prototyping Tools Boom 13:37 New PM Litmus Test 16:05 Why Coaching Fails 20:57 AI Coaching Tipping Point 23:58 Prompting for Product Model 27:30 Load Strategic Context 28:19 Strategic Context Inputs 29:23 Project Model Prompts 30:52 AI Coaching Limits 34:58 Why Humans Still Matter 38:42 What Coaching Looks Like 39:25 Building Product Sense Fast 42:01 Frameworks For Real Work 45:23 Adoption Curve Reality 49:13 Career Advice And Wrap 📚Resources: SVPG Product Coaching and AI Configuring Your Model As Product Coach - an example of how to get started using an AI Model to provide product coaching ✨Where to find Marty: On LinkedIn Silicon Valley Product Group (SVPG) Website & Newsletter sign up  💫 Where to find Carmen: On LinkedIn  🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    54 min

  4. Jun 2

    (Replay) Sally Thornton on Today’s Job Market  

    There is a lot of debate about the state of the job market today. We definitely hear a lot about layoffs in the big tech companies and also about AI eliminating positions. But AI may be having a bigger impact in the requirements for specific roles and even perhaps new types of roles. We will be having periodic conversations with leading recruiters, hiring managers, and others about the evolving job market and what it takes to get hired/noticed.  Our first conversation is with Sally Thornton, CEO & Founder of Forshay, a firm that combines Executive recruiting with interim experts across Finance, HR, and Operations, and by aligning culture and leadership development skills to optimize team performance. 02:17 Forshay Firm Overview 03:27 Job Market Reality Check 06:09 Entry Level Pipeline Crunch 07:44 Where Hiring Is Growing 08:33 What Employers Want Now 09:56 Proving Curiosity in Interviews 11:34 Influence as a Core Skill 12:38 AI Transparency and Flatter Teams 14:47 Fractional Leadership Explained 19:36 How Orgs Are Reshaping for AI 22:43 The Rise of the AI Scout 24:55 Building an AI Experiment Team 25:43 Choosing Tools That Fit 27:16 AI in Hiring and Resume Filters 29:19 Beating the Rejection Machine 31:36 Community as Career Support 32:14 AI as Reflective Hiring Partner 34:37 Gut Instinct Versus Data 37:40 Future Proofing Through Community 39:56 Give More and Experiment Often 41:16 Tools That Reduce Overwork 43:42 Wrap Up and Where to Follow 📚Resources: To Sell is Human, Daniel Pink 🌟 Where to find Sally: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallythornton/ Forshay: https://forshay.com 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    45 min

  5. May 19

    Tracy Pizzo Frey on AI & Adolescence

    We are reckoning with truths that are a bit uncomfortable. AI is not just a tool, but something people are relating to - personally. For kids and teens, we’re finding that that can be extremely dangerous. In this episode, Shannon Peavey speaks with Tracy Pizzo Frey, a veteran technology leader including 11 years at Google where she oversaw Responsible AI for Google Cloud. As a consultant, she worked with Common Sense Media to develop a system for assessing the risks of large language models and AGI, with a particular focus on kids and teens. Tracy brings deep technical experience and knowledge of how technology shapes behavior. Drawing on lessons from social media and emerging research, she explores what feels different about AI. For young people who are still developing social and emotional skills, these interactions may have unique implications. AI systems are responsive and engaging, but they do not challenge users or help them navigate real-world complexity in the same way humans do. Over time, that difference may influence how teens build coping skills, relationships, and a sense of self. Through her work with Common Sense Media, Tracy has evaluated leading AI systems and reached some important conclusions. Today’s models are not designed to serve as mental health companions for kids or teens, even though many young people are already engaging with them in ways that resemble emotional support. Tracy shares how these assessments were created, what they measure, and what they reveal about the current state of AI safety. She offers a grounded perspective on building & using these technologies responsibly, especially when younger users are already deeply involved.. 00:20 AI’s effect on kids 02:07 Why harms are specific to kids & teens 04:50 AI is not a search engine 07:27 Kids & teachers are often earliest adopters 08:06 Tech companies know more than they let on 09:15 Common Sense Media’s risk assessment project 09:57 Let’s not repeat mistakes 11:24 Tracy's involvement 13:11 Set your charter 14:50 Bring diverse, multi-disciplinary teams 16:25 Why psychological safety is important 17:38 Distilling masses of information into risk assessments 18:48 Why hype matters 20:30 How the team looked at social media 23:20 Early assessment of potential harms 25:10 Character.ai as precursor to interaction with LLMs 26:00 ‘Everything in the whole wide world’ 27:13 Why kids are different 32:18 The danger of so-called frictionless relationships 33:02 The best way to test 36:50 Some surprising findings 39:08 How tech can reshape a worldview 41:02 There are good people, but - business models 43:30 Know the tradeoffs 45:07 The fact-to-fiction scale 46:30 Some positivity 48:00 Books, lawsuits, and resources 📚Resources: Common Sense Media (CSM) AI Overview https://www.commonsense.org/ai CSM’s Parents’ Guide https://www.commonsensemedia.org/articles/parents-ultimate-guide-to-generative-ai CSM’s Parents’ guide to AI Companions & Relationships https://www.commonsensemedia.org/articles/parents-ultimate-guide-to-ai-companions-and-relationships Google’s AI Principles https://ai.google/principles/ Social Media’s Harmful Effects on Children https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/social-media-teen-mental-health-a-parents-guide AI & Everything in the Whole Wide World benchmark study https://sites.rutgers.edu/critical-ai/wp-content/uploads/sites/586/2022/01/Bender_AI-and-Everything-in-the-Whole-Wide-World-Benchmark.pdf Shannon Vallor’s research https://edwebprofiles.ed.ac.uk/profile/shannon-vallor Empire of AI by Karen Hao https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/743569/empire-of-ai-by-karen-hao/ Where to find Tracy: Tracy Pizzo Frey, Restorative AI https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracy-frey/ Where to find our host: Shannon Peavey https://www.linkedin.com/in/spmad/ 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    50 min

  6. May 12

    Leading the Transition to AI in Product with Gyanda Sachdeva

    Gyanda joins Carmen Palmer for this episode in our monthly series, In The Lead.  Gyanda Sachdeva is VP of Product Management at LinkedIn where she currently leads the Consumer Experience team. She has over 15 years of product experience across a wide variety of domains including advertising, subscriptions, marketplaces and payments.  In this episode Gyanda shares her insights into managing product teams through the transition to AI and the changing role of PM. She also shares her personal career journey and the challenges of growing from an APM through individual contributor, group manager, director and now VP. In The Lead is a monthly series on Product Rising sharing thought provoking conversations with a wide range of industry leaders hosted by Carmen Palmer, CEO of Women In Product.  Leading the Transition to AI in Product 00:00 Meet Gyanda at LinkedIn 02:34 Career Journey to Product 05:01 Long Tenure Lessons 08:11 Unlearning as a Leader 11:02 AI Shift Moment 14:35 Experimentation Over Roadmaps 19:36 Full Stack Building Culture 22:50 Trust Guardrails and Agents 24:44 Associate Product Builder Program 25:48 Early Adopters Drive ROI 26:20 Mentorship and Product University 28:26 Leaders Get Everyone In 30:42 Scaling AI Enablement 34:13 Keeping Up With Velocity 37:27 Diversity Access and Role Models 40:25 Three Day AI Jumpstart 43:30 Product Launch Gone Wrong 46:26 Daily Tools and Language Barriers 48:12 Embrace the Skill Shift 📚Resources: Statistics on job skills change by 2030: https://economicgraph.linkedin.com/research/work-change-report A guide for new grads on job trends: https://news.linkedin.com/2026/Grads-Guide-2026  ✨Where to find Gyanda: On LinkedIn 💫 Where to find Carmen: On LinkedIn  🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    51 min

  7. May 5

    Rebecca Hinds, PhD: Avoiding the AI Productivity Trap

    In this episode, host Shannon Peavey speaks with Professor Rebecca Hinds, PhD, a Stanford-trained organizational behavior expert and author of Your Best Meeting Ever. Rebecca, who runs the Glean Work AI Institute, explains why the future of AI at work is not about squeezing more productivity out of individuals, but about strengthening organizations as a whole. She shares her system for applying design principles to create effective meetings and illuminates the ways these can help leaders decide when technology enhances collaboration and when it risks undermining human trust, creativity, and emotion. She also highlights a growing body of research on how AI can expand access to insight and make work more effective – though today, she says, many organizations are getting it wrong. Instead of imposing AI from the top down, she argues that companies should empower employees to experiment, and that they should tolerate and even celebrate failure. Importantly, she says, organizations need to establish thoughtful guardrails that allow people to discover how these tools can truly help teams become more effective. 01:56 First things first, the bad news on AI and meeting culture 03:12 The good news on AI and meeting culture 05:29 Why leaders need to think about meetings holistically 07:10 Seven design principles to appy to meeting design 10:16 The “Four-D, CEO” test for meetings 13:41 Where AI can excel 18:02 Thinking differently about human roles 19:18 Why we should worry about “digital twins” 20:45 Keeping human emotions in mind 23:05 What can happen if you deprioritize people 23:30 Psychological safety at work, and with AI at work 26:09 The critical need to have AI policies 28:30 Enabling employees to find the value in AI 30:54 Tolerating, even celebrating failure 33:48 Collaboration with AI: an individual experience 36:36 The future is managing agents 37:38 Hope for a future of unparalleled insights 40:26 Using AI to help the organization, rather than the individual 42:48 Sharing resources and research 📚Resources: Rebecca Hinds https://www.rebeccahinds.com/ Stanford University http://www.stanford.edu The Glean Work AI Institute https://www.workai.institute Rebecca’s book, “Your Best Meeting Ever” https://www.rebeccahinds.com/book Organizational psychologist Bob Sutton https://bobsutton.net/about-bob/ Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmonson https://amycedmondson.com/about/ Wharton School of Business Professor Ethan Mollick https://x.com/emollick?lang=en Charter newsletterhttps://www.charterworks.com/ 🌟 Where to find Rebecca: On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-hinds/ 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    44 min

  8. Apr 28

    Jen Gennai: Leading in AI’s Human Era

    In 2017, before generative AI became a household term, Jen Gennai drafted Google’s original AI Principles. She was part of the effort to define what responsible AI should mean inside one of the most influential technology companies in the world. Now, years later, she is asking a more uncomfortable question. While companies race to deploy AI and governments work toward regulatory frameworks, who is seriously grappling with what this technology is doing to people and how they think, learn, and communicate?  Jen argues that we are making progress on global rules and regulations. But we may NOT be moving fast enough on the human consequences. As an AI responsibility expert and consultant, she spends her time training leaders not just to adopt AI, but to build resilient cultures, to capture gains without eroding human capacities that make those gains meaningful. 02:29 How Google’s original AI Principles came about 07:13 Working cross-industry to up-level the market 08:02 History may not repeat, but it rhymes 09:35 Regulation: rules versus principles 13:08 How federal law could solve some problems 18:18 AI’s “harm categories” 24:03 Why we need to think more about human impact 26:49 Skills for the future: Resilience, analytics, communication, creative problem-solving 31:38 Why we need more focus on training programs 38:30 Should you say your business is AI-first? Maybe not. 40:43 Defining what “good” looks like 42:20 Leading means building psychological safety 📚Resources: T3 https://t3-consultants.com/ Google AI Safety Principles https://ai.google/principles/ NIST AI Risk Management Framework https://www.nist.gov/itl/ai-risk-management-framework EU AI Act https://artificialintelligenceact.eu/ Latanya Sweeney’s 2016 keynote at the Grace Hopper Celebration https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBzP0NouiGo Article describing Latanya Sweeney’s findings on racism in Google ads https://racismandtechnology.center/wp-content/uploads/latanya-sweeney-discrimination-in-online-ad-delivery.pdf The U.S. Government’s AI Literacy Framework https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/eta/eta20260213 MIT’s Technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/ HBR https://hbr.org/ 🌟 Where to find Jen: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jen-gennai-b333933/ 🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product: On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/  Website https://womenpm.org/ Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/

    45 min
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About

Meet product and technology leaders who are shaping what comes next in a world driven by AI, rapid innovation, and global complexity. Every week, we explore the ways bold women and men are navigating change, leading with impact, and redefining the future of product leadership.

Information

  • Creator
    Women In Product
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    128
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Women In Product
  • Show Website
    Product Rising

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