 The biggest difference between someone who is able to join fan companies as a part leader compared with someone who is not able to make it happen was the product leadership mindset. It may take someone years to become a product manager in fan companies. However, if you master the product leadership mindset, it can become much faster. What is product leadership mindset? It is you behave and think as if your product manager before even go into fan companies. So this is our influential product leader podcast series where I interview the product manager from Microsoft, Miquel, and he's sharing his secret regarding how he's able to become a product manager in Microsoft within 40 days. And I believe all the secret we share with you today is able to applicable to you guys as well. So make sure to take lots of notes and let's get started. Hey guys, this is Dr. Nancy Lee, a director product and featured in Forbes. I help hundreds of people land their dream PM job offer in fan companies and unicorn startup and continue to get promoted as a product leader. If you want to achieve the same kind of success, please make sure to go to this website, PMXsearcher.io and make sure subscribe to channel so that you'll be notified every time we turn on your video every Wednesday. Today I had a pleasure to interview Miquel from Microsoft and he's a product manager. He has so much advice and stories like to share with all of you guys. So let's do this. So Miquel, can you quickly introduce yourself? Sure. Yeah. Thank you for having me over. My name is Nikhil Adkuri and I am a product manager in Microsoft in the Azure group. You know, it wasn't easy. It took me so many years to get here and I've had my fair share of challenges getting here. I'm sure a lot of you have as well and I'm hoping that some of the tips and advice that comes out of this session, they're helpful to you. You make notes and hopefully you get into the dream company of yours. So Miquel, I love that how sincere and also how humble you are and actually I know one of your strengths is being able to show your product leadership and through your 30 seconds elevator pitch. Can you give us an example of your 30 seconds elevator pitch so that other people can model after you? Sure. So my name is Nikhil Adkuri and I have over eight years of experience as a product manager working for customer facing products across the technology industry. Most recently I was working for a retail company in San Francisco where I was leading the loyalty rewards program which impacted their revenue and in a good way caused an uptick in revenue by almost 15% and impacts more than 5 million customers and because of that success I was hired at an airline company here in Seattle where I had the opportunity to build a product portfolio for the crew systems platform. So basically build products for pilots and flight attendants which helps them fly across nationally and internationally with ease and deliver a great customer experience and this impacts more than 10,000 of them and in today I am at Microsoft because of my previous experiences and I'm so glad that I joined this company and I'm hoping to achieve more such success in this company going forward. I love this Nikhil. So this is why we bring you as a guest on our Influential Park Leader series and clearly you have lots of success and also as you mentioned earlier you also took a long time to get where you are. So much impact you have made for your past client and I wonder Microsoft love to recruit you to join their team even if they are announcing like hiring freeze and even meta announcing the layoff 10% of the employees of big tech companies potentially going to a recession winter but Microsoft also see you as like great talent and they bring you on board even if some part of the company or other big tech companies start to lay off people. So there must be lots of secrets you want to share with all of you guys that's why I'm so lucky to invite you to our channel. So first of all let's do this. Can you tell us what your biggest challenges advancing your product career especially help you to jump from service company to fan companies? Yeah great question as you mentioned I was a contractor for eight years in the PM space although it gives you great exposure to the different types of industries and how product management actually functions. You get to learn a lot but it comes with its own set of challenges especially when you're trying to get into big tech. Well I would say the top three challenges that I faced was getting calls from these fan companies or you know even Microsoft for that matter and the second one was my ability to really showcase my product skills and the impact that I have created in those service-based companies and usually big tech companies look for scale and that level of impact so you should really be able to demonstrate that and the third challenge that I faced was I was a contractor most of my post MBA career and as a contractor you are kind of restricted on how much of a roadmap you can handle and how much of influence you can have on end to end product delivery so that can be a little bit of an issue when you're trying to explain your stories to the hiring managers so yeah those were the main challenges I would say. Yeah yeah I can imagine because myself was also on H1B so lots of people like us when we get started with our career maybe there are not many options immediately be presented in front of us so therefore sometimes it may be a legit career path for ours to start as a contractor to begin their product career but later on contractor will hit a limit and that's why you you have those challenges why don't we do this why don't you tell us how exactly you conquer all those challenges start from the challenge number one yeah well the biggest challenge first was H1B I didn't have an H1B for many years I got lucky with the lottery and you know after it got approved that initially opened up there was that's not really in your hand unfortunately that's how the system works but post H1B the first challenge that as I mentioned was getting interview calls from these fang and big tech companies like Microsoft. How did you do that? Yeah I think that's where the product management accelerator program was the biggest help because I was struggling to understand where my blockers lied so the PMA program and that record helped me understand where I went wrong with my LinkedIn profile to begin with because that is the first place where these recruiters and hiring managers go so yes if your LinkedIn is not right if you don't have the right keywords to make yourself identifiable you know it's not of much use and other than that also in this program I learned how you pitch and what you pitch to hiring managers I think that is key you know if you try on your own you may try maybe like 100 times 150 times and you may have if you have some luck one would respond but there's no guarantee that that would eventually convert but there's a method to the madness is what I'd like to believe and I think your program was really helpful to me there so that was my biggest blocker and I'm so glad I joined this program because that was the first issue I addressed and then eventually things worked out I didn't even know how to find the right people who were hiring for product roles so that that's also another problem so after I learned a few things in this program I fixed my LinkedIn I first refined my 30 second elevator pitch and made sure that it is actually sounding impactful and I cut out the noise from it and focus on what's important and then there's a way to look for people who are hiring on LinkedIn and the best way is to directly approach them. Applying directly on the carrier portal is a hit or miss usually doesn't work I've tried it in the past it didn't work for me I don't want to generalize it it didn't work for me instead of randomly emailing hundreds of people I chose specific hiring managers from a certain company for example if I reached out to 10 maybe 5 or 6 would respond because of the pitch and what they liked on my profile if you start interacting with those 5 or 6 maybe 2 or 3 would get back to you and would offer you an initial phone round with them and then it's all up to you and a little bit of luck I would say if the phone rounds go well out of those two or three ultimately one would end up converting you into a full-time employee so basically you just like have 10 pitch to 10 hiring manager and convert to one offer from Microsoft like fantastic very efficient thank you for sharing with us and please share with us how you conquer your second challenge you mentioned earlier like not able to stand out so tell us more yeah so after I land an interview the second challenge lies there how do I showcase my product skills and the impact that I've caused how do I make myself stand out because really I am competing against likes of people from Google or other fan companies or MIT or Harvard so the question is how do you impress the hiring manager with your skill set there and the solution that worked for me was immense amount of practice and I can't stress that enough so the more you practice the more your your brain gets tuned to how to answer product sense questions and you automatically turn on that switch when someone asks you okay improve this or design something even at night so I don't know how many mocks I took and that's where I also took advantage of the product management accelerator program I had a lot of buddies who I could mock interview with and you know that helps a lot and you need to identify in this phase how to again cut out the noise you make sure you don't ramble on with your responses and just focus be razor sharp on your product sense and answer what the interviewer is looking for and kind of guide them into what you are thinking and validate with them that's how I overcame my second challenge there and you know when you're not aware of what you need to do after you land an interview then it's a waste of effort so you you've got to be prepared even before you land an interview it's crazy and especially for sure I know if you fail the interview they you cannot come back right here like Google and so it's matter what about Microsoft do they have a freeze period I'm not sure if this was really my first interview with Microsoft I just land an offer okay someone else if whoever listened to this you work for Microsoft you know their freeze period feel free to come and in the description of this video because right now we just land an offer we don't know how what will happen after you get rejected but anyway yeah so that's good to know wow yes so therefore it's important to be fully prepared you mentioned that you don't know how many preparation you have down can you tell us in general in terms of let's say how how much time you dedicated so that we have rough idea especially you have a full-time job for example you dedicate whole Sunday practice given you don't know how many you have down but roughly time management yeah I think I spent about 10 to 20 hours a week I see so those include like studying time in the program doing mock interviews and just randomly thinking how could I improve whatever the hair part so so basically you immerse yourself throughout the entire process that's almost like that's amazing so basically you're in the zone so for people who don't know where to start I think once they join this program they they get it's all ready for them they just have to start going through use cases do mock interviews as I said and it really helps to keep thinking about a problem and that is really that really is product management you think of your customers first right and how do you make their lives better just keep thinking that's it that's your practice awesome I need to like really save this clip to my our existence here because you mentioned you actually study all the like 60 cases and spend most time understanding those because those are the simple answers you just need to think about what you could answer compare yours with mine so usually some students all be like they're trying to be lazy to say oh let me just do one one case I was like all our student land offer from fan companies they do at least 20 like David joined Meta he did 40 I was like we have library of 60 you are this little like do increase in numbers or is it's hard to form the process I like yourself immerse yourself you know how we do this all right it just I love this like it's all come from like amazing hard work but also quick comparison regarding the time right so you are very intense in terms of studying and learning right so how long took you to land your offer my process started I think at least six months ahead of time and that is before I was a part of this program that's including before you joined the program how after you joined the program how long did you offer 40 days I would say 30 to 40 days I love this I love this very efficient and so now let me ask you this question can you elaborate your third challenges how do you conquer those yeah this one's a little tricky the third challenge as I mentioned was being a contractor has its own limitations you sometimes don't have full control on the roadmap or the end-to-end execution when interviewers asked me about my role as a contractor and you know why I was doing a full-time person's job as a contractor and was that even allowed they failed to understand that you were end of the day you are a product manager whether you're a contractor or a full-time employee and product managers have to take end-to-end ownership and the more I progressed in my career the more handle I had on end-to-end delivery and on the roadmap so you need to really think about what your impact points are and you know try and avoid talking about stories or instances which probably did not result into a great impact just focus on your strong stories and you know double down on them awesome so I like how you turn your weakness into strengths basically it is well would just be vulnerable a little bit which is true so being a contractor is a weakness compared with other candidates from Harvard, MIT or Google like those like those companies but you are able to show them hey I'm a contractor but allow me to learn so many different kind of product management in this company here is let me tell you an example here is the impact I made for Alaska airline for this and this see even if I don't work from full time see how I brought in millions of dollars and revenue for them so that's why you hired me so that I can help you to make billions dollars that's an important like mindset shift and narratives in terms of like changing the dynamic within interview I'm glad you execute strategy perfectly this amazing awesome so these lead to my next question regarding mindset right so I really want to understand so what's the number one thing that it really help you from oh I don't know what's going on and boom you just say hit it yeah yeah so one thing I learned all these years is that interviewing is a different skill set from what you actually end up working on because in an interview you really have to you really have to have product thinking and you know think like a startup CEO or just act like the product that you are answering to is your baby and how would you really take it out there developing that thought process takes time and also to really seal the deal and show that you are a leader in true sense you lead the interview it's not the interviewer that mindset makes a lot of a difference I can see the confidence in you just like hey we're having a discussion about the product you are going to work with me side by side so let me show you the thinking and if you don't like mine well let's have a conversation but I'm confident showing you I know how to get a job done and also that's why you learn offer within 40 days after playing all the like strategies they shift it just get it done I love yep can you tell us what the first 30 days look like in Microsoft is a super busy in pens or I heard Microsoft is one of the best place for work like balance compared with all the fan companies is that true so tell us more you know the first 30 days are really getting into the grind of things so first two weeks focus on orientation and getting you set up for success so how many people how you met in the first 30 days it's not even 30 days it's my third week here I've met about 20 to 25 people different people trying to understand them where they come from what is it that they're working on and it's huge even if it's not a long-term goal you should work for try and get into a big tech company understand how it functions I say that because I've seen how service-based companies work versus the scale that these big tech companies have and you probably need a totally different approach here and I joined Microsoft as a total newbie I don't consider myself as a seasoned product manager I'm a blank slate at this moment I want to see how it functions I love how humble you are you still see yourself as a newbie and also start to learn awesome so clearly that's the advice and given from the product leader series so that's why we have final question regarding any advice would you have for other people to jumpstart their PM career especially doing the fan company this is more for people who are intro level who want to get started who want to break in so what advice do you have for them if you are starting out if you're not in a product management role but if product management is something that fascinates you and you want to get into so there's two categories one students fresh graduates and the other ones are who are already working but are not in PM roles to address the I'll start with the people who are already working in companies rather than applying to product management roles outside try and get into product management in your existing company start by helping out other PMs talk to them set up on one's understand what they do on a day-to-day basis because if you ultimately realize that product management is not something you would like then you know you can stop right there but for the other set of people who are maybe just fresh graduates or who have nothing to do with product management I think at whatever stage you are in in your PM career whether it's beginner or seasoned or mid-level you are bound to run into roadblocks at some point and I think product management accelerator program clearly tells you what you need to do at that stage for me getting into a fang company was the major roadblock like opening up my doors through LinkedIn or you know high reaching out to hiring managers you can work with Nancy she's a great resource she has other great resources in the program and I'm pretty sure it'll benefit you a lot at least getting you started and you know there are even folks who will advise you on your career progression there and you can make friends and have peers who are in the same space so I think that's that's one of the ways that you can get started thank you so much Nikhil and actually I actually didn't know we were going to say so much about the program thank you so much and sharing with your peers was in the community we know you're going to speak in our alumni panel next month I'm looking forward to hear about the insider secret working for fang companies what kind of interview question to ask you things like that I'm very looking forward to that part awesome okay so everybody if you'll find this product leader podcast series and very useful please make sure to share this video and give a sum up and comment below if there's any other questions you have for Nikhil and we are more than happy to help you guys for free throughout this entire youtube channel and I want all of you guys to be successful and achieve your own definition of career success and hopefully all of you guys is going to be one of the future product leader in the in the future and help others like you awesome great so thank you very much for joining us Nikhil and everyone and I thank you so for your time and I'll see you guys next time this is dr nancy see you guys bye