Slides from talk given by Mr. Prashant Singh, Vice President - Product, Paytm at Paytm - Build for India : Open Source Incubator Mentor Day.

1. PRODUCT
BLUEPRINTING
Myths & Methods

2. Who Am I ?
Programm
er
Sales
Guy
Apps
Found
er
Product
Guy
Prashant
Singh

3. What this talk is about?
Demystifying ProductJourney…
First Principal-based Toolkit for product development
Filters for identifying Myths & Methods
Lessons & Learning

4. What this talk is NOT about?
It’s NOT…
About Formulas; There are None
Absolute . All advise given here is Directional; There are Exceptions to Everything.
About Answers but the Framework
About Inspiration or Entertainment

5. First Principal Framework
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6. First Principal Framework
What ?
Why ?
Who?
Where?
When?
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7. First Principal Framework
What ? : What to build ?
Why ? : Why Build It ?
Who? : Who to build it with?
Where? : Where to apply your resources?
When? : When to call it quit?
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8. First Principal Framework
What ? : What to build ? : Ideation
Why ? : Why Build It ? : Motivation
Who? : Who to build it with? : Hiring
Where? : Where to apply your resources? : Strategy
When? : When to call it quit? : Exit
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9. What to Build? : IDEATION
How is the water? Importance of being Mindful and Unreasonable
World Is Fundamentally Broken. Best Ideas are Obvious in Hindsight
Scratching your Own Itch. Cliché but True
Avoid the Vision Trap
• Abstraction & Zoom level in vision statement of Uber, Microsoft and Facebook.
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How to select which idea to work on?
Apply Numeric Filters

10. What to Build? : IDEATION
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Applying Numeric Filter on Ideas…
Trill

11. What to Build? : IDEATION
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Applying Numeric Filter on Ideas…
Observation: News Volume = User Interest

12. What to Build? : IDEATION
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Applying Numeric Filter on Ideas…
Conclusion: Demand is universal. All Users are App Savvy.
Observation: Nokia Rich Countries Search for Nokia App

13. Need Identified?
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Identifying
Niche
• Identify the Market Sweet Spot
• Try to do it with Numbers
• Identify the Incumbent and Adjacent Players
Scalable
Niche
• Scale with Category: Uber of X
• Scale with Portfolio: Multiple Failure points, e.g., Candy Crush
• Scale with Platform: Instagram of Blackberry vs. Monument Valley of
Android vs. Alexa of Voice
Growing
Pain
• Design, Prototype & Validate
• Distribute, Distribute, Distribute
• Bad or Good Idea: Both are slow

14. Why to Build? : MOTIVATION
Believer vs. Opportunistic
[Copy vs. Invent] OR [Consume vs. Contribute]
• False Dichotomy of Startups. Flipkart: Amazon of India ? COD: Core Innovation of Flipkart?
Learning accumulated through path dependencies is the only moat for consumer
internet products, e.g., Amazon in India
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How to select which idea to work on?

15. Why to Build? : MOTIVATION
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Separated at Birth?

16. Why to Build? : MOTIVATION
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Home Work: Everything is a remix
https://vimeo.com/1491289
0

17. Who to build it with? : HIRING
Always Keep the Core Team In-house
Headcount → Utilization → Automation
• At scale, 20-30% development is for in-house tools, e.g., AWS, Slack, Asana
Self-learner: In the Growth Phase, Skill Shelf Life is 8 Months
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Truth of Team…

18. Who to build it with? : HIRING
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Hiring and Assembling an “A” Team…
Relentlessly Resourceful
Speed vs. Reliability: Energy vs. Experience
Takes Work Seriously and Not Themselves
Stand up for a Cause vs. Stand up for Identity
First Principal thinkers: Favourite Interview Question

19. Where to apply your resources? : STRATEGY
Based on the Right Mix of DATA & Beliefs
Cohesive with Team Skills and Resources
Responsive to Market Dynamics
Clear about the Bets you are Making
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Qualities of Good Roadmap…

20. Where to apply your resources? : STRATEGY
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21. Where to apply your resources? : STRATEGY
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What are Customers
Doing with Your
Product?
What Competition is
Doing Right?
What are Customers
Asking For?
What do You
Want to Build and
Why?

22. Where to apply your resources? : STRATEGY
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23. Where to apply your resources? : STRATEGY
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Case Study: Feature Design
There are no Right Answers in Product Management
vs.
Pinterest Facebook Wall

24. When to Call it Quit? : EXIT
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Pivot, Preserver or Perish…
Lean Start-up, Rapid Iteration, Incremental Change and Growth
Good Ideas Grow Slowly; Same is True for Bad Ideas
Post Launch Plateau: Version 3 is Version 1
Ride a Wave BUT Evaluate your Standalone Value Proposition
• Odd man out in IBM–Windows, Google–Netscape, Google–Yahoo, Ebay–PayPal,
Pinterest–FB, FB–Spotify, Zynga–FB

25. When to Call it Quit? : EXIT
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Pivot, Preserver or Perish…
Frequency of Pivot from Vision → Strategy → Tactic
Always Talk to the Guerrilla in the Room
Math of Being a Sell-out: Distribute Impact vs. Control, e.g., Paypal vs. FB
Structural Shifts may have First Order Casualty, e.g., Netscape, Napster, Myspace;
Understand the Shift, e.g., Snapchat

26. Lessons & Learning
There is No Substitute to having a Good Product
Avoid Cynics. Their Advise is actually their Biography.
Between Culture and Competency, Culture always Wins.
Take Risk: Mediocrity Kills you by a Thousand Cuts
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27. PRASHANT SINGH
Email: pacificleo@gmail.com
Skype/ Gtalk/ Twitter: pacificleo
Feel Free to contact me at:

28. Visit paytm.com/buildforindia