The 5 PM Archetypes Framework
by Peter Deng • General Partner at Felicis (Former VP Product at OpenAI, Head of Product at Airtable, Uber, Instagram) at Felicis / OpenAI / Uber / Instagram
Peter Deng is a legendary product leader who has built and scaled some of the most iconic products in tech history. His resume includes leading product for Facebook News Feed, Messenger, Instagram, Uber Rider, Airtable, and most recently, ChatGPT at OpenAI.
🎙️ Episode Context
Peter Deng shares deep insights from his experience leading product at OpenAI, Uber, and Instagram. He discusses the specific challenges of scaling from 1 to 100, introduces a framework for the five types of Product Managers, and reveals his unique philosophy on hiring for autonomy and growth mindset.
Problem It Solves
Helps leaders hire diverse talent and build balanced 'Avengers-style' teams rather than hiring generic PMs.
Framework Overview
A classification system developed at Uber to identify the specific 'spikes' or superpowers of different product managers. Most PMs have a primary and a secondary archetype.
🧠 Framework Structure
The Consumer PM: Obsessed with design...
The Growth PM: Skeptical, data-driven...
The Business/GM PM: Focuses on incent...
The Platform PM: Wired to build tools...
The Research/AI PM: Deeply understand...
When to Use
When hiring to ensure team balance or when assessing founder-market fit.
Common Mistakes
Thinking one 'unicorn' PM can do it all, or putting a Consumer PM on a heavy infrastructure/backend problem.
Real World Example
At Uber, 'Marketplace PMs' were Business PMs focusing on pricing/incentives, while internal messaging required Platform PMs. OpenAI required a new 'Model Designer' role fitting the Research PM archetype.
It's almost like you're playing an RPG where everyone has different sliders and you have to create this super team where everyone actually spikes in different ways.
— Peter Deng