The Three Levels of Product Work
by Shreyas Doshi • Product Leader & Advisor at Formerly Stripe, Twitter, Google, Yahoo
Shreyas is a highly influential product thought leader known for his actionable frameworks and contrarian insights. He has led product teams at major tech companies including Stripe, Twitter, and Google, and now focuses on advising and teaching product management.
🎙️ Episode Context
In this masterclass episode, Shreyas Doshi breaks down five transformative concepts for product managers to elevate their career from execution to leadership. He discusses frameworks for time management, risk assessment, strategic alignment, and prioritization, emphasizing the importance of high agency and clear thinking.
Problem It Solves
Explains misalignment between team members (e.g., PM vs. CEO) and helps diagnose why rational arguments fail.
Framework Overview
Product work happens at three levels: Impact (Business outcomes), Execution (Getting things done), and Optics (Internal awareness). Conflicts arise when one person is arguing from 'Execution' (it's hard to build) while the other is looking at 'Impact' (customers hate it).
🧠 Framework Structure
Know Your Level: CEOs default to Impa...
Value Optics: Internal optics isn't j...
Switch Contexts: To resolve conflict,...
When to Use
During product reviews, when communicating with leadership, or when team morale is low despite hard work.
Common Mistakes
Dismissing 'Optics' as negative. Without optics, good work goes unnoticed and resources get cut.
Real World Example
A PM explaining delays due to technical debt (Execution) vs. a CEO asking why customer support tickets are spiking (Impact).
Optics creates awareness of the impact and execution. It creates energy.
— Shreyas Doshi