Master emotional management before AI gives everyone on our team more horsepower and makes us [even more of] a bottleneck
This has nothing to do with AI. Let’s just get that out the way. And also, this has everything to do with AI.Jack and I strongly believe that these skills to manage difficult emotions are really, really important. Not just for our own happiness and wellbeing, but also if you look ahead at an AI future and what that means for product management.Inner game is a prerequisite for using AI. Think about your role today and how you feel like a bottleneck sometimes. Now imagine if all the people around you suddenly got a lot more horsepower. A lot more help, and things that took them a long time now took them not very much time. Imagine how we’re gonna feel as product managers as bottlenecks then.Beyond just a prerequisite, having a strong inner game is an accelerant to using AI. What skills are gonna be selected for in the future for roles like product management? It’s gonna be thoughtfulness and clearheaded judgment. Being able to have a really strong inner game is critical to being successful in this future.Can AI help us with our inner game? Yeah, but like almost every skill that AI can help you leverage, we first have to be really good at it offline without AI.The foundation is inner game. That’s mindfulness, inner dialogue. Once you have strong inner game, you can have strong outer game, which is more like the tools for productivity, the tactics, leadership to change the culture and the team around you. And finally, the icing on the cake is having an AI copilot that leverages these two really critical foundations.But if you jump straight ahead to using AI, it’s gonna be a flimsy foundation.