What is one trait you see in world class product managers that most people overlook?

Name: Former CPO of GitLabis Joe Davis. This is what he swears by to stay sharp.
Uploaded: 2025-10-10T15:34:58+00:00
Duration: 1 min 22 s
Channel: Ethan Lockshin
Description: In this interview excerpt, the host asks former GitLab CPO Joe Davis about a key characteristic that distinguishes top product managers. Davis identifies…

Ethan LockshinSales at NVIDIA focused on AI adoption

Former CPO of GitLabis Joe Davis. This is what he swears by to stay sharp.

10 Oct 2025 · 1 min

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1:22

In this interview excerpt, the host asks former GitLab CPO Joe Davis about a key characteristic that distinguishes top product managers. Davis identifies "systems thinking" as the crucial, often underappreciated trait. He explains that product management extends beyond building features; it requires viewing the product as an end‑to‑end user experience that spans marketing messages, positioning, website copy, pricing pages, signup flows, onboarding, UI/UX, support, and customer success. By connecting these touchpoints, a product manager can drive specific business outcomes such as user retention, upselling, free‑to‑paid conversion, cost reduction, or security remediation. The emphasis is on aligning product actions with desired results rather than merely shipping software.

Questions this video answers

Systems thinking – viewing the product as a whole user experience that connects marketing, positioning, pricing, signup, onboarding, UX, support, and customer success to drive desired outcomes.

Chapters

You've had a lot of experience in product management. What is one trait you see in world class product managers that most people overlook?
I would say systems thinking. If you think about a product, it's not just bits and bytes and features, it's a whole user experience that involves the marketing message, marketing and sales, positioning the work, the website and what it reads, the pricing page, the signup flow, onboarding, the user experience itself, support, customer success. You have to consider all these things as a product manager to do a good job because it all has to connect and it has to result in a seamless user experience across all those touch points. And so people who can connect the dots between all these various touch points have a much better chance of driving the intended outcome with the product actions that they take. It's not just again about shipping software, it's about does it lead to the thing that you want? That might be user retention, it might be uptiering from one version to another, it might be a free to paid upgrade, it might be a cost cut, it might be security remediation. These are all outcomes that can be driven through great product management work.