Today we have something new - a duo - Nicole Williams and Sue Anderson who are both Head of Product at Trade Me:

Nicole Williams: Nicole is passionate about learning and helping grow others. She’s currently Head of Product at Trade Me, where she leads the vision and strategy for their Marketplace team. It’s the perfect environment for her endless curiosity and appetite for gnarly customer problems. She’s previously worked across product and marketing for open source software, platform technology and hardware. Her passions are learning and helping others grow.

Sue Anderson: Sue might have product leadership experience but doesn’t have all the answers - she loves spending time in the uncomfortable problem space, figuring out what’s the right problem to solve. A strong advocate for a customer-led approach that fosters collaboration across customer facing and product & engineering teams. Sue is Head of Product at Trade Me focussed on consumer product and product practice across the verticals. Experienced in leading product teams across the different Trade Me businesses, Mobile telecoms and even did a stint in a B2B Fintech startup.

These are some of the things we talked about:

• Building a product practice at Trade Me including
  • A shared product skillset matrix
  • Making space for discovery
  • Reframing failure as learning experiences
  • Creating shared ways of working across verticals
  • Creating trust and partnerships among the leadership group
• What defines a leadership role in product versus and individual contributor
• Read:
  • Product Waste by Richard Moff
  • Invisible Women by Caroline Cleo Perez
  • Atomic Habits by James Claire
  • Essentialism by Greg McOwen
  • Outlive by Peter Attia
• Listen:
  • My Dad Wrote a Porno (for a bit of fun)
  • Mary Portas - how to thrive in the new kindness economy
  • Lenny's podcast
  • Powrup (kiwi podcast)
  • Business is Boring (Spinoff podcast)
  • No Stupid Questions podcast (from Freakonomics + Stitcher)

Trade Me is New Zealand’s largest and most trusted online marketplace and classified website. Every day around 650,000 Kiwi visit the website to browse over seven million items. There’s everything from cars to property, job listings to clothing, no matter what you're after, Trade Me is the place to be. Trade Me has been around for 24 years and since then, it’s evolved into a dynamic and diverse platform that connects millions of buyers and sellers across Aotearoa. 

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We are Fran and Lauchlan, both Product Managers, and we are discovering the diverse skills and experience that are out there in the product world. We aim to inspire product people on their journeys. Opinions expressed are solely our own and do not express the views of our employers.

Get in touch: productjourneyspodcast@gmail.com

Presenters: Fran Gleisner, Lauchlan Robertson
Music Credit: Harry Charles - Deer Park Remix