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Scott Belsky (Adobe, Behance)18 May 2023

Lessons on building product sense, navigating AI, optimizing the first mile, and making it through the messy middle

7Frameworks
15Insights

Frameworks in this episode

Finance3 steps

Belsky's Founder Bet Checklist

Back mission-driven, pragmatically pessimistic founders building products with a clear object model.

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Productivity3 steps

Do Half, Then Go on a Killing Spree

Build half the features, then remove things until the one core action runs at 10x velocity.

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Leadership3 steps

Merchandise Progress Through the Messy Middle

Short-circuit the human reward system with agreed micro-goals and a narrated sense of progress.

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Strategy3 steps

Optimize for the Problems You Want to Have

Only build features that stop people from reaching the point where they'd ask you for more.

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Entrepreneurship3 steps

The Conviction Test for Whether to Quit

Compare your conviction now versus at the start to decide whether to persevere or pivot.

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Innovation3 steps

The First Mile: Lazy, Vain, and Selfish

Design onboarding for the first 30 seconds, when every new user is lazy, vain, and selfish.

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Innovation3 steps

The Object Model: Three Questions Every Screen Must Answer

On every screen, a user should know how they got here, what to do now, and what to do next.

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Insights & moments

The myth-busts, hot takes, explainers, and tools worth keeping.

Hot Take· 4

Hot Take15:00

People Only Talk About What a Product Does That They Didn't Expect

Belsky observes that customers rarely rave about a product doing exactly what it was supposed to do; they talk about the surprising things, like a Tesla Easter egg. He argues teams should deliberately optimize for surprise and delight to spark word of mouth and build a relationship with the product, borrowing a trick Hollywood uses constantly.

  • Users don't discuss products meeting expectations, only exceeding or surprising them
  • Example: people talk about the Tesla dashboard Easter egg, not a good drive
  • Surprise and delight drives conversation and product loyalty
  • Great consumer products pull a 'magic trick' that feels like magic

“people don't talk about a product doing exactly what they expected it to do. They talk about a product doing what they didn't expect.”

Scott Belsky · 15:00
#consumer#surprise and delight#word of mouth
Hot Take16:30

Most New Consumer Products Are Just Clever Momentary Interfaces

Belsky argues durable consumer products need something working 'under the hood' — a network effect, tapped excess capacity, or a genuinely new consumer insight — like Uber and Pinterest had. Many recent viral consumer apps are just clever momentary interfaces that end up as free R&D for the incumbent platforms, which copy any novel feature into their own products.

  • Uber built a new network effect and tapped previously unused excess capacity
  • Pinterest had a novel consumer-psychology insight and its own network effect and traffic loop
  • Recent viral apps are often 'clever momentary interfaces' with no durable moat
  • If a novel feature works, incumbents (TikTok, native camera) simply absorb it

“Uber was a consumer product, right? But, it built a network effect that was never there before. It leveraged excess capacity that was always there…”

Scott Belsky · 17:00

“They're fun and novel, but if they really work, those features are then brought into the native Apple camera, for instance.”

Scott Belsky · 19:00
#consumer#network effects#durability#moats
Hot Take44:30

When to Quit: The Conviction Test

Belsky's consistent advice to founders deciding whether to continue is to ask how much conviction they have now versus at the start. If they've learned more and have more conviction despite failures, they're just in the messy middle and should stick with it. If they'd never have started knowing what they know now, they should quit and pivot. Great founders know in their core that something needs to exist and are relentless until it does.

  • Compare conviction now vs. at the beginning of the journey
  • More conviction despite failures = messy middle, keep going
  • 'If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't have' = quit and pivot
  • Don't make a bold decision on a bad day, but heed a lasting loss of conviction

“If you've lost conviction, you should not be doing what you're doing in the world of entrepreneurship.”

Scott Belsky · 46:00

“Don't make a bold decision on a bad day.”

Scott Belsky · 46:30
#founders#quitting#conviction
Hot Take50:00

Resourcefulness Beats Resources — Capitalize on the Crisis

In a resource-constrained environment, Belsky argues resourcefulness carries you further than resources. For years teams solved problems by throwing money and headcount at them; now they're forced to refactor and leverage new technology like AI instead. He frames the constraint as an opportunity: resources are cards you spend, but resourcefulness is a muscle that stays with you and makes you stronger.

  • For 7-10 years teams threw money and headcount at every problem
  • Constraint forces refactoring and efficiency over hiring
  • Resources are like cards; resourcefulness is like muscle
  • The best companies are built in constrained eras — capitalize on the crisis

“I've always found that resourcefulness, you know, brings you further than resources”

Scott Belsky · 50:30

“if if if resources are cards, resourcefulness is like muscle. It stays with you, it makes you stronger”

Scott Belsky · 51:30
#resourcefulness#constraints#efficiency

Explainer· 5

Explainer09:30

In the First 30 Seconds, Every User Is Lazy, Vain, and Selfish

Belsky explains the 'first mile' of a product: the onboarding, orientation, and defaults a new user encounters. In the opening seconds people want speed, to look good, and to feel successful without enduring any learning curve. Teams spend their last mile of build time on the customer's first mile, and winning that top of funnel is what separates world-class product teams.

  • The first mile = onboarding, orientation, and defaults
  • New users are lazy, vain, and selfish in the first 30 seconds
  • They won't watch a tour, read anything, or tolerate a learning curve
  • Getting more people through the top of funnel is the mark of a world-class team

“in the first 30 seconds of using a new product, you are lazy, vain, and selfish.”

Scott Belsky · 09:30

“It's fascinating to me that most teams spend the final mile of their time building the product considering the first mile of the customer's experience…”

Scott Belsky · 10:00
#first mile#onboarding#activation#funnel
Explainer26:30

AI Takes Us From Workflow to Flow — and May Grow Headcount, Not Shrink It

Belsky is an optimist on AI: he sees it stripping the mundane, repetitive labor that holds back human ingenuity, getting us 'from workflow to flow.' Riffing on Airtable's Howie, he argues that as engineers got more productive companies wanted more of them, not fewer — so higher ingenuity per person may mean firms build more products and hire more people. He notes ChatGPT mostly mines and regurgitates 'the center' rather than finding new edges.

  • AI removes the friction/'work' in workflows, freeing ingenuity
  • More productive engineers historically increased, not decreased, demand for engineers
  • Companies with more ingenuity per person may run more products and hire more
  • ChatGPT mines and regurgitates the center rather than finding true new edges

“And I think that that's what AI kind of does is it gets us from workflow to flow.”

Scott Belsky · 27:00

“if you have more ingenuity per human being, maybe you can actually do more as a company.”

Scott Belsky · 28:00
#ai#productivity#future of work
Explainer33:00

AI's Superpower for Product Leaders: More Surface Area in Less Time

Belsky says the best designers and product leaders preserve time to explore many possibilities, narrow them, get feedback, and refine — and quality is largely a function of how much of the possibility surface they can explore. Generative AI expands that surface area in far less time. He cites a Hollywood director who uses ChatGPT not to write scripts but to generate scenarios, none of which he uses directly, that tell him what he wouldn't want to do.

  • Great product work = exploring the full surface area of possibility, then narrowing
  • Output quality scales with how much possibility you can explore in the time you have
  • Generative AI expands that surface area dramatically
  • A director uses ChatGPT for discarded scenarios that clarify what NOT to do

“the greatest performers I've ever worked with, whether they're designers or product leaders, basically preserve the time to explore lots of possibilities.”

Scott Belsky · 33:00

“I actually don't use any of them, but it just like gives me more surface area. It tells me the things that I wouldn't want…”

Scott Belsky · 34:00
#ai#design process#exploration
Explainer36:30

The 'Golden Gut' That Separates Junior From Senior Product Thinkers

Belsky defines the 'golden gut' as the instinct experienced product people develop while playing with a flow — sensing when to split one page into three steps, simplify, or remove something entirely and replace it with a presumptuous default. The senior instinct spots that reducing cognitive load for 90% of users is worth confusing 10%. These micro-decisions are where the golden gut lives.

  • The golden gut = instinct while playing with an experience or flow
  • It surfaces moves like splitting steps, simplifying, or removing entirely
  • A presumptuous default users can change beats a whole series of steps
  • Trading 10% confusion for 90% getting through faster is a senior-level call

“The golden gut is when you're when you're designing a an experience and uh and a flow, you are playing around, right?”

Scott Belsky · 37:00

“What if I just had a presumptuous default instead and customers could change it if they think they need to.”

Scott Belsky · 37:30
#product sense#design#cognitive load
Explainer41:30

Surviving the Messy Middle by Merchandising Progress

Belsky describes the middle years of any venture as messy because they are full of volatile lows you must endure through anonymity, uncertainty, and anxiety. Because humans are biologically wired for constant rewards, leaders should short-circuit the reward system with mutually agreed micro-goals. He likens teams to passengers in a blacked-out car: without the narrative that progress is happening, they go stir crazy, so leaders must 'merchandise progress.'

  • The middle is messy because it is full of volatile lows to endure
  • Humans need constant rewards, so celebrate mutually-agreed micro-goals
  • Life expectancy 100+ years ago was 25, so long bets fight our biology
  • Progress begets progress; leaders must steward the narrative of progress

“I always like to use the analogy of we're driving our teams across country as product leaders with the windows blacked out in the backseat…”

Scott Belsky · 43:30

“And so as product leaders like we have to merchandise progress. We have to be the steward of this narrative.”

Scott Belsky · 44:00
#messy middle#motivation#leadership

Story· 1

Story22:30

How Behance's 'Killing Spree' Taught Belsky to Do Half

Behance launched in 2008 overloaded with hedged features — groups, a tip exchange, portfolios, work-in-progress snapshots. When they killed the tip exchange, project publishing (the core metric driving traffic) went up; killing groups pushed it up again. They even removed portfolio color controls: users protested for 24 hours, then went quiet, and the core metric rose. The lesson: everything you think you need to do, you probably only need to do half of it.

  • Behance's most complicated version was ironically its earliest one
  • Killing the tip exchange and groups each increased project publishing
  • Removing portfolio color controls sparked 24 hours of complaints, then silence
  • Focusing the whole product on one thing runs the core metric ~10x faster
  • When adding a feature, consider what you can remove or replace

“And so we basically went on a killing spree. We just started killing things.”

Scott Belsky · 23:30

“Try to kill things and everything you think you need to do, you probably only need to do half of it.”

Scott Belsky · 24:30
#behance#focus#feature-cutting#metrics

Tool· 1

Tool59:00

Belsky's Product Picks: Queue and Tome

In the lightning round Belsky recommends Queue (spelled Q-U-E-U-E), an app for keeping a queue of content you want to watch across every streaming platform, where you can also see friends' queues and what's popular among people you know. As a favorite AI tool he names Tome, an app he invested in that turns a narrative into a draft presentation with imagery and compelling points, like handing work to an intern who returns something usable.

  • Queue: a cross-platform watchlist that also shows friends' queues
  • Queue creates a graph of what people you know want to watch
  • Tome: turns a narrative into a draft presentation with imagery and points
  • Tome feels like handing work to an intern who returns something usable

“it's basically a way to keep a queue of all of this content you want to watch across every streaming platform.”

Scott Belsky · 59:30

“just like a draft of this presentation with imagery and compelling points”

Scott Belsky · 1:00:00
#tools#apps#ai

Takeaway· 4

Takeaway08:30

Product Sense Starts With Empathy, Not Passion for Your Solution

Belsky says the biggest mistake product teams make is falling in love with their solution instead of developing deep empathy for the customer suffering the problem. Empathy tends to hand you the right solution, whereas passion for a preconceived idea can be slightly off-target. He frames product craft as fundamentally about human psychology.

  • Teams over-invest in a solution before understanding the customer's real problem
  • Empathy for the sufferer often reveals the correct solution
  • Passion for your idea can be '30 degrees off' from what actually works
  • Crafting product experiences is really an exercise in psychology

“often times the empathy gives you the solution, whereas the passion you have for whatever you think the solution is might be 30° off with…”

Scott Belsky · 09:00
#product sense#empathy#psychology
Takeaway21:30

Optimize for the Problems You Want to Have

When teams ask what belongs in the MVP, Belsky's rule is to optimize for the problems you want to have. You want customers who get through the funnel, feel successful, and then ask for more platforms, capabilities, or sharing — so don't build those features yet. Only build the things that stop people from ever caring enough to ask.

  • Don't build the features customers will only ask for once they love the product
  • Prioritize removing brick walls: sign-up, account connection, Google login
  • The features people request are 'good problems' — evidence they got value
  • Eliminate catastrophe-type blockers before adding capabilities

“I always tell them to optimize for the problems they want to have.”

Scott Belsky · 21:30

“Only do the things that prevent people from getting to the point where they care enough to ask you for anything.”

Scott Belsky · 22:00
#mvp#prioritization#product strategy
Takeaway38:00

Belsky's One-Word Advice for PMs Facing AI: Play

Asked how PMs stay ahead of AI, Belsky's answer is a single word: play. The risk of experience is getting stuck in your ways and refusing new tools; the antidote is trying everything, pursuing every curiosity, and writing poems or drafting emails with generative AI just to see what's possible. He started his Implications newsletter as a forcing function to actually engage with the constant stream of new tools.

  • Play with every generative AI tool you can find
  • Experience breeds the risk of getting stuck in your ways
  • Pursue every curiosity to see what's newly possible
  • Writing (his Implications newsletter) is a forcing function to keep up

“Quite simply in one word, play.”

Scott Belsky · 38:00

“Make sure you try it. Make sure you play with it.”

Scott Belsky · 38:30
#ai#pm advice#learning
Takeaway47:00

What Belsky Looks For When Angel Investing in Founders

On team, Belsky values founders who listen and learn, and who care more about the mission than the money, because pre-revenue you need to be driven by something grander. He has an allergic reaction to promoters who sugarcoat the truth, and admires leaders who are optimistic about the future but pragmatic and even pessimistic about the present — because those are the people whose teams and investors will get the real truth in the messy middle.

  • Values founders who listen, learn, and value mission over money
  • Allergic to promoters who gloss over the hard parts
  • Wants leaders optimistic on the future but pragmatic/pessimistic on the present
  • Honest founders let teams and investors engage with the real problems

“I also have an allergic reaction to founders that are real promoters, you know, who are constantly trying to sugarcoat the truth, who you know,…”

Scott Belsky · 47:30

“optimistic about the future but very pragmatic and somewhat pessimistic about the present.”

Scott Belsky · 48:00
#founders#investing#team