Julie Zhuo on accelerating your career, impostor syndrome, writing, building product sense, using intuition vs. data, hiring designers, and moving into management
with Julie Zhuo · Jun 2022
Julie switched from long-form essays to Twitter threads to work on being more concise and clear. Constraints force you to strip away ornamentation and focus on the core idea. The medium you choose can be a tool for developing a specific skill, not just a channel for distribution.
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Julie Zhuo on accelerating your career, impostor syndrome, writing, building product sense, using intuition vs. data, hiring designers, and moving into management
Jun 2022Don't write for your audience or for likes—write because you're working on a specific skill you want to develop. If you write to solve a problem you have (clarity, vulnerability, conciseness), the intrinsic motivation sustains the habit far better than external validation ever could.
Julie Zhuo on accelerating your career, impostor syndrome, writing, building product sense, using intuition vs. data, hiring designers, and moving into management
Jun 2022Julie approaches her writing as 'letters to myself'—advice she needs to give herself. The act of writing clarifies her thinking and organizes threads of thought running through her head. The primary audience for her writing is herself; the fact that others resonate with it is a secondary benefit.
Julie Zhuo on accelerating your career, impostor syndrome, writing, building product sense, using intuition vs. data, hiring designers, and moving into management
Jun 2022Instead of aiming for quality, Julie set a word count goal (500 words in 30-45 minutes) to force herself past the blank page. This removes the perfectionism barrier that prevents people from shipping. The hardest part is getting started; quality comes in revision, not in the first draft.
Julie Zhuo on accelerating your career, impostor syndrome, writing, building product sense, using intuition vs. data, hiring designers, and moving into management
Jun 2022As a manager, Julie developed her ability to critique design but stopped practicing design herself, so her ability to actually make things atrophied. Leadership and IC skills require different practice; you can't assume one sustains the other. Returning to hands-on work revealed gaps she didn't know she had.
This Week #1: Must reads on growth, what PMs should focus on when joining a new team, and the value of an MBA
Sep 2019Don't let yourself get overwhelmed by frameworks and best practices. The folks you're reading have learned a few things by going through the same process you're about to go through. You'll learn most by doing—take a few ideas at a time, discuss them with your team, and try them out in the real world.
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