Matt LeMay (@mattlemay) spent 13 years as a music critic at @Pitchfork before becoming one of product management’s most influential voices. He’s consulted with companies from startups to Fortune 500s and authored two essential PM books, including Product Management in Practice, and more recently, Impact-First Product Teams. After watching countless product teams get laid off despite “doing everything right,” he discovered a harsh truth: too many PMs are doing "work around the work" and have lost sight of how their work connects to real business outcomes. In our conversation, we discuss: 🔸 The one question that predicts if your team will survive the next layoffs 🔸 Why following product “best practices” perfectly can actually accelerate your path to unemployment 🔸 The “low-impact PM death spiral”—how teams accidentally make themselves irrelevant 🔸 How to push back on executives without saying “no” 🔸 The counterintuitive reason why the happiest PMs are also the most commercially minded 🔸 The Liz Phair review that made Matt an internet villain for 22 years—and what it taught him about product management Listen now 👇 • YouTube: • Spotify: • Apple: Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for supporting the podcast: 🏆 @enterpret_ai — Transform customer feedback into product growth: 🏆 @Pragmaticmkting — Industry‑recognized product, marketing, and AI training & certifications: 🏆 @AnthropicAI — The AI for problem solvers and enterprise: