How Building AI Products is Different—and Why Product Teams Need to Evolve

The Digital Project Manager

AI is fundamentally reshaping how digital products are conceived, built, and delivered—and the shift isn’t just technical, it’s cultural. Jyothi Nookula, a seasoned AI product leader with experience at companies like Netflix, Meta, Amazon AWS, and Etsy, joins Galen to unpack what makes AI-native products so different from conventional ones, why building them demands new evaluation frameworks, and how product teams can evolve their skills and mindset to keep pace.

Whether you're dealing with unpredictable model outputs, shifting success metrics, or a team with uneven comfort levels around emerging tech, Jyothi offers grounded, real-world strategies for staying user-centered, experiment-driven, and confidently collaborative in the face of rapid change.

Resources from this episode:

• Join DPM Membership
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• Connect with Jyothi on LinkedIn
• Check out Next Gen Product Manager and Jyothi’s website

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1. Opening And Topic Framing (00:00:00)

2. Guest Introduction And Credentials (00:01:28)

3. What Makes AI-Native Products Different (00:04:16)

4. Measuring Usefulness And Intent (00:09:20)

5. Skills Gaps: Competency Vs Disposition (00:12:30)

6. Hands-On Adoption And Peer Learning (00:16:40)

7. AI Across The Product Lifecycle (00:20:40)

8. Prototypes Plus PRDs And Iteration (00:25:00)

9. Human In The Loop And Taste (00:28:20)

10. Pushing Back On Tech-First Pressure (00:31:00)

11. Working Backwards And Press Releases (00:34:20)

12. Future Of PM: Portfolios That Stand Out (00:38:00)

13. Technical Fluency Without Coding (00:42:00)