Sharanya Chandrakantha
Rao Inna
Principal - Product Management
"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
25 - 6:00 PM EDT/New York (See in local time)
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05/25/2025 6:00 PM
05/25/2025 06:20 PM
America/New_York
#WTGC2025
"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
#WTGC2025
"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
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"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
"Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)"
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Session: Making the leap from non-technical sectors to managing technical products (and finding success)
Share a framework and examples from my career transitioning from the non-profit space, to managing machine learning products for Amazon Marketplace and Highspot. Through the session, I want to help provide a structured approach with examples, that not only makes the transition smoother for PMs who come from diverse sectors and walks of life, to the technology sector, but also helps them succeed quickly in their new teams/organizations.Key Takeaways
- 1) Framework for transitioning from a non-technical to a technical product management role
- 2) Learning to lean on your technical peers/stakeholders for guidance, support and mentorship
- 3) Helpful references and tools to bring you up to speed on technical concepts in your area of interest
Bio
Through 6 years of product management experience at Amazon and Highspot (and with 10 years of experience overall), I gained expertise across various domains - including AI/ML, Search, Retail, Marketplace, Online Publishing, Content Management and Video Streaming. Across domains, I launched new experiences and innovative capabilities, that positively impacted customer satisfaction, improved revenue growth and cost savings for customers, sellers and content publishers at Amazon and Highspot.Prior to my experience in Product Management, I used to work in Education (as a Teach For India fellow for 2 years – the India-based equivalent of Teach For America) to radically improve reading and mathematical proficiencies for students in a low-income school, at a non-profit improving urban/civic policy and at an impact investing fund, with a focus on ed-tech investments.
At Highspot, I lead efforts towards transforming the search experience to leverage AI/ML capabilities and scale effectively across all our enterprise customers worldwide (e.g. Fortune 500 companies such as Salesforce). I drove the launch of the first two Generative AI-based features to customers and I also led a team that enhanced the overall content organization and management experience (core Highspot product offering).
At Amazon, I drove efforts to scale paid video content across new countries and led initiatives to improve the publisher and moderator experience (estimated $XXX MM incremental revenue). Within Amazon Marketplace, I led a team to introduce ML-based search experiences and evolve issue-detection (using neural networks) products for millions of Amazon sellers. These efforts led to significant cost savings, streamlined support journeys, and proactive issue detection, fostering improved seller support and satisfaction.
