Bangaly Kaba was an early growth PM at Facebook, head of growth at Instagram, and VP of Product at Instacart and is currently Director of Product at YouTube overseeing a global team working on creator monetization. Bangaly has also been a growth advisor to dozens of companies, including Twitter, on the board of multiple companies, and is an active angel investor. In our conversation, we discuss:
• A simple framework for choosing where to work and what to work on
• The importance of “understand work”
• The “adjacent users” theory and how it can help you drive growth
• Advice for coaching product managers
• Invaluable lessons from his time at Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube
• Much more
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Find the transcript and references at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/frameworks-for-growing-your-career-bangaly-kaba
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Where to find Bangaly Kaba:
• X: https://twitter.com/iambangaly
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iambangaly/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambangaly/
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Where to find Lenny:
• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/
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In this episode, we cover:
(00:00) Bangaly’s background
(06:31) Choosing where to work and what to work on
(08:39) The impact factor
(10:53) Evaluating the environment
(15:53) The manager component
(18:27) The skills part of the equation
(23:49) Advice on finding a mentor
(25:42) The power of “understand work”
(31:17) Operationalizing understand work
(37:55) Balancing understand work
(41:25) Managing complex change
(45:26) Effective management of product managers
(51:35) The role of product managers as coaches and team leaders
(54:52) Driving growth through flywheels and value proposition
(01:03:14) Understanding adjacent users
(01:08:41) The role of partnerships and SEO in Instagram’s early growth
(01:16:08) The secret behind Instagram’s growth
(01:25:37) Lessons from Facebook
(01:29:15) Failure corner
(01:31:58) Lightning round
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Referenced:
• Impact = Environment x Skills: How to Make Career Decisions: https://www.reforge.com/blog/how-to-make-career-decisions
• Thinking beyond frameworks | Casey Winters (Pinterest, Eventbrite, Airbnb, Tinder, Canva, Reddit, Grubhub): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/thinking-beyond-frameworks-casey
• Casey Winters’s blog: https://caseyaccidental.com/
• Ben Thompson’s newsletter: https://stratechery.com/about/
• Elena Verna on how B2B growth is changing, product-led growth, product-led sales, why you should go freemium not trial, what features to make free, and much more: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/elena-verna-on-why-every-company
• George Lee on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/geolee/
• Bangaly Kaba: The Path to 1 Billion: Lessons Learned from Growing Instagram—CXL LIVE 2018: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9ZHlb6kj_E
• What Is ‘Dogfooding’?: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/14/business/dogfooding.html
• Bloom’s taxonomy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom%27s_taxonomy
• Kevin Systrom on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinsystrom/
• Mike Krieger on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikekrieger/
• LeBron James: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LeBron_James
• Kobe Bryant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobe_Bryant
• Mike Krzyzewski: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Krzyzewski
• John Calipari: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Calipari
• Stripe: https://stripe.com/
• Chief: https://chief.com/
• Jobs to be done framework: https://jobs-to-be-done.com/jobs-to-be-done-a-framework-for-customer-needs-c883cbf61c90
• The Adjacent User: https://brianbalfour.com/quick-takes/the-adjacent-user
• How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1,000 users: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-the-biggest-consumer-apps-got
• Alex Zhu on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keepsilence/
• From Brush to Canvas with Alex Zhu of Musical.ly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey15v81pwII
• Selena Gomez on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/selenagomez/
• Kim Kardashian on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kimkardashian/
• Rob Andrews on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robby-andrews-64669720/
• Instagram’s growth speeds up as it hits 700 million users: https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/26/instagram-700-million-users/
• Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World: https://www.amazon.com/Range-Generalists-Triumph-Specialized-World/dp/0735214484
• Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World: https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Work-Focused-Success-Distracted/dp/1455586692
• Start at the End: How to Build Products That Create Change: https://www.amazon.com/Start-End-Products-Create-Change/dp/0525534423
• Flighty app: https://www.flightyapp.com/
• Adam Grant on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adamgrant/
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Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com.
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Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe
Casey Winters is the Chief Product Officer at Eventbrite where he leads the PM, product design, research, and growth marketing teams. Prior to Eventbrite, Casey spent close to 3 years at Pinterest where he led the growth product team.
Andy Johns is one of the pre-eminent growth leaders of the last decade. Andy's career started in growth at Facebook when the company scaled from 100M-500M active users. Since he has worked in some of the leading growth orgs at companies like Twitter, Quora and more recently at Wealthfront as Head of Growth and President.
Bangaly Kaba is the Head of Platform Growth @ Popshop Live, a live streaming mobile marketplace that combines commerce, entertainment, and social. Prior to Popshop, Bangaly led the product growth and consumer product orgs at Instacart and before Instacart was Head of Growth @ Instagram, where he built and led the product team that helped grow Instagram from 440M to > 1B monthly actives in 2.5yrs.
Elena Verna is a master when it comes to all things starting and scaling growth organizations. Previously, Elena spent over 7 years as SVP Growth @ SurveyMonkey where she ran product, growth marketing, and data teams. Post SurveyMonkey, Elena worked with the rocket ship that is Miro both as Interim CMO and as an advisor.
Ed Baker is an angel investor and growth advisor to various startups including Lime, Zwift, Whoop, Crimson Education, GoPeer, and Playbook. Ed was the VP of Product and Growth at Uber from 2013-2017. Prior to Uber, Ed was the Head of International Growth at Facebook.
Rob Schutz is Chief Growth Officer and Co-founder at Ro, the healthcare technology company building a patient-centric healthcare system. Under Rob's growth leadership, Ro has become one of the fastest-growing companies in the country. Prior to Ro, Rob was VP of Growth at Bark, the makers of BarkBox, and helped scale revenue from zero to $100 million.
In Today's Episode with Ed Baker You Will Learn:
1.) Casey Winters:
How does Casey define "growth"? How does it differ from product?
How do the best growth leaders decide between art vs science when making growth decisions?
2.) Andy Johns:
What is Andy's biggest advice to founders looking to build their first growth team?
What unexpected choice did Andy decide to make at Twitter that moved the needle for new user acquisition?
3.) Bangaly Kaba:
What were some of Bangaly's biggest takeaways from scaling Instagram from 440M users to 1BN?
What decisions did Bangaly make without data? How did they go? What did he learn?
4.) Ed Baker:
What are Ed's biggest takeaways from facebook around structuring growth teams?
What are Ed's biggest pieces of advice for startyups looking to grow internationally?
What were some of Ed's biggest learnings from working with Travis @ Uber?
5.) Elena Verna:
What is the difference between a good vs great growth model?
When does one need to change or amend their growth model? How does one know when it is working?
6.) Rob Schutz:
Why does Rob believe that startups should not diversify their customer acquisition channels too quickly?
How does Rob assess resouirce allocation and spend on new channels? How did this process look when partnering with the MLB for Ro?
Bangaly Kaba is the Head of Platform Growth @ Popshop Live, a live streaming mobile marketplace that combines commerce, entertainment, and social. Prior to Popshop, Bangaly led the product growth and consumer product orgs at Instacart and before Instacart was Head of Growth @ Instagram, where he built and led the product team that helped grow Instagram from 440M to > 1B monthly actives in 2.5yrs. If all of this was not enough, Bangaly has also spent time investing as a Sequoia Scout having made investments into Career Karma, Binti.com and Squad App to name a few.
In Today's Episode with Bangaly Kaba You Will Learn:
1.) How Bangaly made his way into the world of growth and came to lead some of the largest growth orgs in tech at the likes of Instacart and Instagram?
2.) How does Bangaly define the rule of "Head of Growth"? When is the right time for founders to start hiring a growth leader? How do they know whether to hire a growth leader or junior growth reps? Where should founders place these first growth hires in the org? Product or marketing?
3.) How would Bangaly structure the hiring process for any growth hire? What are the must-ask questions? What case studies would Bangaly ask all candidates to complete? What are the signals of a 10x growth hire? What are some core red flags that show in the interview process?
4.) What does the ideal onboarding process look like for new growth hires? What are the signs that a new growth hire is hitting target and expectations? What are some early warning signs that a growth hire is not meeting expectations?
5.) What is the ideal relationship between the Head of Growth and the CEO? How often should they meet? How should they structure the discussion? How should the growth team work with product teams to be successful? How should growth teams work with marketing teams?