Peter Sellis

@peter-sellis · 18 positions · 0 changes of mind

Former head of product at Discord; earlier Snap's first product manager, where he spent seven years, and before that a product manager at Ustream.

Everything they publish, on ppll ↗

Peter Sellis did not write this page.

We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.

The shading behind a date shows how recently it was said: full within a month, empty after three years.

Our reading
Collaboration carries coordination costs that leave a team moving as slow as its slowest node.

Their wordscollaboration comes with incredible coordination costs. And coordination costs essentially assure that you're moving as slow as the slowest node
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:06:50 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 1st of 18 in this recording
Our reading
It is essential to build an organization that can absorb spiky, unconventional talent.

Their wordsI think it's like essential to be able to create an organization that can adopt that type of talent.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:13:08 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 2nd of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Spiky product managers are like bands: sometimes they put out a dud album, and if you still believe in them as artists you stick with them.

product management

Their wordsThat's kind of how I think of a lot of the spikier product managers that I've worked with, which is like, man, sometimes they whiff on an album, but if I still believe in them as an artist, like I'll stick with them.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:15:06 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 3rd of 18 in this recording
Our reading
The way the product management profession is set up, its median practitioner is probably pretty bad.

product management

Their wordsmathematically uh it's kind of like set up to be this profession where the the median product manager is actually probably pretty bad.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:18:18 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 4th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Great engineers rarely complain about product managers, because they bend them to their will and do not put up with bad ones.

product management

Their wordsI really don't hear great engineers complain about product managers that much because great engineers a they know how to bend product managers to their will. They get the the the use out of them that they want and b they just like don't put up with bad ones.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:20:16 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 5th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Ads are the product-market fit of consumer monetization on the internet.

product management

Their wordsads are truly the magical kind of like product market fit of consumer monetization on the internet.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:21:41 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 6th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
It is harder to build performance advertising products around audiences that are hard to measure.

Their wordsThe key thing to think about is like those are just harder to measure and it's harder to build performance products around things that are hard to measure.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:22:49 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 7th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
There are not yet any really great ad products for messaging apps.

Their wordsAnd like there aren't really great ad products for messaging apps right now.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:24:18 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 8th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
The most underrated part of systems thinking is being able to describe the system in mathematical terms.

Their wordsActually the most underrated aspect like of of systems thinking is is is having a mathematical background to be able to describe the the system in mathematical terms.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:30:23 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 9th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
One way to gauge a candidate's taste is to ask about the things they built and never shipped.

taste hiring

Their wordsone way you can kind of like get at somebody's taste is uh when you're interviewing them is just ask them about some of the things they built that they never shipped.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:36:06 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 10th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Restraint, saying no to good ideas, is probably one of the few ways to exercise taste.

taste

Their wordsexercising that kind of muscle of like saying no uh of restraint is probably one of the easiest like one of the few like muscles of taste you can exercise. If if a museum has all of their collection on the walls, then the curator hasn't done anything.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:36:27 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 11th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
In a chat assistant, how far advertisers may influence an answer should be set by how much user trust it trades off.

Their wordsAnd I think the mechanism by which how influenced I should be should essentially be how much trust I'm trading off.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:43:20 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 12th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Keep loading people who make consistently good decisions with more decisions until they start making bad ones.

Their wordspeople who are making consistently good decisions I just want to load them up with more decisions till I start to see them make bad ones.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:48:56 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 13th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Almost every consumer product needs to be optimizing for daily active use.

Their wordsI think almost every consumer product maybe it's also a controversial take like needs to be optimizing for daily active use
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 0:51:42 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 14th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
Very few people have the blank-sheet creativity to imagine the future unencumbered by the present.

Their wordsthere are very few people that have this type of like blank sheet creativity to think about the future totally unencumbered from the present.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 1:00:39 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 15th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
An ads business's revenue tomorrow is essentially caused by the return it delivers advertisers today.

Their wordsrevenue tomorrow for advertising is essentially causally related to the ROI you drive for advertisers today.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 1:11:53 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 16th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
A product's core value needs both a phrase and a metric: metrics alone mean little to people, and a phrase alone does not get acted on.

product management

Their wordsif it's just metrics, it's kind of meaningless to people. If it's just a phrase, it doesn't get actioned day-to-day by data scientists, product managers, and engineers.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 1:15:38 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 17th of 18 in this recording
Our reading
A really good product manager has to be very confident, often to the point of bordering on arrogance.

product management

Their wordsI think to be a really good really good PM you kind of have to be like really confident and that borders on arrogance a lot of the time.
spoken · machine transcript hear it at 1:17:01 · all korrents from this recording
↗90 minutes of unfiltered product advice from Snap and Discord’s product chief | Peter Sellisyoutube.com 18th of 18 in this recording

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