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Lenny's Podcast / episode intelligence

The GitLab way: Kindness, transparency, and short toes | David DeSanto (CPO)

14 Apr 2024 24 published claims 2 attributable people
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Speakers in the public record

David DeSantoLenny Rachitsky

Claim mix

belief 8evaluation 4commitment 4recommendation 3preference 2observation 1uncertainty 1prediction 1

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Claim ledger

The useful parts, with receipts.

24 published records

01 / recommendation

Recommends Crossing The Chasm. Recommends Essentialism.

“The two that I probably recommend the most are Crossing The Chasm by Jeffrey Moore. The current edition still has some things that are a little bit older now as examples, but the core of it is still very, very amazing. The other one is Essentialism, and that is really about saying no to the right things and finding the thing that you really need to do to get the job done. And then not a book, but Jeffrey Moore created this. There's the critical core context framework, and if you've read both of those books, it really helps you frame in what is the critical part for your business, what is the core of the expectation and what are the things that you can say no to with the little bout of risks? So those things together, I think are really powerful.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

03 / observation

I know you weren't there at the beginning, but just I guess do you have any thoughts or insights from when it makes sense to go wide versus when it makes sense to focus? Because usually the advice is just do one thing really great and that's the only way to win.

“I know you weren't there at the beginning, but just I guess do you have any thoughts or insights from when it makes sense to go wide versus when it makes sense to focus? Because usually the advice is just do one thing really great and that's the only way to win.”
Speaker
Lenny Rachitsky
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

11 / belief

Going a totally different direction, Hila also said that you're a leader with a great sense of humor and you often use your humor to navigate very high stakes conversations and executive negotiations. And I think a lot of people would love to have the skill.

“Going a totally different direction, Hila also said that you're a leader with a great sense of humor and you often use your humor to navigate very high stakes conversations and executive negotiations. And I think a lot of people would love to have the skill.”
Speaker
Lenny Rachitsky
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

12 / belief

What I learned early in my career is that tension, especially very high, very tension driven conversations can really kill productivity, kill morale. And that I found that if I can deflate that a little bit and re-add some, I don't want to say humanity to the conversation, but really disarm the topic, that people are able to move forward.

“What I learned early in my career is that tension, especially very high, very tension driven conversations can really kill productivity, kill morale. And that I found that if I can deflate that a little bit and re-add some, I don't want to say humanity to the conversation, but really disarm the topic, that people are able to move forward.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

14 / belief

I've not seen a number yet that from other companies, how much are they still remote, but obviously during the pandemic, I think Google and Apple would win as the largest all remote.

“I've not seen a number yet that from other companies, how much are they still remote, but obviously during the pandemic, I think Google and Apple would win as the largest all remote.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

15 / prediction

What are you trying to do with that? And by the way, I think that's the biggest challenge for people who move from a different role into a product division or a product role, is changing that dynamic to not be the bits and the bytes but be the use case, the pain point.

“What are you trying to do with that? And by the way, I think that's the biggest challenge for people who move from a different role into a product division or a product role, is changing that dynamic to not be the bits and the bytes but be the use case, the pain point.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

16 / preference

That is a good question. So we focus on asynchronous communication first, and so that means that key decisions that involve people who are in a time zone where the meeting's not occurring, that waits until they're back online because the directly responsible individual or DRI as we say here.

“That is a good question. So we focus on asynchronous communication first, and so that means that key decisions that involve people who are in a time zone where the meeting's not occurring, that waits until they're back online because the directly responsible individual or DRI as we say here.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

19 / evaluation

We've heard from customers, they've seen efficiency boosts of 50% and above by leveraging GitLab Duo. And I would say if you've not heard from us in a while or aren't as familiar, please just check that out because we are truly unique in the space and it's something I take a lot of pride in.

“We've heard from customers, they've seen efficiency boosts of 50% and above by leveraging GitLab Duo. And I would say if you've not heard from us in a while or aren't as familiar, please just check that out because we are truly unique in the space and it's something I take a lot of pride in.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

20 / commitment

The next was we wanted to be both transparent, which fits into our conversation earlier and be focused on privacy with AI. And that means that we tell you what models we're using, we're source available so you can see how we're using them.

“The next was we wanted to be both transparent, which fits into our conversation earlier and be focused on privacy with AI. And that means that we tell you what models we're using, we're source available so you can see how we're using them.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

21 / recommendation

My last employer, we started sharing the list of open requests for new features more externally and we got a much more honed in roadmap and that led to better customer engagement, which led to a higher retention rate, which led to better expansion numbers.

“My last employer, we started sharing the list of open requests for new features more externally and we got a much more honed in roadmap and that led to better customer engagement, which led to a higher retention rate, which led to better expansion numbers.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

22 / commitment

com/values and you can see them. But what I will share with you is that we have a thanks channel where people just post a thank you note whenever they are truly thankful for something and that channel is constantly getting those messages in and it's reinforcing that engagement that you really want to have where people are working together collaboratively and assuming positive intent and so forth.

“com/values and you can see them. But what I will share with you is that we have a thanks channel where people just post a thank you note whenever they are truly thankful for something and that channel is constantly getting those messages in and it's reinforcing that engagement that you really want to have where people are working together collaboratively and assuming positive intent and so forth.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast

23 / commitment

Yeah, I think you're touching on actually when I interviewed in 2019, I actually asked Sid, our co-founder and CEO, a similar question. And I came from security in the GitLab and I said, hey, we don't share more than four or six weeks with a roadmap with customers and even sales because we were in the situation where we didn't want our great idea to be taken and built before we built it.

“Yeah, I think you're touching on actually when I interviewed in 2019, I actually asked Sid, our co-founder and CEO, a similar question. And I came from security in the GitLab and I said, hey, we don't share more than four or six weeks with a roadmap with customers and even sales because we were in the situation where we didn't want our great idea to be taken and built before we built it.”
Speaker
David DeSanto
Publisher
Lenny's Podcast
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