As senior product manager at Salesforce, Chelsey Smith \u201906 works at the intersection of customer, technology, and business. \u201cProduct is at the table to represent the voice of the customer,\u201d she says. \u201cWe focus on the heart of what a customer is trying to do.\u201d The product team she is a part of generates ideas on what features to build (and why), prioritizes what to build first, and then collaborates with designers, engineers, and others to execute. Smith\u2019s perspective is informed by her degree in studio arts from Mac, a graduate degree in architecture, and past roles as an architect and small-business owner. Here she reflects on some of the pivots she\u2019s made so far, and the lessons she\u2019s learned along the way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I used to be a zero-inbox person. That was my sign that I\u2019m doing my job, and I\u2019m great at it. The last few years I\u2019ve had to become more intentional about how I use my time and what I\u2019m doing. My natural place is to jump in and just start. Now I recognize that doing is not the same as creating value. I\u2019ve let go of things\u2014I\u2019m not a zero-inbox person anymore. That\u2019s something that was freeing, and I think I do more valuable work in exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Salesforce we embrace bringing your whole, authentic self to work. I struggled with that for a while. I was friendly enough but transactional. I felt like, \u201cWe\u2019re at work. Let\u2019s get work done.\u201d Now I think that even if it\u2019s just a 5 percent increase in that area, just showing folks a little of your vulnerable and human side can put some people at ease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have a phrase on my whiteboard that reads, \u201cnormalize not knowing.\u201d It\u2019s OK to say, \u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d I\u2019m an internal processor, and I\u2019m not good on the spot. I have tried to embrace that and say, \u201cI\u2019ve never thought about it that way. Let me get back to you.\u201d I would much rather take a beat to think when I need to offer a solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A few years ago, I decided to leave my salaried day job and start a small business. That ran its course for a couple years, but I eventually came back to the same company\u2014Salesforce\u2014in a different role and as a more seasoned person. Things are different, but it wasn\u2019t an irreversible decision. Giving yourself a little bit of grace to say, \u201cIf I make the less-than-great decision or get some new information in the future, do I have the room to change my mind or change the direction?\u201d is something I wish I had embraced earlier on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I pivoted from architecture into all things digital by leaning on skills I had in the organization space. My then boyfriend (now husband) and I were living in Seattle and he encouraged me to explore roles in digital. I honed in on project management and did a bunch of cold outreach. I started project managing website redesigns and website development, and apps came a little bit later. I love the scale, and speed, and opportunities to reach a big audience and interact with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I hope everyone finds themselves with good managers and people-leaders, but you need to advocate for yourself and ask for those stretch goals, ask for the pay you need, the space you need, the time you need\u2014whatever it may be. People have great intentions and they want to help you be successful, but they don\u2019t always know how to do that or know what you need.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Smith is a senior product manager at Salesforce, with past roles as an architect and small-business owner.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1077,"featured_media":20573,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","mediatype-articles"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"fields":{"article_type":[8],"flickr_photoset_id":"","youtube_id":"","square_thumbnail":false,"press_photos":false,"story_title":"","story_caption":"","rotations":false,"maps":false,"marker_title":"","marker_text":"","geographic_location":false,"feature_embed":"","custom_link_url":"","news_icon_name":"","image_options":false,"main_feature_story":"","custom_image":false,"custom_feature_title":"","custom_feature_caption":"","custom_markup":"","custom_markup_link":"","custom_markup_title":"","custom_markup_caption":"","byline":"","post_thumbnail_style":"default","press_downloads":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1077"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20547"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30067,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20547\/revisions\/30067"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}