For most of my career, a product team’s hardest constraint was capacity, and leading product meant rationing engineering time. AI is loosening that constraint. Now that building is cheaper than ever, the expensive part is deciding what to build.
Amira Youssef put it clearly: “When building gets faster, choosing matters more.”
I’m delighted to share that Amira is joining Products That Count as our new Resident CPO. Some of you will recognize her name. In 2025, we honored Amira with a CPO Award. Now she’s returning to help strengthen the community that recognized her leadership.
Amira sees CPOs rethinking where AI creates customer value and which products are still worth building. She also names a trap I see in many teams. “There’s a temptation to treat discovery as another task we can automate, but generating more ideas or prototypes doesn’t mean we understand the customer’s problem.”
Output feels like progress, but a hundred prototypes built on a shallow understanding of the customer only show you how quickly you can be wrong. Getting the choice right now extends all the way to market. In Amira’s words, “Product strategy and go-to-market can no longer sit in separate conversations.” The CPOs who lead the next decade will own both.
That’s the conversation Amira will lead for us. As Resident CPO, Amira will host executive peer discussions with CPOs and help shape our thought leadership. I’ll share what we learn here.
You can meet her on November 11 at 8 a.m. PT at our virtual Product Salon with Syniti. Author Sebastian Wernicke opens, then Amira joins the roundtable on turning what your data shows into what your team should do next. Bring a decision you’re working through, and register below.
Amira’s journey with us began with a CPO Award. If you know a product leader whose judgment deserves recognition, nominate them here.
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