Todd Olson, CEO of Pendo, discusses how AI is transforming software development and product management. He emphasizes the need for high-quality context and data to guide AI tools, warns against generating 'AI slop,' and highlights the importance of feedback loops, user behavior data, and managing risk through concepts like 'one-way vs. two-way doors.'
Summarized by Podsumo
AI makes it easier to create software but risks producing 'AI slop' if not guided by rigorous data, context, and user feedback.
Measuring user behavior—from journey data to 'rage prompts' (e.g., profanity or repeated queries)—is critical for improving software quality and agent interactions.
The role of product managers is shifting toward higher-level business strategy (market opportunity, pricing), while engineers focus more on architecture and scalability, and designers get closer to code.
Building a 'feedback loop' where usage data feeds back into AI agents to continuously improve software is the ultimate vision.
Companies that adopt an 'engineering mindset'—iterating on AI tools to overcome initial weaknesses—are most successful.
"If you don't know what good looks like, it is hard to inspect. That's the thing that a lot of folks worry about is how do we help all these people, which are our new builders, using these amazing solutions to make sure that what they're building is of high quality, that it scales."
"Rage prompts are everything from exclamation points to capital letters to profane language. That could be bad for everyone. You don't want to end up on the front page of the Wall Street Journal for leaking people's data, right?"
"Step one is give your team some time to play around with things. Give them space. You will see the gains later, but you need to do it first."