Vision, conviction, and hype: How to build 0 to 1 inside a company | Mihika Kapoor (Product, Figma)

Mihika Kapoor is a design-engineer-PM hybrid at Figma, where she was an early PM on FigJam and is now spearheading development on a new product at the company that’s coming out this June. She’s known as the go-to person at Figma for leading new 0-to-1 products, and, as you’ll hear in our conversation, beloved by everyone she works with. Her background includes founding Design Nation, a national nonprofit focused on democratizing design education for undergraduates; spearheading product launches at Meta; and community building within the NYC AI startup scene. In our conversation, we discuss:
• How to effectively take ideas from 0 to 1 at larger companies
• How to craft a compelling vision
• The importance of vulnerability and feedback
• The role of intuition and product sense in making decisions
• How to practically communicate your vision
• How to balance collaboration and strong opinions
• Advice for building a strong team culture
• Pivoting with grace and enthusiasm
• The current AI revolution and its impact on PM
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Find the transcript and references at: www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/vi...
Where to find Mihika Kapoor:
• X: / mihikapoor
• LinkedIn: / mihikakapoor
Where to find Lenny:
• Newsletter: www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: / lennysan
• LinkedIn: / lennyrachitsky
In this episode, we cover:
(00:00) Mihika’s background
(04:29) Core attributes of great product managers
(07:34) Crafting a compelling vision
(12:12) The vision behind FigJam
(18:25) Delivering a vision without design or engineering skills
(21:52) Creating momentum
(26:36) The importance of strong conviction
(27:45) Direct communication
(32:48) Building hype
(42:20) Immersing yourself in user insights
(47:16) Operationalizing user insights
(50:33) Caring deeply about what you build
(54:01) Finding passion in your work
(57:00) Building a strong culture
(01:07:07) Pivoting with grace and enthusiasm
(01:11:48) Design Nation
(01:13:15) Mihika’s weaknesses
(01:16:07) Building new products at larger companies
(01:20:50) Coming up with a great idea
(01:22:49) The key to going from 0 to 1
(01:26:47) Spreading the idea across the company
(01:29:15) Closing thoughts
(01:32:11) Lightning round
Production and marketing by penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [e-mail].
Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

[@naveenmanimaran7219]

Honestly, I am blown away in the way Mihika speaks about product management and PM-ing at Figma. Her straightforward storytelling style really got me hyped. One of the first episodes I watched the whole way through. Thank you for such a pleasant conversation

[@rentingcai2136]

Thanks so much to both of you on the generous sharing of products insights - I’m kind of in a bottleneck of my product career and this episode definitely inspired me a lot and shaped my perspective of building something from scratch and finding passion in work

[@shivanandkotian]

Amazing podcast. She loves and breathes the product. The marketing team at Figma should raise a toast for the awareness she has created for Figjam 🙌🏼

[@JohanRonsse]

Mihika is possibly the smartest mind in product. Amazing.

[@panos_PM]

Vision --> conviction --> hype --> repeat! Thank you this was once more an amazing episode with great learnings!

[@abdurrahmanhalis]

Thanks for the insightful and super uplifting conversation... Heres my take of Mihika in 4 pillars Paramount agency (no one cares, OK i will do it then) Delusional conviction (they said no, but they meant "not yet") Continuous proximity (meet, listen, pitch, prototype) Adorable empathy (set things up to fall in love with the team)

[@OpenBookmarksCo.]

she spreads such a positive atmosphere, figma and team are surely great as well 🎉

[@jkidsimon]

It was a great episode. After listening to many podcasts, I always get some inspiration and ideas, especially energy. I come from Asia, and I've been listening to Lenny's podcast for a while, mainly to understand and learn about the thinking and working styles of different types of companies and product managers. I feel that Lenny is very consciously planning to cover different aspects as much as possible. As a product manager for almost 10 years, I increasingly feel that while tactics and frameworks are important, what's more important is the core and unchanging things, such as your company's culture and deep-rooted habits, while in terms of product manager skills, it's communication, mindset, way of thinking, making things happen and understanding yourself. Tactics can help you grow in the short term, but these unchanging things take you further. A product manager has to work together with the team to move forward. And in this episode, I saw the most original and essential aspects of a PM from Mihika.

[@tcallquest]

Mihika does a nice job. Not common to find a high performing triple threat, so it was nice to hear her perspective even if it felt a touch vague (project I can't talk about) and a touch cliche (talk to users, I ask all my friends) at times. The question I'm really left with after watching this episode is about the nature of the podcast. We often hear from PMs within the tech-circles of SV (often the same circles/companies), and Lenny does that in service of helping other PMs learn from successful tech models and successful tech businesses. Those who aren't part of this culture stand to gain the most. The question I have is are they learning? Is it helping? We don't often (do we ever?) hear from a PM at a legacy company who might have deployed various frameworks and methodologies to build something different/unique/business changing. Is that because those PMs don't exist? Because legacy (or tech-adjacent) companies outside of SV are too entrenched to change? I would imagine interesting examples and stories exist, and that we could learn from them. I do appreciate Lenny's podcast. I almost always learn something. But often it feels like I'm learning similar things, or concepts that are born and are evolved through a similar cultural lens. The podcast, at times, feels like PR, or quid pro quo. I know Lenny can go deeper, wider.

[@LennysPodcast]

Totally hear you! I focus on top-tier companies because people there operate at the highest levels, and so there's a lot to learn from this group, but I know many people can't put some of these concepts into practice. I will definitely try to bring in more folks from "legacy" companies, but from my past experience, people don't seen to actually tune into those episodes. It's innately less interesting to people to hear what a PM at Comcast has learned. But feedback received 🙏

[@acseattle1975]

I completely agree, and I'll explain why It feels like Lenny is throwing softballs many times to extract the big idea of how someone is successful and do what they do. This is helpful for the general listener. However for people in the weeds, we yearn for more tactical decisions that moved the needle for someone; I find myself learning most and leaving the podcast feeling empowered is when we learn war stories, intricate details of what the significant bets made were that could've gone sideways. In this case I think not being able to speak about this new project really hurts this episode because nobody can stress test or have a reaction on the instincts and bets made. All we know is that Mahika has been vouched for, and for that alone I am happy to internalize everything that was mentioned (I also agree with the approach and philosophy that she shares) Would love to see Mahika return after the product launches, maybe a month after and for us to learn what went wrong, what went well, how did they validate the interest of the product, what met expectations, what tradeoffs had to be made. I know Mahika couldn't share this here which is also a reason Lenny never tried to dig deeper.

[@LennysPodcast]

@@acseattle1975 love that idea

[@aniketkulkarni9435]

@@acseattle1975 I agree with this! This was one of the best episodes :)

[@olemew]

If a cliche is true are you supposed to make up some contrarian opinion? I don't think it was vague. For example, when she talked about asking friends about using FigJam she mentioned the specific insights, like a barrier for non-designers and how previewing multiple templates for several typical use cases lowered that barrier. (45:39)

[@StacyHutchins]

One of the podcast by Lenny! Packed full of information!

[@chan90s]

One major question that you missed - She dropped out of Harvard to join Figma. Wanted to know her thought process leading to that decision

[@mihikakapoor4554]

Can definitely share more of my thought process here :) When I was at HBS, I felt most of the students around me fell into one of 3 buckets. (1) They worked in finance/consulting/some other industry where where an MBA has historically been an important ingredient to career success, (2) they were not all-in on the field they previously worked in; rather, they wanted to pivot and wanted a generalist foundation to do so, (3) they were still in search of a career that spoke to them and wanted to take advantage of the internships, etc to identify their ideal path. However, none of these applied to me. I already worked as a PM, loved it, and wanted to stay in the world of tech. As a result, even though getting an MBA had momentum behind it, being in the classroom for 2 years felt like too high an opportunity cost from a career POV, as I’m a learning-by-doing person. On the other hand, having impact at a rocketship like Figma was something I couldn’t say no to. I’ll caveat the above by saying that everyone learns differently and there is no right path, but I do generally recommend to folks interested in staying/moving into tech that hands-on experience outweighs most theoretical things you learn in the classroom.

[@med-3000]

Really inspired by Mihika relentless energy and enthusiasm. There are so many nuggets of inspiration for great team culture and product leadership, great interview.

[@lupresta7629]

One of my favourite episodes so far. Really enjoyed this conversation and left inspired. Thank you both!

[@nosh3019]

Got many good insights from this episode. Also an engaging conversation to listen to. Thanks

[@victorchibacu7128]

Amazing episode 😍

[@LukeI]

MIHIKA! So proud

[@alih7628]

Thanks for the great interview, really appreciated the practitioner level point of view and the concrete examples that she gave.

[@sun-ship]

inspiring person

[@user-js9hh2ri7i]

Thanks for sharing your experience and wisdom, Mihika. Love your free-spirited and positive attitude. Fave timestamp is 01:20:50 onwards And as always, thank you, Lenny, for democratizing product management for the world.

[@bhupeshsingh7252]

Great Episode! I'm curious about the books int he background! Can we get a list/recommendation?

[@joana_utrera]

Amazing

[@zulferjiffry765]

Enjoyed understanding the culture at Figma

[@VishnuPrasad-uj6ek]

Very good podcast. I understand creating the hype aspect and selling your idea at every avenue but it would be nice if we can deep dive on how you convert the hype that you built into leadership buy in.

[@juliuswinter995]

Definitely deserves a Figgy!

[@VasiliyZimin]

сибо за подгон инфы по этому казику) наконец-то я разберусь как здесь играть)))спа

[@ioriii_k]

Lenny最近のエピソードの中で1番楽しそう。かわいい😊

[@sagarjaid]

Devin is overhyped!

[@Hallabol151]

Saw Ayan Rand in the background after 11 mins into the podcast and had to turn it off. Can't take anyone seriously especially a grown brown woman open to white libertarian ideology.

[@youssef.elmoumen]

With all my respect to her seniority but Why the heck she's talking this way, it sounds fake

[@olemew]

"talking this way" in what way? positive and passionate about her job?

[@youssef.elmoumen]

@@olemew vocal fry

[@olemew]

@@youssef.elmoumen edit: ok, I was listening closely, and noticed some vocal fry here and there, not sure if people can control this or are aware of their accent

[@youssef.elmoumen]

@@olemew I don’t know either but it’s annoying 😅