Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
How do you get product and engineering to truly operate as one team? Today, I’m joined by Ebi Atawodi, Director of Product Management at YouTube Studio, and a former product leader at Netflix and Uber.
Ebi was the first PM I partnered with after stepping into engineering management at Uber, and we both learned a lot together. We share lessons from our time at Uber and discuss how strong product-engineering partnerships drive better outcomes, grow teams, foster cultures of ownership, and unlock agency, innovation, and trust.
In this episode, we cover:
• Why you need to earn a new team's trust before trying to drive change
• How practices like the "business scorecard" and “State of the Union” updates helped communicate business goals and impact to teams at Uber
• How understanding business impact leads to more ideas and collaboration
• A case for getting to know your team as people, not just employees
• Why junior employees should have a conversation with a recruiter every six months
• Ebi’s approach to solving small problems with the bet that they’ll unlock larger, more impactful solutions
• Why investing time in trust and connection isn't at odds with efficiency
• The qualities of the best engineers—and why they’re the same traits that make people successful in any role
• The three-pronged definition of product: business impact, feasibility, and customer experience
• Why you should treat your career as a project
• And more!
—
Brought to by:
• WorkOS — The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS workos.com
• The Software Engineer’s Guidebook: Written by me (Gergely) – now out in audio form as well engguidebook.com/#buy
—
The Pragmatic Engineer deepdives relevant for this episode:
• The product-minded software engineer blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engineer
• Working with Product Managers as an Engineering Manager or Engineer newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/working-with-product-managers
• Working with Product Managers: advice from PMs newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/working-with-product-managers-advice-from-pms
• What is Growth Engineering? newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/what-is-growth-engineering
—
Where to find Ebi Atawodi:
• X: https://x.com/ebiatawodi
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ebiatawodi
Where to find Gergely Orosz:
• X: https://x.com/GergelyOrosz
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gergelyorosz
• Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/gergely.pragmaticengineer.com
• Newsletter and blog: pragmaticengineer.com
—
In this episode, we cover:
(00:00) Intro
(02:19) Engineering and Product working together: a rocky start
(12:35) Working as a startup inside a large company
(30:24) Product-minded engineers
(36:00) Getting headcount for Engineering
(43:58) The importance of a "vision" and meeting people
(50:44) Traits of standout software engineers engineers look like?
(1:06:54) The value of a great PM
(1:11:50) Play the long game
—
See the transcript and other references from the episode at newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/podcast
—
Production and marketing by penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@pragmaticengineer.com.
How do you get product and engineering to truly operate as one team? Today, I’m joined by Ebi Atawodi, Director of Product Management at YouTube Studio, and a former product leader at Netflix and Uber.
Ebi was the first PM I partnered with after stepping into engineering management at Uber, and we both learned a lot together. We share lessons from our time at Uber and discuss how strong product-engineering partnerships drive better outcomes, grow teams, foster cultures of ownership, and unlock agency, innovation, and trust.
In this episode, we cover:
• Why you need to earn a new team's trust before trying to drive change
• How practices like the "business scorecard" and “State of the Union” updates helped communicate business goals and impact to teams at Uber
• How understanding business impact leads to more ideas and collaboration
• A case for getting to know your team as people, not just employees
• Why junior employees should have a conversation with a recruiter every six months
• Ebi’s approach to solving small problems with the bet that they’ll unlock larger, more impactful solutions
• Why investing time in trust and connection isn't at odds with efficiency
• The qualities of the best engineers—and why they’re the same traits that make people successful in any role
• The three-pronged definition of product: business impact, feasibility, and customer experience
• Why you should treat your career as a project
• And more!
—
Brought to by:
• WorkOS — The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS workos.com
• The Software Engineer’s Guidebook: Written by me (Gergely) – now out in audio form as well engguidebook.com/#buy
—
The Pragmatic Engineer deepdives relevant for this episode:
• The product-minded software engineer blog.pragmaticengineer.com/the-product-minded-engineer
• Working with Product Managers as an Engineering Manager or Engineer newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/working-with-product-managers
• Working with Product Managers: advice from PMs newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/working-with-product-managers-advice-from-pms
• What is Growth Engineering? newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/what-is-growth-engineering
—
Where to find Ebi Atawodi:
• X: https://x.com/ebiatawodi
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ebiatawodi
Where to find Gergely Orosz:
• X: https://x.com/GergelyOrosz
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gergelyorosz
• Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/gergely.pragmaticengineer.com
• Newsletter and blog: pragmaticengineer.com
—
In this episode, we cover:
(00:00) Intro
(02:19) Engineering and Product working together: a rocky start
(12:35) Working as a startup inside a large company
(30:24) Product-minded engineers
(36:00) Getting headcount for Engineering
(43:58) The importance of a "vision" and meeting people
(50:44) Traits of standout software engineers engineers look like?
(1:06:54) The value of a great PM
(1:11:50) Play the long game
—
See the transcript and other references from the episode at newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/podcast
—
Production and marketing by penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@pragmaticengineer.com.
