podcast

As a jack of all trades,Yasmeen Turayhi is a Product Marketing Executive in Silicon Valley, a filmmaker, an author, and a podcast host.  She is on the Board of Directors of TechWadi and the author of Product Marketing Debunked, founder of Modern Product, host of The Essential Go-To-Market show, produced by Sharebird, and the host of “Gateways to Awakening”, a podcast on wellness and spirituality produced by Hakawati. 
 

We invited Yasmeen on our productivity and engineering podcast and had an interesting conversation on product marketing, success in silicon valley and her journey towards work/life balance and wellbeing.
 

Why is product marketing important ?

After working as a lawyer and in many firms in New York city, Yasmeen started working in the go-to market. Go-to market is the operationalization of a product in a market. The primary goal of product marketing is to deliver the product to the target customer and ensure the customer adopts the product. This is done by building the infrastructure of the go-to market.

People usually underestimate the importance of building the infrastructure of the go-to market. Go-to market looks at the product from many perspectives and puts it all together. In her book, Yasmeen explains how product marketing works. 

Yasmeen says that product marketing is “a little bit of Art and Science”. As opposed to other forms of marketing that are more analytical. To be a good product marketer, you need to have experience in different fields. Product marketing brings all the pieces that contribute to a product together to have a unified strategy. For this reason, engineers who are creating the product are very important in the process.

One misconception about the go-to market strategy is that there is one strategy for all. Yasmeen explains that the go-to market strategy is going to be very different from one company to another. The go-to market strategy depends on the stage of the firm. A company that is still small is going to have a different strategy from a big firm. That is because one still hasn't launched its product and the other already has the product on the market. This is why there is no possible template for a go-to market strategy.

Self awareness and its role in increasing productivity 

About her decision to start a wellness and spirituality show in the, Yasmeen explained those things are part of everyone’s daily life. Many people try to dissociate their “work self” from their “home self”. When we go to work, we leave part of our personality at home. Either because it is not appropriate for the workplace or because we are afraid to show that part of ourselves to our colleagues. Yet, that dissociation is not healthy. 

Five years ago, Yasmeen did a personal introspection and contemplation about her life. She decided she did not want to separate her personality at work and at home. She joined a program that helped her become more intuitive and emotional. That program changed her life. She explains that becoming intuitive requires work and training. Once she became more intuitive, she started all her other careers. She learned how to be in the moment and how to trust her intuition.

At Veamly, we are trying to help software engineers be more present at home and be more productive. For us, productivity doesn’t mean achieving more work. Productivity means bettering our well being and having a better work life balance. It is also about being better with ourselves and our team.

To increase productivity, companies need to start prioritizing their employees' health and well being. Despite what people believe, taking time to meditate or take care of ourselves is not a waste of time. Doing that actually increases productivity. 

Today, many companies treat their employees as commodities and not as human beings. In the long run, only companies that have invested in their employees' well being will be successful. Only companies that have had an impact in changing the hustle culture will survive. Companies need to also understand that spirituality and religion are different from wellbeing and personal development. And so it is possible to create wellbeing habits without having anything to do with religion.

To change the hustle culture, we need to gain a sense of compassion. We need to understand that wealth is not important. What is important is the positive impact that we have in the world. Which is why CEOs and founders need to stop thinking about accumulating wealth. They need to start thinking about creating an inclusive, diverse and empowering culture in their companies.

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Self awareness is also understanding that intelligence is not limited to analytical intelligence. It is also about emotional intelligence and creativity. With the development of AI, this is going to be more true than ever. Jobs that need innovation and creativity also need a level of pattern recognition and self awareness. For this reason, Yasmeen believes that self awareness is very important. The way we talk, the way we act when we are around others is very important.

Some final advice :

To achieve a work life balance, Yasmeen has created a morning and an evening routine that work for her and enable her to be more productive. In the morning, she takes time to meditate, to create a space where she feels empowered. She thinks about the person she wants to be that day. She also thinks about what she needs to do to achieve her long term goals. She gets intentional with what she wants to bring into her day instead of being reactive to the day.

Yasmeen said that she only works on things she feels like working on because that way she achieves more.She surrounds herself with people who have the same goals as her in life.

For her evening routine, she stretches, reflects on her day and reads a book. She does not watch any TV or movies.
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Listen to the full episode with our CEO Emna Ghariani on your favorite podcast platform.