I'm a member of the Product MeetUp Facebook group and I don't even remember how I ended up in it. And then, more than a month ago, I saw a post that there is an opportunity to speak in TED format on any topic. To be honest, I love to speak, present, conduct master classes, work with students, but I didn't have such an experience exactly like at TED.

And so I responded. There was no formed idea, but there was a desire to speak about the painful things that I am living with now.

Communication began with the organizer (Denis Yalugin) about the format, how it will be so that the topic is catchy, there will be a time limit, etc.

2 weeks have passed, the topic has matured and the site has finally been determined. It will be Mail.Ru Group and 4.04!

The organizers offered to build a performance with the leitmotif "Error 404" (The page or resource was not found).

It took another 2 weeks, it was necessary to prepare the first content. About the torments of creativity. From the desire to tell what the difference is between product managers working in B2C and B2B companies, the message began to shift to other meanings.

By the will of fate, I found myself in a project where 2 companies Sberbank and Rambler Group have combined their assets and plan to create an ecosystem for the HoReCa market, which should unite 4 companies (UCS (Cash Solutions), Plazius (Loyalty System), Afisha Restaurants (Restaurant website) and Smart Reserve (Table reservation System)). All companies have their own background, their own approach to development, experience and year of foundation and, of course, staff.

And this clash of cultures in the worldview of product development became my help in preparing the material.

The first sketches began to take shape, each day provided another food for the development of the story of my presentation.

I sketched out in large strokes what I want to tell you, and began to write down the small details that will decorate my performance.

And here is the 1st run in Mail.Ru The group is on the 22nd floor. To immerse us in the atmosphere, Ivan Rusanov (GeekBrains) gave us a tour. The passage between the towers, the 26th floor and a view of evening Moscow!

In the office Mail.RU Group

That's it, and now the training. The boys screwed up, the girls were great.

We received a lot of feedback and went with our heads down to improve our presentations. One decided to refrain from speaking.

2 more weeks went by.Sasha is a performance colleague from a startup vcv.ru I sent access to their resource so that we could practice before the performance and started making recordings of what we broadcast there.By this point, I have already watched dozens of video presentations at Ted TalksBy the way, here are the most favorite and useful videos for me:

During the week, we agreed to get together again and present each other. There are changes for the better. Everyone became more confident, there were performance goals, everyone wanted to help improve each other's material.

At the same time, everyone in the group began to share useful links to performances from which it was possible to take note of something useful.I conducted a pilot run of the presentation at the meetup, fed it to my wife, the children also listened, well, the sparrows stared in surprise at the eccentric, who mumbled something under his nose and gesticulated on the way to the train)

The hour “X” was inexorably approaching. Now, going to the train, I was saying what I wanted to convey to the public, coming to the office and while no one was there, I was again saying out loud my future performance.

April 4th has arrived.

The huge hall is slowly filling up, there are no empty seats left, friends come up, wish to perform well, colleagues cheer each other up and here are the ramp lights, the backlight, the sound engineer hooks your headphones, a quiet hum, knees and hands stop shaking, the first words and …

This is an unforgettable experience of speaking in front of more than 300 of your fellow product managers, students and sympathizers. I also managed to promote a startup in which I was a cofounder of Tilly's Preschool at that timeHe's with me now. If you have such an opportunity, do not hesitate, but immediately agree!

More material and details on my channel Telegram channelFAQTech

And in the blog

Vatyutov

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