Why half of product managers are in trouble | Nikhyl Singhal (Meta, Google)

Nikhyl Singhal frames the change in product management as a shift from moving information to exercising judgment and building. Three years earlier, many product leaders spent their days packaging information for layers of management, carrying responsibility without corresponding authority. The current wave gives builders a more direct connection between an idea, a test, and a customer, which makes the work more engaging while also making the old information-mover role less valuable.

The opportunity is real but uneven. Lenny's job-market report finds the highest number of open PM roles at global technology companies in more than three years, while Singhal expects large employers to shed staff and then rehire fewer people with AI-first skills. He predicts that builders will have unusually strong opportunities, including founder, CEO, and cross-functional executive paths, but warns that people who do not enjoy building will face a harder transition.

Singhal describes the cost as exhaustion and continuous alertness. Product practices that once remained stable for years can be obsolete within three months, while mid-career workers are balancing the fastest period of professional energy with children, aging parents, health, and limited time. The result is a combination of joy and fatigue: the best builders are more interested in their work, but the whole industry worries about falling behind or becoming collateral damage as the rules change.

The emerging scarce skill is judgment. It means deciding whether a change improves the product, choosing among possible directions, and determining whether a feature is sustainable, differentiated, and worth releasing. Singhal describes this as a system-level skill rather than a feature-writing task. As the cost of testing and changing software falls, teams will face many more possible changes, making the choice of which changes to pursue more important rather than less.