🔥Last Week Today with Cherie
March 19 ⚡️
Welcome to my Substack where I share a weekly recap all about my life. Think of this as a virtual catch-up session between friends. So grab a cup of tea 🍵 (or your beverage of choice) and let's get started ☕️
Highlight of the week
We hit 50,000 on my IG page this week. OMG. WHAT. The last month of growth has been absolutely absurd — *takes a deep breath while typing. Inhale. Exhale. — I’m feeling incredibly thankful for us being here on this journey together.
Some of us have just met and a few of us have known each other for years. Shoutout to the day1s who watched my feral 2021 content you know who you are ❤️. But also why does it feel like we’re just getting started?? Here’s to embracing more of ourselves together in the hot, weird, badass, professional, absolutely vulnerable, and amazing moments. We got werk to do baby. And you know that I am cheering you on from the sidelines, ALWAYS 😇
Plus, as a former product manager, I’m geeking out on these analytics 🤓 Accounts engaged +35,229% is just a crazy thing to wrap my head around.
💅🏻 ICYMI: What I posted on IG Reels This Week
🎓 Where Stanford MBA students went to undergrad
📚 MBA Classmate Deep Dive: Vishal
👾 MBA Classmate Deep Dive: Aaron
🚀 MBA Classmate Deep Dive: Zach
Advice from me. Hi 👋🏻
Found this layoffs tracker this week. I’m going to analyze it from a product perspective below. But first, a note: if you’re a hiring manager or hiring for a role on your team, please open the “list of laid off employees” tab. There are many talented individuals impacted by current economic conditions and looking for their next role. This is a great resource to start your search for talent.
Now, onto the product analysis. If you’re looking to pivot into product management, consider taking on a side project like this, especially if you don’t have PM experience. When I interviewed people trying to break into product roles, these kinds of passion projects stood out 👀
Why I like it (i.e. factors to consider when building product):
Timely product-market-fit: Since the start of the pandemic, layoffs have been on our minds — How many layoffs? Where? When? What does it look like over time? There’s a clear general use case for this site.
Addresses both sides of the marketplace: The “list of laid off employees" tab connects job seekers with hirers. This site creates interdependency and has the potential to solve needs of many user types.
It’s so dang simple: The site has 3 tabs. It’s crystal clear what to do when you land on the site. No need to complicate it.
What I’m consuming
HBR Article “Nice Girls Don’t Ask”: At first I was like omg this article will be amazing because that’s right. Nice girls don’t ask, they 👏🏻TAKE👏🏻😤💅🏻. And then I kept reading and I was immediately disappointed by the evidence of gender-based gaps in negotiation studies: Women negotiate less than men—and everyone pays the price.
Here are my takeaways:
By the numbers. A study on MBA starting salary show that salaries of male new grads was 7.6% higher than those of female new grads from the same program. This was because most women had simply accepted the employer’s initial salary offer; only 7% of women had attempted to negotiate where 57% of male counterparts—8X as many men as women—had asked for more.
LADIES!!!!! Always ask. Women don’t realize that men are asking for more, MORE OFTEN than women are 🆘. I don’t mean to sound alarmist here, but it’s time to wake up ⏰. It never hurts to ask because you can’t get what you don’t ask for. The worse case is that your ask is rejected and then life moves on. And I’m telling you, life does move on from awkward moments. Practice asking for little things in life (seriously go to Costco and ask for more free samples or ask for a free seat upgrade at the airport) so that when the big asks come up, you’re ready. It sounds silly, but asking is a muscle and it requires training 💪🏻 You best believe I’m (nicely) asking for a free seat upgrade for my spring break trip.
Managers need to step in. If you manage a team, it is your job to make it known at an individual level the importance of negotiating. Employees aren’t taught this in school and the realization that it’s okay to negotiate often happens way too late. If you are a manager, you can: (1) Tell women employees they must ask for what they want and need (2) Inform your reports the benefits of negotiating (3) Give men and women comparable raises for comparable performance (4) Recognize how leadership shows up differently across genders. If you’re still reading this, you’re probably a people manager who cares about the wellbeing of your reports!! This is a good place to start.
My newest purchase
Abercrombie’s Vegan Leather 90s Relaxed Pant - not sponsored
Why I like them:
Look: Perfect pants for a going-out night and they just look clean and chic
Feel: They’re a soft and a bit stretchy; can stand and sit comfortably.
Size: I got them in “short” (I’m 5’4) and they’re perfect length for me
Cost: ARITIZIA MELINA PANT DUUUUPE (Aritzia $148 vs A&F $110 although I did get the A&F ones on sale so it was ~$90)
Why I’m annoyed: I bought 2 other pairs of jeans from A&F in the same order as the vegan leather ones and I ended up returning the jeans because they’re too big even though I purchased all 3 pairs of pants in the same size. It’s really frustrating when sizing is inconsistent across products from a brand. I know this is my pant size, so why doesn’t it apply to all A&F pants? *eye roll*
What I’m perplexed by
Khan Academy launched an AI tutor bot: read more here
Why this matters: I’m closely following different AI applications and I’m seeing a trend of more specialized chatbots. Wonder if they’re all using OpenAI. I mainly encounter chatbots today for customer service requests — but what other applications are possible?
Big idea: What if there was a “CherieBot” who we could “chat with” and ask any question to? On the backend it could index all of my video transcripts and provide responses to any question we ask about product management, venture capital, and business school. We’re seeing this already with HubermanAI, which indexes all Huberman Lab’s podcasts and turns it into a chatbot interface. V cool.
Why this is also meaningful to me: I’ve looked up to Sal Khan since I heard his How I Built This episode. Sal is a former finance bro turned non-profit founder who helps hundreds of millions of students around the world. From what I’ve seen of his content, his mission-driven work is inspiring for founders and leaders. I would love to chat with him one day about the future of EdTech.
Meme Reminder
What we really mean when we say as per my last email 🥰 👊🏻
XO Cherie
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I really love your content Cherie and I look forward to learn more from you 🐥❤️❤️❤️❤️
~ Sujaya Shetty