We are back!

Welcome back to the Product Bakery. It was a long time and we haven't talked much. So Alex, I think it's worth sharing what has happened in the previous months and to give the people a little update on what we are planning right now and how we want to come back harder, better, faster and smarter. Stronger. Thank you. People should think we are BFFs man. Completing each other's sentences, you know. Sorry. First of all, it's late. Second of all, I need to say, I did miss you. I mean, it's not that we've only been absent on the podcast here, but we also only met probably twice. Okay. So we've only met twice since the recording of the last episode. And I think the last time we met was actually just to talk about bringing the Product Bakery back. So I am very glad to be sitting here with you again. I really think it was always great to have these conversations just to also like kind of get some things off the chest from the day to day work to discuss some of the topics. And well, I think also hearing from some of you that you missed us as well. I think that was a little bit like the push factor for us to sit down again, take the time and come back and come back also stronger and more often again. So yeah, I mean, where should we start or where did we leave this whole thing? I would say, so what I'm having in my mind is maybe we're going to start with a small summary on what we have done in our free time the last month. And then we can maybe also give a little outlook on what we plan to talk about because there's so much things going on at the moment. Yeah. So I mean, the first thing that comes to my mind is that your question actually betrayed me in the sense of podcast partnership, because you have been active at least in some other areas and some other fields beyond product management, right? So that's true. That's true. It's actually already a spoiler. I started a small ventures, maybe the wrong word, but with a couple of friends who are very passionate about crypto. We started talking in German about cryptocurrencies, investing and stuff like that. Unfortunately, one of my friends got very sick, so we needed to pause that. And at the same time, Alex, you know that I started becoming a psychotherapist. So just tell me how you feel today. Yeah. So that's my big side project. So I'm also not doing much coaching at the moment because the training is taking a lot of time and I want to become as good as possible at it. So yeah, my focus is shifting a little bit. I'm also now trying or slowly coming back to coaching product people again, but also with a different approach now. Yeah. And if you're wondering what was Christian doing, that was it actually. Besides that, I was also traveling a lot since things are getting easier again. I also needed some time to recover actually from the past months. How about you? I mean, I didn't become a digital nobet the way you did. I didn't shift focus of my field. And obviously it has been quite an interesting time. I mean, we discussed some of it in our last conversations, but in my day-to-day job, a lot happened. My team is currently at a size of like 15 people from starting with one. In one year, right? Yeah, exactly. So hiring has obviously been very top of mind and we're also currently about to launch our new brand. So I do have to say that I spent way more time on branding and marketing related topics than I did in the past. So it was actually quite refreshing also to spend more time thinking about those areas instead of focusing mostly on the product side of things. So yeah, I'm still trying to kind of walk the line and find the right balance between the two. I'm super happy to have more people that I'm currently onboarding that will hopefully help me doing that. So yeah, exciting times to come. And I think there's also a lot of good stuff that we can talk about, but I mean, maybe we can jump to my therapy session. So how do you feel today? Isn't it like usually like, what happened? Tell me about your childhood. That's the second question. Yeah, but talking about that, I think you said branding, hiring is a big topic for you right now. And I think, I mean, especially branding gets more and more important these days. So definitely something where I could imagine we could talk about in the future. Yeah, important, but at the same time also more and more boring. I feel like, I mean, it's a bit this bias, right? You scroll down on social media or LinkedIn specifically and you see like all these companies doing rebrands, all these big names doing rebrands and all of them looking very, very, very similar. So I think within the branding space or within the agency and creative director space, there's something that I see being criticized quite a lot. But yeah, I mean, it's something that we can definitely unfold at one point. Good one. And at the same time, since we just covered the crypto technology part, I think there is a huge trend emerging at the moment with cryptocurrencies, with Web 3.0, with NFTs, with the metaverse, etc. So something we should definitely catch up on, I think. Yeah. So, I mean, trying to summarize it also, because I think, I mean, we've did a lot of interviews in the past. I feel like we spend a lot of time focusing on very specific topics within the area of like product management, product development. There's been design topics, research topics. I mean, I personally feel like for me, the nicest thing of these conversations is, well, it's in the word, having a conversation with you, right? So I feel like, I mean, moving forward, the goal should really be for us to kind of have these open conversations on topics that we find interesting. Absolutely. At the same time, and this is always back to the community. I mean, we're happy that people are listening to us. I think the nicest thing is if we can know that we generate value and that we help someone improve something, change something, do something differently, so I think like, obviously it's very important for us to also get this feedback. Like if you're listening to us, not for the first time, but you've been following us already for longer or since the beginning, and well, if you miss something or you feel like, okay, the format is like going in the wrong direction, please feel free to shoot us a line. We will constantly try and experiment. Again, first goal for us to have fun together. But secondly, to not only do it alone. Yeah, absolutely. And something we also need to highlight more, if you like this podcast, don't forget to press the follow button. And share. And share. Yeah. Okay. Enough marketing at the end of our conversation, Alex. I think we have enough to talk about. We need to do a short session, I think, offline to manage how we want to do the recording and uploading and all that stuff, because it's quite some work, actually. However, we promise again, I would say, I do say, weekly episodes for you. Yes. Let's note that down because I think that was always like the best factor to get us back. Writing is thinking. Perfect. Dan, Christian, I see you in the next episode. Happy to be back. More than happy to be back. Bye, everyone.