Linear’s secret to building beloved B2B products | Nan Yu (Head of Product)

Nan Yu is the head of product at Linear, one of the most beloved and fastest-growing B2B SaaS products out there today, and the gold standard for high-performing tech teams. In our conversation, we discuss:• Why speed and quality aren’t actually at odds• Linear’s unique approach to product development• Nan’s systematic approach to creativity• Linear’s philosophy on deadlines• The “double triangle” framework for product management• Nan’s approach to landing his dream product roles• Much more—Brought to you by:• Sinch—Build messaging, email, and calling into your product• Paragon—Ship every SaaS integration your customers want• Wix Studio—The web creation platform built for agencies—Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/linears-secret-to-building-beloved-b2b-products-nan-yu—Where to find Nan Yu:• X: https://x.com/thenanyu• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thenanyu/—Where to find Lenny:• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/—In this episode, we cover:(00:00) Introduction to Nan Yu and Linear(04:54) Survey insights: Linear vs. Jira(07:51) The speed vs. quality myth(09:24) Building and iterating quickly(15:31) Avoiding bloat in enterprise software(23:57) Understanding user needs deeply(30:09) How to approach customer calls(34:10) Creating strong emotional hooks(40:31) Managing the product backlog(44:46) Systemizing creativity(48:16) Demo: Saving drafts in Linear(51:38) Breaking constraints and building at extremes(54:15) Adopting new tools(58:22) The “double triangle” framework for product management(01:04:23) Effective job-hunting strategies for PMs(01:09:15) Thoughts on deadlines(01:14:15) Lightning round—Referenced:• Jira: https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira• Linear: https://linear.app/• Patrick Collison’s post on X: https://x.com/patrickc/status/1869422495985750459• Magnus Carlsen on X: https://x.com/magnuscarlsen• Hikaru Nakamura on X: https:/