some days, being a product manager feels less like managing features and more like building houses inside my head. every thought needs a doorway. every decision, a hallway that leads somewhere. you can't just put a sink in the attic and call it design. it has to flow. it has to make sense.
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i remember about the time when my sister was writing her thesis. it's titled 'Perlindungan Data Pribadi dan Asas Publisitas dalam Sertifikat Tanah Elektronik' — a mouthful of law and nuance, if you ask me.
and as she wrote, she asked things like:
- "how do we protect privacy in a system that demands exposure?"
- "is publicity always the enemy of security?"
- "what makes data ‘personal’—and who decides?"
i found myself answering her, not as a legal expert, but as a storyteller who draws blueprints. it led me thinking, what is a user journey, if not a legal puzzle in motion? what is product logic, if not a quiet promise that everything connects?
i don’t always have the right answers, but i’ve learned to ask the right kind. not “what should this feature do?” but “why would someone need this here, now, in this exact pain?”
not “how do we protect data?” but “how do we protect dignity—at scale?”
why? because systems are more than functions. they are narratives, and every friction point tells a story of misunderstanding.
i used to think systematic thinking was about being clever. like solving a rubik’s cube or predicting user clicks. but now, it’s more like writing a novel you’ll never sign your name on.
every wireframe is a paragraph. every edge case is a plot twist. every error message is a whisper to the user: you’re not lost. we planned for this. and yes, even in bugs, there’s subtext.
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my sister writes about law. i write about flow. and somehow, we’re both chasing the same thing: a structure that holds. a logic that loves. a map that leads people home.
so no, product thinking isn’t just building things. it’s noticing patterns in the chaos. it’s listening closely to the way a person moves through confusion and designing an answer before they know they’re asking.
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today, i’m grateful for every unanswered question she throws at me. they remind me that thinking isn’t just a skill— it’s a form of compassion. a quiet kind. the kind that draws diagrams with empathy and writes specs like love letters to future users who won’t know your name, but will feel seen anyway.