My team replaced me with AI and I loved it.
My team built an IBM Bob skill modeled on the way I review product narratives, business reviews, strategy presentations, and executive communications.
In practice, the team uses the skill to identify gaps in materials before review by pressure-testing the work against the kinds of questions I’m likely to ask.
Here are a few that most product leaders will probably recognize:
- Where is the use case?
• What customer pain point are we solving?
• Where is the growth coming from?
• What patterns have we identified?
• What outcome are we trying to drive?
• What decision are we trying to influence?
• What assumption are we making, and how do we know it’s true?
• What does success actually look like?
• Is this aspirational enough?
I thought it was amazing from the start.
Not because it could mimic a review process, but because it reinforced something important about great product leadership.
Good product managers learn to anticipate users. They study behavior, signals, and patterns closely enough to understand what customers will need, where friction exists, and what is likely to happen next.
The best product organizations learn to anticipate in a similar way.
Over time, teams internalize the standards, questions, and ways of thinking that lead to better outcomes. Consistent coaching creates shared instincts. Eventually, people stop preparing for the review and start building with those expectations in mind from the start.
The real value here isn’t automation. It’s elevation.
Human time is more valuable than ever. If AI can help teams sharpen the narrative, tighten the logic, pressure-test assumptions, identify gaps, and connect recommendations to measurable outcomes before we meet, then the time we spend together can focus on harder problems, more complex tradeoffs, and the strategic conversations that actually move the business forward.
The best teams don’t wait for review meetings to know what good looks like. They build toward it from the beginning.
And no, I’m not worried about being replaced by AI. I’m excited about what happens when AI helps us get through the first rounds of feedback faster so we can spend more time tackling the harder problems, asking better questions, and raising the level of the conversation together.
About the Author :
Ms. Briana Frank
Vice President of Product & Design,
IBM Cloud
Ms. Briana Frank leads Product Management for the Cloud Native portfolio and oversees Design across IBM Cloud.
Ms. Briana Frank believes great technology starts with understanding the needs of the people and systems it serves, & brings that perspective to everything she builds across cloud and AI.
Ms. Briana Frank has a proven track record of taking new products from early idea to high growth, helping teams move quickly from concept to adoption while building strong partnerships across product, design, and engineering.
Outside of Ms. Briana Frank day job, Ms. Briana Frank mentors founders from underrepresented communities, speaks on product leadership, cloud, and AI, and guest lectures at Duke University and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Ms. Briana Frank is a patented inventor and a Boston Marathon qualifying runner.
Ms. Briana Frank is Bestowed with the following Licenses & Certifications:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/fr
Ms. Briana Frank can be contacted at :
