Greg Powell is the Senior Director of Employer Product Marketing at Indeed.com, a global matching and hiring platform.

Recently, Greg decided to step up his team's game by enrolling them in four top-tier PMA workshops:

  • Positioning
  • Messaging
  • Narrative Design
  • Storytelling

Join us as we delve into Greg's insights on:

  • Why he enrolled his team in these workshops
  • How his team found the workshops
  • The impact these workshops have had on the team’s output
  • How this training has impacted Greg’s day-to-day

Why did you enroll your team in these workshops?

The product marketing team at Indeed grew very quickly over the span of two years. They came from a variety of companies and had very different competency areas. Not everyone had been trained in messaging – some people were already strong; others needed some training.

This is an area where our CMO and I agreed we needed to invest. PMA's workshops really scratched that itch and gave everyone on the team the baseline they needed.

How did your team find the workshops?

In general, people really liked them. People took so much away from Div’s Narrative Design Workshop. The reason why it works so well is because the framework and the way Div describes it are so clear.

I've been using that framework to phenomenal effect internally. I actually started writing a new narrative during the workshop, then I shared it with the folks in our sales team, and they said, “This is what's been missing. This is the missing ingredient!” We already had a messaging framework, but the sales folks weren’t sure how to work into conversations with prospects, and what we learned in the workshop has really helped with that.

The team gave really positive feedback on Holly’s Messaging Workshop too. People liked it and they got a lot out of it. There was a lot of, “Oh, yeah! That's a good point!” and other good feedback there.

The Storytelling Workshop with Elliott was very satisfying from an intellectual standpoint. It felt like we were back in college. He gave us a ton of information, and people came away really stimulated.

The Positioning Workshop, run by Collette, was also really solid training. People came away with more knowledge about positioning than they had going in, and kudos to Collette because we've been more consistently including positioning in our work since that workshop. It’s had a lasting impact.

What impact have these workshops had on your team’s output?

About two weeks ago, we had probably the best discussion on messaging that we've ever had. It was a step change improvement. We've made messaging a priority as an entire team, so I can't isolate PMA’s effect, but I can tell you that it definitely helped.

The templates and frameworks we’ve taken from these workshops have been great too. They’ve given us industry-standard best practices for positioning, messaging, and narratives. We’ve combined and customized Holly’s messaging template and Collette's positioning framework to make a template for our organization, so we can build best-in-class messaging and positioning every time.

To summarize, the workshops fulfilled all the objectives that I set forth, we're noticing improvements in both the quality and the structure of what we're presenting, and the team is very focused on these elements.

How has training your team impacted your day-to-day?

It's really good to know that the team now has the tools to go and do the work by themselves. For my first couple of years at Indeed, I led by showing. Now, because we've had this training, PMMs have the opportunity to lead these things themselves. That's been a really gratifying transition.

Now that we’re all operating with common frameworks, I'm building out the team more, and focusing on working "on" the business versus working "in" it.

Ready to elevate your product marketing team to new heights?

Let's talk about tailored corporate training that can get everyone to speak the same language, fill skills gaps, and empower your team to be the next decision-making leaders – just like the team at Indeed.

We've had the pleasure of training teams at Microsoft, Zendesk, Twitter, and Adobe, and we'd love to have you join the club.

So, why wait? Click the button below and kickstart a conversation about your team's future!

Find out more