lenny-skills

Lenny's Product Skills for Claude Code — 2.0

76 product management and engineering skills, distilled from the full archive of Lenny's Podcast and Lenny's Newsletter: 597 episodes and posts, 4,019 sourced insights, every quote verified verbatim against its source.

Curated by Refound AI. Browse the full database with guides, quotes, and templates at refoundai.com/lenny-skills.

What's new in 2.0

• Organized as a product operating model — skills are grouped into the process areas a product org actually runs: strategy, planning, discovery, building, launch, growth, team, and operating cadence, plus vertical playbooks and a career track.
• Newsletter content included — 1.0 was podcast-only; 2.0 adds frameworks and templates from 349 newsletter posts, including the 'How X builds product' series.
• Templates & frameworks per skill — each skill ships with the named frameworks, checklists, and templates guests actually use, in references/artifacts.md.
• Verified quotes — every quote is checked verbatim against the source transcript or post. No paraphrase drift.

What are Skills?

Skills are markdown files that give AI agents specialized knowledge and workflows. Add them to your project and Claude Code (or any agent that reads SKILL.md files) applies the right frameworks when you work on a matching task.

Installation

Copy any skill folder into your project's .claude/skills/ directory:

git clone https://github.com/RefoundAI/lenny-skills.git
cp -R lenny-skills/skills/writing-prds .claude/skills/

Or grab individual skills with download links at refoundai.com/lenny-skills.

The Skills

Strategy & Positioning

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Defining Product Strategy	Transform vision into a concrete plan of action by making hard choices that drive customer behavior.	47
Product Vision Creation	Design an aspirational future state that inspires teams and guides strategic decision-making.	22
Strategic Product Positioning	Define the context that makes your product's unique value obvious and undeniable	28
Pricing Strategy & Optimization	Design and iterate on pricing models that capture the true value of your product.	21
North Star Metrics	Align your team and strategy around a single, quantifiable measure of customer value and business success.	15
Measuring Product-Market Fit	Transition from pushing your product to feeling the market pull it out of you.	21
Competitive Strategy	Build durable moats and outmaneuver rivals by identifying structural power and customer-centric differentiation.	24
Recovering From Failure	Turn product setbacks and stalled growth into strategic breakthroughs and pivots.	20

Planning & Prioritization

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Roadmap Prioritization	Transform a chaotic backlog into a high-ROI strategic plan based on evidence and appetite.	43
Goal Setting and OKRs	Drive organizational focus by translating long-term strategy into ambitious measurable outcomes.	19
Planning Cadence Optimization	Align long-term strategy with short-term execution through structured, tiered planning rituals.	13
High Stakes Decision Making	Navigate irreversible choices and extreme uncertainty with speed and structural clarity.	30
Evaluating Trade-Offs	Master the art of weighing competing options to maximize long-term impact and team velocity.	14

Discovery & Research

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Mastering Customer Interviews	Uncover deep user pain and behavioral triggers to build products people actually need.	11
Continuous Product Discovery	Turn customer feedback from a periodic chore into a high-frequency engine for product decisions.	23
Idea Validation	Stop building things people don't want by moving from opinion to evidence-based development.	34
Product Experimentation Excellence	Drive measurable growth and mitigate risk through rigorous A/B testing and data-driven learning.	9
Defining Your ICP	Narrow your focus to win a market beachhead and build undeniable momentum.	15
Analyzing User Feedback	Transform raw signals into actionable insights by scaling empathy and synthesis.	19
Product Taste and Intuition	Develop a reliable internal compass to recognize and build world-class products.	36

Building & Shipping

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Writing Product Requirement Documents	Define clear problems and bounded solutions to maximize team velocity and creative output.	14
Shipping Velocity	Accelerate execution by removing organizational friction and establishing a high-intensity shipping culture.	19
AI-Assisted Prototyping	Transform abstract product concepts into functional, interactive software using natural language and AI tools.	15
Building With AI Agents	Transition from writing lines of code to directing a parallel team of autonomous agents.	15
Product Stack Strategy	Build a high-performance product toolkit by balancing established standards with AI-native speed.	6
Engineering Health and Productivity	Maintain high shipping velocity by balancing technical excellence with strategic developer investments.	18

Launch & Go-to-Market

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Product Launch Planning	Build momentum and drive adoption by turning product updates into remarkable market events.	18
PLG Sales Integration	Bridge the gap between self-serve adoption and enterprise deal-making to maximize revenue.	13
Mastering Enterprise Sales Motion	Transition from founder-led sales to a repeatable, scalable enterprise engine.	16
Acquiring First B2B Customers	Transition from zero to your first ten paying customers through manual hustle and high-trust relationships.	7
Marketing Org and Stack	Architect high-performing marketing organizations by aligning specialized talent with scalable data infrastructure.	11
Mastering PR and Press	Turn media coverage into a strategic engine for credibility, growth, and brand authority.	9
Naming and Branding	Build a distinctive identity that acts as a permanent competitive weapon and emotional anchor.	11

Growth & Retention

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Building a Sustainable Growth Model	Move beyond linear funnels to build compounding loops that drive scalable, long-term product growth.	30
Acquisition Channel Strategy	Identify, test, and scale the distribution engines that drive sustainable growth.	25
User Onboarding and Activation	Bridge the gap between initial signup and realized value to maximize long-term retention.	25
Retention and Engagement Mastery	Build sustainable growth by embedding products into workflows and creating compounding user value.	17
Referrals and Word-of-Mouth	Turn user satisfaction into a high-leverage growth engine through organic advocacy and structured referral loops.	13
SEO Growth Strategy	Turn organic search into a scalable acquisition engine using programmatic data and systematic experimentation.	9
Growth Experimentation Velocity	Build a high-output engine to compound small wins into massive growth.	10
International Market Expansion	Scale your product globally by balancing local empathy with operational playbooks.	8

Team & Organization

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Hiring World-Class Product Talent	Build a high-leverage product organization by sourcing, evaluating, and closing the top 1% of talent.	30
Interviewing and Evaluating Candidates	Move beyond resumes to assess high-fidelity signals like agency, first-principles thinking, and actual craft.	48
Organizational Design for Product and Engineering	Structure your teams to maximize autonomy, speed, and strategic alignment.	60
Building a Growth Team	Assemble and structure a high-impact team to scale distribution and optimize the user journey.	14
Founding Executive Team Building	Design and scale the core leadership layer that drives company growth from zero to one.	15
Coaching and Talent Development	Build a high-performing team by shifting from a problem-solver to a growth-accelerator.	34
Building High-Performing Team Culture	Establish a culture of ownership, transparency, and intensity to drive long-term product success.	53
Giving Effective Feedback	Transform difficult conversations into catalysts for growth and high performance.	30
Fixing Underperforming Teams	Diagnose the root cause of dysfunction and take decisive action to restore high performance.	12
Leading Organizational Change	Transform culture, structure, and operations without breaking the business.	58

Operating Cadence & Communication

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Effective Product Reviews	Run rigorous alignment sessions that raise the quality bar and accelerate decision-making.	12
Executive Communication	Master the art of framing, transparency, and decision-ready communication to build trust with leadership.	9
Managing Up for Leaders	Transform your relationship with leadership from a reporting line into a high-trust strategic partnership.	21
Running Effective Meetings	Transform calendars from soul-crushing time-sinks into high-velocity alignment machines.	12
Written Communication for Leaders	Scale your influence and drive alignment through structured, clear, and persuasive writing.	12
Stakeholder Alignment	Drive cross-functional momentum by mapping incentives and co-creating solutions	57

Playbook: Marketplaces

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Marketplace Fundamentals	Build, bootstrap, and scale a self-sustaining ecosystem of buyers and sellers.	7
Supply Demand Balance	Master marketplace liquidity by identifying bottlenecks and strategically scaling the harder side of the market.	6
Marketplace Liquidity and Take Rates	Optimize the balance between transaction reliability and monetization to build a defensible ecosystem.	6

Playbook: Building AI Products

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
AI Product Strategy	Prioritize high-impact workflows and navigate non-deterministic development to build defensible AI products.	34
AI Evaluation Strategy	Move beyond vibe checks to systematic, empirical measurement of AI product quality and reliability.	11
Designing AI-Native User Experiences	Transition from static interfaces to fluid, intent-driven interactions that leverage model intelligence.	14

Playbook: Zero to One

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Evaluating Startup Ideas	Systematically validate problem-solution fit, market timing, and business viability before you build.	28
Startup Fundraising and Exits	Master the art of raising capital, managing investor relations, and navigating strategic acquisitions.	16
Founder-Led Sales	Master the art of personally selling your product to build trust and find product-market fit.	6

Playbook: Enterprise & PLG

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
PLG Fundamentals	Transform your product into the primary engine for distribution, activation, and expansion.	9

Career

Skill	What it helps you do	Sources
Breaking Into Product Management	Strategically navigate the competitive path to your first product management role.	11
PM Career Growth	Transition from task-executor to high-impact product leader by mastering influence, ownership, and strategic foresight.	99
Navigating Career Transitions	Move beyond the default path by optimizing for high-growth environments and internal energy.	56
Building a Promotion Case	Turn your professional impact into a compelling, data-backed argument for your next career move.	6
Negotiating Tech Compensation	Master the art of benchmarking, intelligence gathering, and collaborative negotiation to maximize your total rewards.	1
Personal Brand Network	Transform your professional expertise into a magnetic network and a high-affinity audience.	21
Mastery of Public Speaking	Transform your technical expertise into compelling narratives that command authority and drive action.	12
Time and Energy Management	Protect your focus and fuel your performance by treating time and energy as strategic assets.	46
Founder Psychology and Resilience	Mastering the internal landscape to sustain high performance and navigate the emotional roller coaster of leadership.	38

Attribution

All insights, quotes, frameworks, and templates originate from Lenny Rachitsky's podcast and newsletter and remain his and his guests' intellectual property. Every skill links back to the source episodes and posts. If you find these useful, subscribe to Lenny's Newsletter.

Contributing

Found a way to improve a skill? Open a PR. Please keep quotes verbatim and sourced.

License

MIT for the skill file structure and organization. Underlying content belongs to Lenny Rachitsky and podcast guests; used with attribution, free, and ungated.