The Authors

Jackie Bavaro

Jackie Bavaro was most recently Head of Product Management for eight years at Asana, the well-loved work management software, where she joined pre-launch as the first PM. During her tenure, she grew the PM team to over twenty amazing people, oversaw Asana's growth from $0 to more than $100 million a year, and launched Asana's associate product manager program.

With over 15 years of product management experience, she has also worked as a PM for Google and Microsoft as well, and in a diverse set of roles—a consumer PM, a B2B PM, a platform PM, a mobile PM, and a growth PM.

Jackie has coached, mentored, managed, and advised hundreds of people in product and people who aspire to move to product roles. Jackie and Gayle's first co-authored book, the best-selling Cracking the PM Interview, has been credited with helping to level the playing field for product management talent.

More of Jackie’s writing about product management can be found on Twitter (@jackiebo) and at https://medium.com/@jackiebo.

Jackie graduated from Cornell University with a double major in Computer Science and Economics.

She currently writes, coaches, and advises from her home in San Francisco, California.

Gayle Laakmann McDowell

Gayle Laakmann McDowell is an author, consultant, and founder focusing on improving tech hiring for both the interviewer and the candidate.

Gayle has worked as an engineer for Google, Microsoft, and Apple. Most recently, at Google, she served on the hiring committee where she interviewed hundreds of candidates and evaluated thousands more. It was here that she discovered the disconnect between candidates, their skill set, and their interview performance.

Through her company, CareerCup, Gayle has worked with many of the top tech companies to reform their hiring practices and implement interviewer training programs.

She is the author of three other best-selling books — Cracking the Coding Interview, Cracking the PM Interview (co-authored with Jackie Bavaro), and Cracking the Tech Career.

Gayle holds a bachelor's and master's in Computer Science from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business.

She currently consults, writes, and codes from her home in Palo Alto, California. She can be found online at gayle.com, twitter (@gayle), and facebook (@gayle).