AI’s third era: the rise of persistent AI coworkers | Tara Seshan (OpenAI’s product lead)
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在一次引人入胜的讨论中，OpenAI 的 Codex 和 ChatGPT 产品负责人塔拉·西申（Tara Seishin）分享了她对快速发展的 AI 产品管理格局、OpenAI 独特的文化以及她对未来工作的愿景的见解。西申在 OpenAI 工作了一年，她将其形容为 AI 领域的“一生”，她透露，尽管她之前在高增长公司工作过，OpenAI 仍然带来了独特的惊喜。
她指出，OpenAI 在分布式意义上是“创始人主导的”，每个人都在各自领域扮演着创始人的角色，自上而下的指导“极其有限”。这促进了产品经理与市场之间的距离很小，类似于创业公司的历程。令人惊讶的是，她发现 OpenAI 的“秘密战略”很大程度上是公开的，想法和产品很快就会公之于众，这与她过去工作中那种更内部化、“支付圣经”式的方法形成了鲜明对比。
西申强调了产品管理角色中的一个重大转变。在一个静态市场中，宏大的战略是可行的，但 AI 的涌现性和快速变化的特性使长期规划变得过时。重点已从学术的、理论的推理转向经验性的、多产的实验。产品经理现在必须专注于定义“本征问题”——即最关键的假设——并尽快对其进行测试。这一核心的产品经理工作，即理解用户、市场和技术以形成敏锐的假设，并未改变，反而变得更加关键。
展望知识工作的未来，西申预见了从“划船”到“掌舵”的转变。AI 代理将处理更全面的任务，人类将越来越多地专注于更高层次的指导和反馈。她预见到持久性 AI 协作者的兴起，使得协作代理工作成为可能，在此过程中，人类直觉和“有主见的判断”仍然至关重要，指导软件开发中的“作者”式表达。
西申认为，雄心壮志不仅被 AI 工具所赋能，更是其所“要求”的。能够在多个领域胜任的“独角兽”式个体，现在对许多人来说触手可及，扩展了“他们的可能性范围”。OpenAI 的产品经理肩负着“提升他人的雄心”的使命，他们通过不断挑战关于能实现什么以及能多快实现这些的假设。内部流行语，例如“这是否已达到最大加速度？”和“你是否已经将其融入主线？”，反映了这种紧迫感和深度沉浸于产品的文化。一个关键的运作原则是为模型在“两到三个月后”的状态而构建，因为为当下或过远的未来而构建都是“同样错误的”。
关于 ChatGPT 应用程序，西申解释说当前界面（ChatGPT、Codex、聊天/工作模式）是一个过渡状态。北极星目标是提供一种无缝的体验，让 AI 直观地选择正确的工具。挑战在于自然地将代理能力带给十亿用户，简化对消费者而言陌生的“缰绳”（harnesses）等概念。她强调，对于团队而言，“完成好过完美”，专注于尽快将变革性的产品交到用户手中，即使后期才进行完善。
西申还分享了她个人使用 AI 的案例。她经常构建“网站”——即通过简单提示生成的自定义网络应用程序——用于各种需求，从团队游戏到背包旅行计划器。她还称赞了 Codex 中的 `/visualize` 命令，可以轻松生成数据可视化。她在“作为思考的写作”（人类驱动，用于清晰化思想）和“作为报告的写作”（AI 辅助，用于总结或重新格式化）之间划清了关键区别，主张人类在前一种写作中保持参与，以避免“大脑退化”。她还指出，验证编码任务是面向输出的，而验证知识工作则需要理解 AI 的过程、推理和输入。
回顾她在 Sutter Hill Ventures 的时光，西申赞扬该公司证明了产品市场契合度并非“玄妙之术”，而是一个可重复的过程。一个重要的教训是，经常被低估的“产品营销契合度”的重要性——即在产品构建“之前”就通过迭代推介和完善信息来确定正确的叙事和定位。
最终，西申认为人类大脑将仍然弥足珍贵，在于责任感，在于创作中表达独特的艺术性和主见，以及至关重要地，在于促进人际连接和协作。“我们如何关爱彼此、相互关联……我工作中的这部分仍然如此充满人性。”
In a captivating discussion, Tara Seishin, OpenAI's product lead for Codex and ChatGPT, shared insights into the rapidly evolving landscape of AI product management, the unique culture at OpenAI, and her vision for the future of work. Having spent a year at OpenAI, which she describes as "a lifetime" in AI terms, Seishin revealed that despite her prior experience in high-growth companies, OpenAI presented unique surprises.
She noted that OpenAI is "founders-led" in a distributed sense, with everyone acting as a founder in their respective areas, and top-down direction being "extremely limited." This fosters a thin distance between product managers and the market, akin to a startup journey. Surprisingly, she found that OpenAI’s "secret strategy" was largely open, with ideas and products quickly becoming public, contrasting sharply with the more internal, "payments Bible" approach of her past roles.
Seishin highlighted a significant shift in the product management role. In a static market, grand strategy is possible, but AI's emergent and fast-changing nature makes long-term planning obsolete. The emphasis has moved from academic, theoretical reasoning to empirical, prolific experimentation. Product managers must now focus on defining the "eigenquestion"—the most critical hypothesis—and testing it as fast as possible. This core PM job, understanding users, market, and technology to form sharp hypotheses, has not changed, but rather become even more crucial.
Looking to the future of knowledge work, Seishin envisions a shift from "rowing" to "steering." AI agents will handle more comprehensive tasks, and humans will increasingly focus on higher-level direction and feedback. She foresees the rise of persistent AI co-workers, allowing for collaborative agent work, where human intuition and "opinionated calls" remain vital, guiding the "auteur" statement in software development.
Ambition, Seishin argues, is not just enabled but *required* by AI tools. The "unicorn" individual, capable across multiple domains, is now within reach for many, expanding what's "within their range of possibilities." PMs at OpenAI are tasked with "elevating others' ambitions" by constantly challenging assumptions about what can be achieved, and how quickly. Internal memes like "Is this maximally accelerated?" and "Are you mainlining it yet?" reflect this culture of urgency and deep product immersion. A critical operating principle is building for where models will be in "two to three months," as building for the present or too far into the future are "equally wrong."
Regarding the ChatGPT app, Seishin explained the current interface (ChatGPT, Codex, Chat/Work modes) is a transitional state. The North Star is a seamless experience where the AI intuitively selects the right tool. The challenge is bringing agent power to a billion users naturally, simplifying concepts like "harnesses" that are foreign to consumers. She emphasized that for the team, "done is better than perfect," focusing on getting transformative products into users' hands quickly, even if polish follows.
Seishin also shared personal AI use cases. She frequently builds "sites" – custom web apps generated from a simple prompt – for various needs, from team games to backpacking trip planners. She also praised the `/visualize` command in Codex for effortlessly generating data visualizations. She drew a crucial distinction between "writing as thinking" (human-driven, for crystallizing ideas) and "writing as reporting" (AI-assisted, for summarization or reformatting), advocating for human engagement in the former to avoid "brain rot." She also noted that validating coding tasks is output-focused, while validating knowledge work requires understanding the AI's process, reasoning, and inputs.
Reflecting on her time at Sutter Hill Ventures, Seishin credited the firm with demonstrating that product market fit isn't a "dark art" but a repeatable process. A key lesson was the often-underrated importance of "product marketing fit"—getting the narrative and positioning right even *before* building the product, by iteratively pitching and refining the message.
Ultimately, Seishin believes human brains will remain invaluable for accountability, for expressing unique artistry and opinionation in creation, and critically, for fostering human connection and collaboration. "How we care for each other and relate to one another... that piece of my work has remained so human."
摘要
Tara Seshan leads product for Codex and ChatGPT Work at OpenAI (alongside previous podcast guest Andrew Ambrosino, who’s her engineering manager). Before OpenAI, Tara spent over six years at Stripe, where she joined as one of the first five product managers. She went on to lead product for Watershed, which Time magazine named one of the best inventions of 2022, and she is also a founder and Thiel Fellow. Most personally meaningful to me: Tara is one of the three inaugural Lenny’s Newsletter Fellows, a program I ran a couple of years ago to spotlight the most exciting up-and-coming product leaders.
*In our in-depth conversation, we discuss:*
1. The shift from “rowing” to “steering,” and why human judgment and ambition will become differentiators as AI takes on execution
2. How OpenAI thinks about building for model capabilities two to three months out
3. OpenAI’s best internal memes, such as “Is this maximally accelerated?” and “Are you mainlining it yet?”
4. Why ambition is the new bottleneck for companies, and why elevating others’ ambitions is now the key part of the PM job
5. Writing as thinking vs. writing as reporting
*Brought to you by:*
WorkOS—Make your app enterprise-ready, with SSO, SCIM, RBAC, and more: https://workos.com/lenny
Mercury—Radically different banking, now with Command: https://mercury.com/
*Episode transcript:* https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/ais-third-era-the-rise-of-persistent
*Archive of all Lenny's Podcast transcripts:* https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/yxi4s2w998p1gvtpu4193/AMdNPR8AOw0lMklwtnC0TrQ?rlkey=j06x0nipoti519e0xgm23zsn9&st=ahz0fj11&dl=0
*Where to find Tara Seshan:*
• X: https://x.com/tarstarr
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarstarr
• Newsletter: https://substack.com/@taraseshan
*Where to find Lenny:*
• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/
*In this episode, we cover:*
(00:00) Introduction
(02:18) What makes OpenAI’s culture so different
(06:42) Why AI product strategy is all about fast experimentation
(09:02) How the PM role is changing
(10:50) The shift from rowing to steering
(15:35) What changes when agents become coworkers
(20:05) Why ambition matters more than ever
(26:39) Building products for models that do not exist yet
(29:21) How ChatGPT’s Chat and Work modes differ
(34:01) How OpenAI ships so quickly at scale
(39:14) The vibe shift happening inside Codex
(42:20) Why traditional roles are beginning to blur
(45:59) Where humans will continue to provide unique value
(48:20) How Tara uses AI in her own work
(51:38) The magic of the /visualize command
(52:39) Writing to think versus writing to report
(57:10) How to use AI without losing your ability to think
(01:00:15) Tara’s biggest lesson from Sutter Hill
(01:04:16) ChatGPT’s site output
(01:05:01) Why knowledge work is becoming more like coding
(01:07:55) Lightning round and final thoughts
*Referenced:*
• Codex: https://chatgpt.com/codex
• ChatGPT Work: https://openai.com/chatgpt-work
• Stripe: https://stripe.com
• Watershed: https://watershed.com
• Thiel Fellowship: https://thielfellowship.org
• Meet your Lenny’s Newsletter Fellows: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/meet-your-lennys-newsletter-fellows
• The rituals of great teams | Shishir Mehrotra of Coda, YouTube, Microsoft: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-rituals-of-great-teams-shishir
• The nature of product | Marty Cagan, Silicon Valley Product Group: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-nature-of-product-marty-cagan
• Product management theater | Marty Cagan (Silicon Valley Product Group): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/product-management-theater-marty
• Patrick Collison’s examples of fast projects: https://patrickcollison.com/fast
• Inside ChatGPT: The fastest-growing product in history | Nick Turley (Head of ChatGPT at OpenAI): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-chatgpt-nick-turley
• Andrew Ambrosino on X: https://x.com/ajambrosino
...References continued at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/ais-third-era-the-rise-of-persistent
*Recommended books:*
• Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143109391
• Anna Karenina: https://www.amazon.com/Anna-Karenina-LEO-TOLSTOY/dp/8175993421
• The Power Broker: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0394720245
• War and Peace: https://www.amazon.com/War-Peace-Leo-Tolstoy/dp/8175992832
• Wolf Hall: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0312429983
_Production and marketing by https://penname.co/._
_For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com._
Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.
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