Hire a PM

To: Rosa Lindqvist, VP Product Subject: Group PM recommendation — Joy Adeyemi

Recommendation: Hire Joy, subject to focused reference and influence checks before the offer. She has the stronger evidence against the role’s core needs: measurable payment outcomes, thoughtful product judgment, and the ability to lead through other people. The CEO needs a decision by Friday; I would not let the debrief scores alone drive it.

Evidence

• Execution and influence (35%): Joy gave a specific result from her last company—payment completion rose from 33% to 47% over 18 months—and explained a failed experiment and what she learned. Her leadership examples showed investment in others: coaching a struggling PM into a different role and promoting another. Dev’s evidence was less concrete: he described platform growth and 40+ shipped features but supplied no outcome metric when pressed. His stories were consistently framed around his own contribution, and he said his team struggled to keep up with him.
• Product sense (25%): Joy investigated who pays and why before proposing text-to-pay for the 58% who currently pay by phone, including trade-offs. That is relevant to our 41% online payment rate and reflects problem-first judgment. Dev’s creativity and presentation were strengths, but six ideas in the first five minutes—before clarifying who pays and why—are a concern for this role.
• Analytics (20%): Joy’s quantified result and discussion of a failed experiment are stronger evidence of analytical ownership. Dev did not provide a measurable result.
• People leadership (20%): Joy’s examples demonstrate coaching, development, and shared credit. Dev’s confidence and presentation are positives, but they do not offset the limited evidence of developing a team or his comment about the team struggling to keep up.

Risks and scorecard

Joy’s main risk is whether she can influence senior stakeholders, particularly the CFO and Finance. The “not much presence” and “command the room” comments are concerns to test, not proof that she cannot do it; we should assess her ability to make a clear, evidence-based case rather than equate influence with a particular presentation style.

Dev may be compelling with executives, but we need to understand the team-turnover signal and whether his leadership style scales. His two references are current direct reports, which may limit candor. His former-company reference’s report of high turnover is important but unverified.

I would treat the 4/4/4/4 versus 3/3/3/3 ratings as weak evidence. The VP Engineering’s pre-debrief note called Joy the strongest leader seen and rated her a 4, then the score became a 3 after discussion; the Head of Design also spoke first. This does not establish why the ratings changed, but it is reason to rely on the underlying evidence and check for independent calibration.

Before making the offer

1. Ask Joy’s former manager and peer specifically about her influence with Finance/CFO-level stakeholders, including a difficult disagreement and the outcome.
2. Ask for one additional Joy reference who can speak to cross-functional execution; ask Dev’s references about team turnover, feedback, and how he develops PMs. Seek candid, comparable evidence where possible.
3. In a short structured conversation, ask Joy to make the case for a payment-rate strategy to a skeptical CFO. Evaluate clarity, use of evidence, and handling of challenge—not polish alone.
4. Confirm Joy’s 33%→47% result, her role in it, and the scope of her people leadership.

If those checks reveal a material gap in Joy’s influence or ownership, I would choose neither rather than default to Dev on presentation strength. Otherwise, proceed with Joy at her requested $230k, within band.

MEMORANDUM

TO: Rosa Lindqvist, VP of Product FROM: Director of Product, Medvia DATE: October 24, 2023 SUBJECT: Hiring Recommendation: Group PM, Patient Payments

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Rosa,

Following yesterday’s debrief, I have reviewed the scorecards, interview transcripts, and reference notes for our open Group PM role. We are tasked with finding a leader who can set strategy, lift our online payment rate from its current 41%, lead a team of three PMs, and collaborate effectively with Finance and Compliance in a regulated healthcare environment.

The CEO needs our decision by Friday. My recommendation is that we extend an offer to Joy Adeyemi at $230k. We should not hire Dev Malhotra.

Below is the evidence, the associated risks, and the pre-offer checks required to secure Joy.

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1. The Evidence: Why Joy Adeyemi over Dev Malhotra

While the final entered scores (Dev straight 4s; Joy straight 3s) suggest a clear winner, the raw interview notes and hidden dynamics of our debrief tell a different story.

• Product Sense & Problem Solving: Dev is a classic "feature factory" ideator. The Head of Design noted Dev pitched six features in five minutes before asking who pays and why. Conversely, Joy spent her first 15 minutes investigating the root causes of friction—asking who pays and why others don’t—before proposing a targeted, high-leverage solution: text-to-pay tailored to the 58% of patients currently paying via phone. For a critical metric like our 41% online payment rate, we need clinical execution, not a scattershot feature list.
• Analytics & Rigor: The Data Lead’s notes on Dev are a red flag. When pressed on metrics, Dev offered vague marketing speak ("grew massively," "shipped 40+ features") with zero data attribution. Joy provided hard, demonstrable impact: she raised payment completion at her previous company from 33% to 47% over 18 months. Crucially, she also walked through a failed experiment and extracted lessons—proving she understands the complex trade-offs of healthcare payments.
• People Leadership & Culture: Dev speaks entirely in the first person ("I," "my wins") and casually remarked that his last team "struggled to keep up with me." Rosa, you likely noted your contact’s warning that his team suffered high turnover. Joy is the inverse: she coaches struggling reports, promotes talent, and attributes wins directly to her engineers. The VP of Engineering’s pre-debrief notebook literally rated Joy as a "4, strongest leader we've seen," before social pressure in the debrief caused the scores to normalize.
• The "Presence" Bias: The primary knock on Joy during the debrief was a lack of "presence" and a concern about whether she could "command the room with the CFO." This is a subjective trap. We do not need a charismatic showman to present slide decks; we need a strategist who can build bulletproof business cases with Finance and navigate Compliance. Joy’s methodical, customer-first approach is precisely what Finance will trust.

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2. Risks to Manage

• The CFO/Executive Presence Risk: Because the interview panel worried Joy might be quiet in front of executive stakeholders, we must validate her ability to defend her strategy to our CFO and Compliance leads.
• Compensation and Closing: Joy is asking for $230k (right in the middle of our $220k–$250k band), making her a financially sound hire. However, because she is measured and thoughtful, she may take a few days to deliberate. We need to move decisively.

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3. Pre-Offer Checks (To Be Completed by Thursday EOD)

Before we release the offer to Joy, I will execute two final validation steps:

1. Backchannel/Targeted Reference Check: Since our previous reference calls did not explicitly probe her dynamic with Finance or Compliance, I will spend 10 minutes with her former manager specifically asking: “How did Joy handle budget cross-examinations with Finance? How did she partner with Legal/Compliance when building payment flows?”
2. The "CFO Alignment" Test: I’d like to spend 30 minutes with Joy and our current Director of Finance (or you and I) presenting a mock 10-minute briefing on our 41% online payment bottleneck, asking her to walk us through how she would construct the business case for the Q1 roadmap.

Conclusion

Dev is dazzling in a pitch meeting, but his metrics are hollow, his leadership style is toxic to retention, and his instinct is to build before understanding. Joy is rigorous, customer-obsessed, metrics-driven, and a multiplier for her team and cross-functional partners.

Let’s trust the substance over the theater. I am ready to initiate the final check and prepare the $230k offer for Friday morning.