Did you know that every Product Manager at Agoda owns their product end-to-end, working closely with dedicated Scrum teams? It’s a unique setup that empowers us to move fast, innovate, and truly make an impact.
Hi, I’m Anna Lazutkina, and I’m a Director of Product here at Agoda.
I currently manage five talented Product Managers, who together lead about 80 developers across 11 scrum teams. My role is all about connecting the dots—making sure our teams are empowered, unblocked, and working towards a shared vision.
How My Teams Work
My organization is split into two big teams. The first is called “Trips.” I like to think of us as the glue that unites all the different funnels—flights, hotels, activities—into one seamless trip experience for our users.
The second team is our Platform team. They do similar work, but from the implementation perspective, ensuring we efficiently build scalable products that support our ambitious goals.
What’s cool about the Product team here is how our scope also rotates and evolves, so we have the opportunity to explore new parts of the product and tackle new sets of challenges.
A Day in My Life
A typical day for me starts with messages, numbers, and—of course—coffee. (By the way, Thailand has some of the best coffee beans!) I spend the first half hour checking data—looking for trends, surprises, or anything that needs my attention. Dashboards are my morning reading material, before I tackle other areas of my work.
Product Leadership in Action
I typically have a series of one-on-one meetings with my team on in-office days. We discuss a wide range of topics, from operational challenges to career aspirations. My goal is to support them, help them brainstorm, and make sure they have what they need to succeed. At Agoda, PMs own their products end-to-end, and that sense of ownership is truly empowering.
As a manager, my role isn’t to tell people what to do—it’s to support them, remove roadblocks, and help them grow.
Another highlight of my day is supporting my PMs as they prepare to share their work with Agoda’s leadership team, including the CEO It’s a fantastic opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the bigger picture and receive direct feedback. During our meeting, I help them validate that all the important information is covered.
Product Culture at Agoda
What I love about Agoda’s product culture is the combination of people, ownership, and data. We’re super data-driven, but we also value user feedback and collaboration. Sharing insights across teams helps us get fresh ideas and valuable input.
One of the most exciting projects my team is working on is the timeline view for all your bookings. It began as a high-level idea to provide a delightful post-booking experience for all our products, and it has unlocked a significant amount of business value.
To understand what a delightful post-booking experience should look like, the team organized a series of design sprints, working closely with designers and researchers to identify user pain points, build prototypes, and validate solutions through interviews. At Agoda, we’re agile and move fast—validating our ideas at the design stage helps us iterate based on user feedback, increasing our chances of success. All our product and design decisions are backed by data and user feedback.
Innovating with AI
We’re also doing some really cool things with AI, like automatically reviewing code for accessibility issues and suggesting fixes. It’s not user-facing, but it makes a huge difference for our developers and, ultimately, for our users.
Team Culture and Collaboration
Tuesdays and Wednesdays are our team’s in-office days, and they’re packed with meetings! But we always make time for a team lunch where we don’t talk work—instead, we catch up on each other’s travel plans (we’re all big travel lovers!). Our team is truly multinational, so there are always interesting travel suggestions to share.
Every day is different, and that’s what keeps it exciting. Whether it’s building new products, solving tough problems, or helping my team grow, I love being part of Agoda’s journey.
Join our Product team and make an impact. View job openings here.
