Salesforce

Deloitte

Al Dea

Previously @ Salesforce & Deloitte. Founder, The Edge of Work

Influence Without Authority

Instructor, keynote speaker, advisor, and founder of The Edge of Work

Learn how to identify what stakeholders really care about before you make an ask

Map the Room Before You Speak

Discover how to trust and credibility with stakeholders long before a high-stakes moment requires it

Earn Trust Before You Need It

Unlock the practices that turn a one-time yes into someone who champions you and your ideas when you're not in the room

Turn Compliance Into Advocacy

Stop executing others' roadmaps. Build a strategy that gets approved, speak the language of business, and win stakeholder buy-in.

VP Product. 500+ PMs Stuck to Strategic

Amazon

PayPal

Capital One

Coda

Brennan Collins

Product Executive. 
Coached 500+ PMs from Stuck to Strategic.

Summer Nights

Fall Break '26

( ⏰ Early enrollment 33% off promotion expires August 26! Use code EARLY for discount ⏰)You are the product manager known for execution, but that reputation is also the reason you are handed roadmaps instead of being asked to decide on the strategy.The product manager with the most impact is the one who connects feature work to business outcomes and speaks the language of executive stakeholders.Most PMs were trained in one pillar of the job: delivery. Yet, when it's time for promotion, they are judged on all four: strategy, delivery, customer experience, and growth.For mid-level PMs, their success hinges entirely on making strategic decisions and communicating them persuasively. This course targets these two critical areas to amplify your product impact and accelerate your career.The Influential PM is a three-week, live, small-group cohort: six sessions with Brennan plus three office hours, where you practice every technique on your actual work with a group of peers who will sharpen your thinking.Every lesson is immediately applicable to your work, that same day.

Shift from executing roadmaps to owning the strategy behind them.

The Product Metrics Ladder

Stakeholder Navigation

Executive Communication

Hidden Incentives

Strategic Storytelling

Connect Research to Strategy

This course assumes you've been around product for a few years, regardless of the size of company.

Experience as a Product Manager, Product Owner, Strategist, or Founder

Students who use their real work in the exercises learn 10x more. "Out of work" students are encouraged to use prior products.

A real product and deliverables you can build upon in the course

If you have that, you're my kind of people. 

A passion for continuous learning and growth

Product Managers with 3 to 10 years of experience who are strong at shipping and want to move more into strategy

PMs who've been told to "be more strategic" while simultaneously being fed a roadmap of stakeholder demands

PMs who want more influence by speaking the language of executives with clarity, confidence, and persuasion

Stop over-explaining and start guiding decisions. You'll become the professional who walks into senior rooms and walks out with a yes.

Cohort 7

24-Year Banker -> Presentation Expert

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Commerzbank

Royal Bank

Mary Beth Hazeldine

24 years at JPMorgan, PwC, RBS. Now training executives to win decisions.

Cohort 6

You've done the work. You know the material. You've prepared the slides.And yet the decision stalls.Polite nods. Reasonable questions. Then: "Let's take this offline." "We'll circle back." "Good discussion."Translation: No decision today.If this keeps happening, it's not because you lack expertise or presentation skills. It's because the way you're structuring your message doesn't match how senior people decide.Here's what nobody tells you: executives make their decision in the first few minutes, then spend the rest of the time looking for reasons to trust that instinct—or doubt it. When you lead with context, build to your recommendation, and back it up with extensive data, you're triggering doubt, not confidence.The unspoken question in their mind: "If they need this much explanation, is the recommendation actually solid?"This course gives you a different approach—a system built on how decisions actually happen in senior rooms. You'll learn to structure your message so that "yes" feels like the obvious, low-risk choice.Not through tips you'll forget under pressure. Through a repeatable system that works even when you're tired, rushed, or facing pushback.

Executives decide before your presentation ends. Structure accordingly

Structure presentations that win decisions

Remove the anxiety before you even start

Build credibility without over-explaining

Choose proof that reassures, not proof that defends

Handle pushback without becoming defensive

Use AI tools without sounding generic or losing authority

<code>You present to executives, boards, or steering committees—and need decisions, not "good discussions." Your credibility is on the line.</code>

You pitch to clients and present recommendations for a living. Stalled decisions cost you deals, revenue, and repeat business.

You're in relationship management, business development, or sales—presenting to win deals, budgets, or strategic alignment.

Your strategy is strong. The room still didn't get it. This workshop fixes that.

ex-Product Exec @Spryker, Commerce, eBay

Spryker Systems

BigCommerce

eBay Inc.

Elena Leonova

Founder & CPO, OneRank.io,  ex-CPO @ Spryker, VP of Product @ BigCommerce

Cohort 1

Cohort 2

You can build a sound strategy and still lose the room.Most product leaders aren't unclear. They're at the wrong altitude. They lead with user workflows when the board wants market opportunity. They walk in with 30 slides when the CEO has 5 minutes. They explain why the work matters when executives are deciding how much it's worth.The cost isn't a bad meeting. It's a worse career trajectory. Decisions move forward without you. Headcount goes elsewhere. Roadmaps get rewritten by people closer to the money.This workshop fixes one thing: how you communicate product strategy when the room is deciding whether to fund it, defend it, or push it back to next quarter. Four hours, hands-on, with live coaching from Elena. You leave with a rewritten exec update for a real situation in your own work — pressure-tested by your peers and critiqued live.This is not communication theory. It is what gets the yes.

Translate product strategy into the language executives decide in — capital allocation, risk, market opportunity. Land the yes.

Diagnose the altitude of your last exec update

Architect every update around the three executive questions

Pre-wire your decision room before the meeting starts

Pitch your real proposal under live pressure 

This is hands-on. Bring an actual situation from your work — board deck, exec update, strategy ask. No fictional case studies.

A real exec update or stuck proposal you need to nail. 

No prior coursework required, but you should already be operating in rooms where executives evaluate your judgment. This is not a foundation

Senior PM level or above. 

Block the calendar. The practice + critique element only happens live. Showing up at minute 30 will cost you the value.

Four hours uninterrupted. 

Senior &amp; Principal PMs whose strategic proposals keep getting translated, redirected, or politely ignored by the exec team.

Group PMs, Directors, VPs of Product who've lost — or nearly lost — a critical decision because the room didn't land as expected.

Product consultants and advisors who coach senior PMs through executive presentations and want a sharper toolkit for the altitude shift.

The skills, tools and scripts that get you taken seriously at work and paid well in your career. 

Leadership Mentor for Women in Tech

Blinkist

Blacklane

Montblanc

Ioana Iordache

Leadership Mentor for Women · Agentic AI builder · Product Growth Leader

You're the expert in the room, and still have to prove yourself, defend your opinions, while questioning yourself. You're not alone.Research shows that women have 6x less influence than men in group discussions. Being the expert doesn't help.Learning how to build authority at work is the most important skill of your career. It's what gets you valued and paid well.It matters now, more than ever. AI is widening the authority gap and it's redefining the traditional career path, demanding higher-impact, higher-influence roles. If your plan is to do excellent work until someone notices, that plan is becoming obsolete.You've probably tried to fix this but nothing changed, because most leadership advice wasn't written with women in mind, and often works against us.In 4 weeks you'll learn and practice the Authority Accelerator Framework, a 4-step process to build authority at work as a woman.What makes this program unique?<ol><li>Practical, built by a woman who led teams for a decade, not regurgitated theory.</li><li>Designed to integrate learnings: role-plays, AI skills to practice, challenges to apply at work, and sharing back.</li><li>Supportive, with a community of women dealing with similar challenges as you. </li></ol>

You're already doing the work. In 4 weeks, be taken seriously for it.

Position yourself in any room and amplify your visibility.

Influence your audience and make your ideas heard.

Act in the face of adversity.

Recover your energy to sustain authority.

Women new managers.You're shifting from individual contributor to manager and your success depends on how well you build authority.

Women building a solopreneur career.Freelancers or consultants who need to rebuild authority with every new client, in less than 14 days.

Senior individual contributors.You need to get things done without a team or you move into a new role and have 90 days to build authority.

Agentic AI

Coding with AI

AI Workflows

Claude Code

OpenClaw

Vibe Coding

AI Evals

AI Transformation

RAG & Search

AI for PMs

AI for Engineers

AI for Designers

AI for Marketers

AI for Founders

Product Sense

Product Discovery

User Research

Prototyping

Growth

Analytics

Tech Foundations

Strategy

Influence

Leadership

Career Growth

Machine Learning

LLM Ops

Context Eng

Security

System Design

Figma

Design Systems

Visual Design

Design Strategy

Automation

Content Marketing

Demand Gen

Go-to-Market

Product Marketing

Positioning

Social Media

Brand

B2B Marketing

SEO & AEO

AI for Leaders

AI Governance

Communication

Management

People Operations

Exec Presence

Storytelling

Goal-setting

Personal Brand

Fundraising

Everyone

Operators

Data Scientists

Business Analysts

User Researchers

Customer Success

Project Managers

HR Professionals

Sales People

Lawyers

Finance

Investors

Real Estate

Educators

Creators

Accelerate Your Career

Introduction and Speaker Background

The Importance of Influence Without Authority in the Modern Workplace

Redefining Influence: From Compliance to Contribution

Overview of the Three Moves of Influence

Move 1: Map the Room and Context Mapping

Move 2: Flip the Script and Build Trust (Deposits)

Move 3: Activate and The ABCs of Getting the Yes

Influence as a Continuous Ecosystem

Practical Steps to Get Started and Conclusion

Product managers who drive strategy, development, and launch of products.

Broad professional audience — content relevant across many roles and functions.

Project managers who organize and oversee execution of initiatives, timelines, and cross-functional delivery.

Executive communication — presenting to boards, writing memos, running all-hands, and high-stakes messaging.

Persuading stakeholders, presenting ideas, and getting buy-in across an organization without formal authority.

Influence Without Authority

What you'll learn

Why this topic matters

You'll learn from

Al Dea