Free Lesson

Slow Down to Speed Up: AI Product Discovery and Development

Hosted by Beth Lingard and Jonathan Waddingham

Thu, Jun 25, 2026

4:00 PM UTC (45 minutes)

Virtual (Zoom)

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AI Prototyping for Product Managers
Jonathan Waddingham
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What you'll learn

Frame better product problems

Learn practical ways to define clearer problems before jumping into AI-assisted building

How to use AI as a thought partner

Explore ideas, challenge assumptions, and improve thinking using AI as a creative partner

Prototype faster without losing quality

Create stronger prototypes with clearer prompts, faster learning, and less wasted iteration

Why this topic matters

AI has made building dramatically faster. It's also removed the friction that used to protect us from building the wrong thing. This session is about slowing down briefly at the start so you move faster in the end. We'll cover how defining clearer problems, acting on user insights, and prototyping intentionally lets you build something people actually want, so you skip the expensive rework.

You'll learn from

Beth Lingard

Product Strategist + Advisor Partnering with founders at inflection points

I’ve spent 20+ years in tech, moving from startups to big tech, where I most recently served as UX Research Director for Meta AI. I’ve worked as a product manager and agile project manager, which means I understand the tradeoffs, timelines, and internal debates that shape what actually gets built. Today I run Lingard Strategy Studio, helping Series A+ AI founders find product-market fit through product discovery and user research. I write about product discovery and user research on Medium, and co-author a Substack on user research in the age of AI with Elissa Darnell.

Jonathan Waddingham

Former CPO helping teams turn AI ambition into shipped products

I help teams figure out what’s worth building, then turn ideas into working products fast.

As Chief Product Officer at Lightful, I led product, design and engineering, building AI-powered tools used by nonprofits worldwide. I also created a cross-functional “AI Squad”, developing rapid prototyping approaches to test real problems and shape product direction.

Before that, I spent 12 years at JustGiving, building their crowdfunding product from MVP to a UK category leader, raising over £100m in just five years.

What makes my approach different is that I don’t treat AI as a strategy deck. I focus on what’s actually worth building, then help teams prototype, test and learn quickly.

Worked at

Meta
JustGiving
ModCloth
AnswerLab
Lightful
See all products from Jonathan

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