How product management can fix your AI integration problems

Jeff Gothelf just put his finger on something most companies are getting wrong. We've got a generation of AI features — chatbots, automations, LLM wrappers — being bolted onto products that never had a clear reason for existing in the first place. The result? AI that looks impressive in a demo and confuses everyone in practice.

Gothelf's point is straightforward: product management is the missing piece. Not more AI tools. Not bigger models. But the discipline of asking what problem the feature actually solves, who it's for, and why it matters. Too many companies are treating AI like a technology problem — "how do we integrate the model?" — when it's really a product problem — "does this feature do what users need?" The difference matters because without product discipline, AI becomes expensive decoration.

Why this matters for us: la gente who depend on these tools for work, for side hustles, for staying connected — we need them to work, not just look cool.