The people behind September’s conversation
Our September 2026 Product Conversations webinar brought together Jiaona Zhang and Casey Winters. This feature introduces the backgrounds behind their invitations and the complementary perspectives we wanted to bring to Pinnacle’s audience.
We selected this line-up to connect product foundations and AI-era team design with growth strategy, retention and engagement. Jiaona’s perspective on adaptation complemented Casey’s focus on the customer behaviour and organisational constraints behind sustainable growth.
Jiaona Zhang
Product expert and educator
The experience behind the invitation
Jiaona Zhang combines product leadership with teaching on product management foundations and leadership in the AI era. Her experience spans consumer and enterprise products, and her work connects product design with organisational choices and effective teams. Her perspective helps practitioners consider how changing technology affects both product strategy and the way teams work.
Why we invited Jiaona
We invited Jiaona to connect strong product foundations with thoughtful adaptation to AI. Her expertise was relevant to our audience’s questions about evolving responsibilities, organising teams around new opportunities and keeping customer needs central as tools and ways of working change.
Which team responsibility or strategic assumption should you revisit as AI changes how your product is built and used?
Casey Winters
Product growth expert
The experience behind the invitation
Casey Winters focuses on the constraints that prevent technology businesses from growing, including gaps in team structure, data and experience with scaling. His educational work covers growth strategy, retention and engagement. His perspective connects a company’s growth ambitions with understanding how customers find value and continue using its products.
Why we invited Casey
We invited Casey to connect product choices with sustainable growth. His expertise was relevant to practitioners looking beyond acquisition to understand retention, engagement and the bottlenecks that prevent a product from building a stronger relationship with its customers.
What is the main constraint on your product’s growth, and what evidence would show that you have addressed it?
The line-up connected effective product teams with sustainable customer growth. We invited both speakers to help our audience consider how strategic and organisational choices support lasting product value.