Dmitry Zlokazov is the head of product at Revolut, the $45 billion fintech giant operating in over 50 countries, serving more than 50 million customers, and producing some of the world’s top product leaders. Dmitry shares his hard-won lessons, contrarian org design principles, and day-to-day practices that power Revolut’s relentless shipping velocity, culture of ownership, and unparalleled “wow” product experience.
*What you’ll learn:*
• Revolut’s unique organizational approach, where “product owners” manage cross-functional pods as “local CEOs,” with genuine end-to-end ownership and hiring/firing power
• How a radical, ultra-flat structure enables more than 150 product owners to maintain founder-level quality and velocity across dozens of parallel launches
• How Revolut maintains quality while shipping hundreds of features across over 50 countries
• Why Revolut favors “raw intellect and hunger” over experience, and how internal transfers (including ex-engineers and ops managers) become the company’s most successful product leaders
• How Revolut’s founders review every single UI shipped, and why this founder detail obsession scales rather than limits innovation
• Their framework for launching new products—from ideation, validation, and first user cohort to rapid “algorithmization” and scaling across countries
• The importance of treating products that are 99% done as closer to 0% done, vs. 100% done
*Transcript:* https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-revolut-trains-world-class-product-managers
*This entire episode is brought to you by:*
Stripe—Helping companies of all sizes grow revenue: https://stripe.com/
*Where to find Dmitry Zlokazov:*
• X: https://x.com/Dzlokazov
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zlokazov/
*Where to find Lenny:*
• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/
*In this episode, we cover:*
(00:00) Introduction to Dmitry and Revolut
(03:41) Revolut’s unique approach to product management
(06:58) The role and responsibilities of product owners
(09:28) Types of product owners at Revolut
(15:50) Building “wow” products
(25:00) Hiring practices
(31:33) Managing teams and projects
(41:07) Revolut’s diverse product offerings
(44:40) Scaling new products successfully
(52:10) Attracting top talent
(58:43) Failure corner
(01:02:49) Lightning round and final thoughts
*Referenced:*
• Revolut: https://www.revolut.com/
• Intercom: https://www.intercom.com/
• Palantir: https://www.palantir.com/
• Which companies produce the best product managers: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/which-companies-produce-the-best
• Which companies accelerate PM careers most: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/which-companies-accelerate-your-pm
• Deliver WOW to our customers: https://www.revolut.com/blog/post/deliver-wow/
• Nik Storonsky on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nstoronsky
• Vlad Yatsenko on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yatsenko/
• How Palantir built the ultimate founder factory | Nabeel S. Qureshi (entrepreneur and writer, ex-Palantir): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-palantir-nabeel-qureshi
• Gokul Rajaram on designing your product development process, when and how to hire your first PM, a playbook for hiring leaders, getting ahead in you career, how to get started angel investing, more: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/gokul-rajaram-on-designing-your-product
• Gokul Rajaram on X: https://x.com/gokulr
• Brian Chesky’s new playbook: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/brian-cheskys-contrarian-approach
• Schlep blindness: https://www.paulgraham.com/schlep.html
• Revolut Launches RevPoints Loyalty Programme, Turning Daily Expenses into Exclusive Rewards: https://www.revolut.com/news/revolut_launches_revpoints_loyalty_programme_turning_daily_expenses_into_exclusive_rewards/
• Gemini: https://gemini.google.com/
• ChatGPT: https://chatgpt.com/
• Figma: https://www.figma.com/
• Oppenheimer: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15398776/
• Manus: https://manus.im/
• Eisenhower quote: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/11/18/planning/
• Wealth protection: https://help.revolut.com/help/security-logging-in/wealth-protection/what-is-wealth-protection/
*Recommended books:*
• The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business when There Are No Easy Answers―Straight Talk on the Challenges of Entrepreneurship: https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0062273205
• Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making―Personal Journey from Product Designer to Mentor: https://www.amazon.com/Build-Unorthodox-Guide-Making-Things/dp/0063046067
_Production and marketing by https://penname.co/._
_For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com._
Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.
