Her Story
About Charvi
I've been in product management for about 12 years now, with around 7 years focused specifically on e-commerce and 3-4 years in SaaS products. I started my career as a software engineer for the first year, but then gradually shifted to being a PM. I began with app experiences, then moved on to building customer support CRMs and chat support CRMs. My first stint as an e-commerce PM was at Flipkart, where I worked on post-purchase fulfillment experiences. At Walmart, I've been leading the social commerce charter, which I started from the ground up. What you see now as the Walmart Creator platform, the on-site social experiences on the app, the videos experience, and the content experience - I created all of that. Within just a year or two, the Walmart creators actually did more than $1 billion of business, which I'm incredibly proud of. The content experiences that customers see at Walmart now are very novel and not very common, and people are really appreciating it. Customers are actually looking forward to the videos. Most recently, I've moved to building a fashion customer identity for customers to really help reflect their style through Walmart. My day-to-day involves strategizing about how products should look, roadmapping, having conversations with executives to refine strategy, defining ways of working for cross-functional teams, reviewing the annual operating plan with executives, working directly with engineers using AI tools to bring vision to life, and managing a lot of cross-functional partnerships across discovery, item pages, post-purchase, pre-purchase experience, marketing, and business teams.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Charvi
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to taking a lot of risks throughout my career and never refraining from working for free when it meant learning something valuable. I actually worked for 6 months for free to break into product management, and I think that experience was invaluable because when you're working with someone for free, that person has nothing to lose but everything to give you. I also credit reading good books - particularly 'Think and Grow Rich,' which was a pivotal book that changed how I approach my career and life. It taught me that it's not just about money, but also about the network, the connections, and the passion you should have while building things. I've always been very resilient and kept learning and upskilling. I believe in integrity, hard work combined with smart execution, and having a growth mindset. Just hard work alone won't get you anywhere, but smart execution gets you a long way.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I've ever received is to just keep your options open, always. It builds a lot of confidence in yourself overall, so if you keep your options always open, you are never scared to ask for what you think you deserve or what you believe you deserve.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I would say take as many risks as you want, and work for free in the first 2 years if you want. The learning that you will gain from experienced folks is actually unmatchable to how much anybody can pay you. I actually worked for 6 months for free to break into product management, and I think I couldn't have been better off because if you're working with someone for free, that person actually has nothing to lose but everything to give you. You're giving a lot to that person while you're learning, so I think that really builds better growth and connections. I would say to the young ones, take as many risks as you can, work for free to learn the thing that you really are passionate about - that's one of the most important things - and always keep your network active.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
From an opportunity standpoint, I think AI is going to be really, really helpful and great. I see a lot of opportunities where everybody can think multidimensionally when it comes to AI. It's nothing to be scared about, in my opinion. It's making you so much more powerful, curious, and intelligent. Every knowledge is approachable now, everything that you wanted to learn about is so approachable. Execution is at the snap of your fingers. I think there are a lot of opportunities in building the right strategy. When everything gets so easy, the right thing is, can you bring clarity? Can you be very sure of what we want to do, so that there is no back and forth? Because once we put our head to something, then I think it'll be just like a day that you can execute that idea. So opportunities are around clarity - that's one of the biggest things. But opportunities are also around how do you embrace yourself, because AI is making you better, but we have to believe in that.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Integrity is very important in my work life. Hard work with smart skills are also very important - just hard work will not get you anywhere, but smart execution actually gets you a long way. And having a growth mindset - I think these three are very important to keep you going. So integrity, hard work with smart execution, and having a growth mindset are the values I hold most dear.
Join Influential Women and start making an impact. Register now.