Influential Woman · Technology

Sarah Zou

MBA

Principal Technical Product Manager, Amazon

Seattle, WA

Certifications · Degrees · Memberships

Degree MBA from UCLA Cert MBA Member Industry alliances for identity protocol and specifications

Her Story

About Sarah

I've been doing product management for more than 10 years. When I started my career, I started as an engineer. I like building things, and I like building things that can touch people's lives. But just like many other millennials, when I was in my early 20s, as an engineer, I wanted to do a startup. Instead of building something for other people or another company, I wanted to build something that I own, for my own company. That didn't turn out super successful - that was a great lesson, not a great success. The reason I failed was because I know the technicals in and out, but I didn't know the go-to-market strategy. I couldn't speak to my customers. Because of that, I decided to pursue my MBA with UCLA. During that, I learned a lot about different things around running a business, how to build a product that actually can solve a customer's pain point, how to market those product ideas to customers. After my MBA, it was a natural pivot for me to get into product management with the technology and business knowledge that I have acquired. Now I work at Amazon, and my responsibility is I'm the principal product manager to ensure customers have a safe way to delegate to AI agents to take different actions on behalf of them. I own identity and authorization for agents at Amazon.

Her Interview

Ten minutes with Sarah

01What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?

I've had various mentors throughout my career who helped me, and two pieces of advice really stuck with me. One is, if you feel comfortable when you join a meeting, and you feel like 'I got this' every day at work, that means you're not running fast enough. You're not growing fast enough. The other one is very straightforward but very catchy - staying in your comfort zone is where dreams die. Both are very similar and really speak to me, because I do feel challenged from time to time, and I do feel the stress and pressure, but then I try to use them to remind myself that's because I'm growing. Pain is how you grow muscle, and being challenged is how you also grow as a leader. For stressful days, those are the things I remind myself of.

02What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?

I think many people who are in the tech industry are all thinking about how AI agents will change the way that we work, because now you can vibe code, you can ship product, you can use agents to do design, to write requirements. People are asking, do we still have a job? What does the future look like? I think in the 5 to 10 years with AI agents, there will be more code and more applications to manage. They still require some human in the loop. For you to have a career in 5 to 10 years, really think about what is the most influential way to use those AI agents. Maybe it's no longer about your coding skill, maybe it's about having a vision of the product, or building domain knowledge, thinking about how to use AI to scale. That's something we should all think about, not just for the younger generation, but for people who are in the industry. Maybe a little bit controversial.

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