Wes Kao is an executive coach, advisor, and entrepreneur who writes at newsletter.weskao.com. She is co-founder of Maven, an edtech company that raised $25M from First Round and Andreessen Horowitz. Previously, she co-founded the altMBA with bestselling author Seth Godin.

Newsletter for 60,000+ high performers on Wednesdays at 8am ET
-> weskao.com/newsletter

Live, 2-day course on Executive Communication & Influence 
-> https://maven.com/wes-kao/executive-communication-influence

1:1 executive coaching for tech leaders 
-> https://www.weskao.com/coaching

Wes Kao

Excited to be featured in Lenny Rachitsky’s “The AI-Native Product Manager” series. I’ll be teaching a free workshop on the topic “how to get buy-in as a PM.”

Of the 1,700 tech operators who have taken my course in the past 1.5 years, product managers are one of the biggest groups represented. About 1/3 of my private coaching clients are product leaders at companies like Meta, DoorDash, Atlassian, Amazon, Google, etc. I love working with product folks, and want to help you succeed because the bar for PMs is getting increasingly higher.

In this session, I’ll cover how to:

1. Present to impatient executives: Be prepared to move fast, speak directly, etc.

2. Manage up to senior leaders: Most PMs suck at managing up. We'll cover principles that will serve you now and throughout your career.

3. Anticipate questions and prevent skepticism: How to anticipate questions to avoid endless back-and-forth.

You will be able to apply these principles to stakeholders upwards, downwards, and laterally. 

The workshop will be on Friday, March 13 at 12pm ET. It will be an action-packed 30 minutes.

I rarely do free workshops, so if you’ve been curious about my course or found my Lenny podcast episode helpful, I hope to see you there.

Sign up link is in the comments.

a16z-backed founder turned executive coach. Helping tech operators improve their executive communication, leadership, and influence

I help in LinkedIn Growth 🚀 | TedX & Josh Talks Speaker| Influencer Marketing on LinkedIn| Personal Branding for busy Founders | Ghostwriter for Founders | LinkedIn Organic Growth | B2B Lead generation| Founders PR 🔥

I’m Sakshi Darpan, Founder of SackBerry Media, a personal branding and social media agency that’s helped 250+ founders, CXOs, and investors build their online presence and win trust in the digital world.

In the last 3 years, we have worked with clients across India, Dubai, US & Canada while generating millions of impressions for them!

What I do: 
- Build magnetic personal brands on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter/X
- Grow visibility for brands through social media strategy, PR, and paid ads
- Use AI-driven systems to scale outreach, content, and operations without adding extra headcount

🌍 What makes me different
I don’t believe in cookie-cutter content. I believe in storytelling that actually makes people stop scrolling, pay attention, and remember you. My clients don’t just get followers, they get leads, speaking gigs, media features, and opportunities they didn’t even know were possible.

📌 Beyond business
I’ve grown my own brand to 90K+ followers on LinkedIn by sharing my learnings in real time
I’ve been invited to speak on panels, podcasts, and judge startup events!
I’ve built an agency that runs on strong systems, so I can take vacations (sometimes a full month!) while the business grows


✨ What drives me
 Helping founders and brands turn their expertise into influence. 

Let's chat: sakshi@sackberry.com

Sakshi Darpan

I met a UAE based real estate founder last month. 
50 million AED in transactions. Clients across Emirates. Referral-only business.

His LinkedIn? 
Dead for eight months. 
His bio said "Real Estate Entrepreneur." 

His last post was a repost of his company page post.
I asked him why he doesn't build online.
He said: "My deals speak for themselves."

Here's what he doesn't see:
The high-net-worth investor who could give him 200 million in capital is doing due diligence on him. 

First stop? Google. 
Second stop? LinkedIn.

And they find nothing. Or worse, they find a resume pretending to be a personal brand.

This is the Dubai founder gap I keep hearing about.

1: Offline credibility doesn't transfer to digital credibility. 
A founder with fifty closed deals has social proof. But the person who hasn't met you yet doesn't know that. On LinkedIn, "Real Estate Entrepreneur" positions you as replaceable. 

2: In Dubai, trust gets built differently online than it does offline. 
Offline, a handshake and a referral carry weight. 
Online, people decide whether to trust you in forty seconds by reading your headline and skimming your last three posts. Dubai CXOs are time-starved.

3: The referral network gets smaller the higher you go. 
Referrals work until you want to work with someone outside your current circle. When you're trying to close a partnership with a fund, an investor, or a brand you haven't met before, you become searchable.

4: Authority online = faster sales conversations. 
When someone finds you on LinkedIn and already understands your thinking, your process, and what makes you different, the sales conversation starts three steps ahead. You're not explaining what you do. You're discussing whether you're the right fit.

CTA: If you're building in Dubai and your online presence doesn't reflect your actual positioning, let's talk about what needs to shift.


#PersonalBrand #UAE #Dubai #Dubaibuiness  #Content

Some coincidences are too good to ignore.

The whole country celebrated India’s recent win!
And the very next morning I noticed this Kurkure Ad - the brand had been **twinning with men in blue* even before the victory happened!

Creative thought, perfectly timed with the nation’s mood.

That’s what great moment marketing feels like — effortless.



#TeamIndia #BleedBlue #Kurkure #JowarPuff #CricketNostalgia

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The Battle

Wes Kao

Sakshi Darpan

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Performance ScoreWes Kao's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreSakshi Darpan's LinkedIn Performance

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taplio

The Battle

Wes Kao

Sakshi Darpan

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Wes Kao's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreSakshi Darpan's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreWes Kao's LinkedIn Performance