Ask HN: How to onboard yourself to a new product/industry in a new job?

100% support this approach. My knowledge of product has always been less important than my knowledge of the people, resources, and structure of my organization. I don't need to know things, I need to know who knows things. At least at the start.

I've learned to work in multiple industries and verticals and transferring what I know that can.

Generally, there's no hack around learning, other than learning more efficiently. The faster you dive in, the sooner you'll have a sense of what you know (more than you think) and where to actually focus in the next 3-6-9-12 months.

There is a course called learning how to learn that focuses on how adults learn differently that's worth checking out before going into fintech or other topics. Highly recommend checking it out as a first stop.

Fintech is a broad and vague category, not specific.

In this case if it's new to you, focus on first principles learning whether it's in finance, banking.

If you can saturate your time, consciousness with meaning full content, there is a good amount of passive spaced repetition from hearing different explanations of concepts. Podcasts can be helpful, but for learning you will probably find some things on youtube to subscribe to and work through. Have a playlist ready to go, whether it's in your ears, or on a speaker while getting ready in the mornings.

First principles learning means learning the basics and using that to build up to the other concepts. Luckily it also can mean learn it like you're 5 and don't expect to learn it as quickly as something that is partially familiar or similar. When you do this, your brain will point out what's familiar or similar anyways.

What's nice is if you're not great at math, there's still a lot of people and process interactions that can have value added too. The math can be learned too.

> 2. Read the management discussion in the 10k of a public version of the company you work

YES! Management's Discussion of Risks section of 10ks is amazing, and really easy to read.

I think it's nuts to work at a public company and NOT follow your employer's 10ks and earnings calls (at least on and off, or at least when newly hired as well as for context any time there's Big Corporate News)

It really helps cut through management's BS when you can just read how they're describing the situation to the shareholders rather than the spin for internal audiences. It's the One Secret Trick that will give you an idea of what the motivations and interests of your company's leaders are, as opposed to what they claim or you guess that they are, which then ends up being super useful for say, judging which project has a better likelihood of becoming important, how to sell things internally, etc

You'd learn, wouldn't you? Other marketers were not born with the knowledge either.

Are you Product Marketing or Content Marketing/Demand Gen?

First - recognize that there is a significant difference between the two.

Second - chat with peer PMMs, Field Marketers, Growth PMs, etc to get good tips and advice.

Finally, I recommend reading Monetizing Innovation [0] in order to understand the Packaging and Pricing portion of Product Marketing. For Content Marketing/Demand Gen, I found Hacking Growth to be useful, but honestly there are a number of YC and adjacent podcasts that are fairly useful for that.

Finally - if you feel you don't like the role or the space, make sure to let you CEO know ASAP and make a transition plan with them. In my younger days I burnt a bridge with a good friend when I became an inexperienced VP Marketing/Demand Gen at their startup.

[0] - https://www.simon-kucher.com/en/insights/monetizing-innovati...