​If you're a product manager or a founder, your job is communicating ideas. Usually that means a deck, a PRD, or a conversation where you try to get someone excited enough to build the thing. AI coding tools change that equation. You can now take an idea and turn it into a working prototype yourself, in minutes, without writing a line of code. No more describing what you want and hoping it lands. You can just show people.

​AP is a Product Manager at Airtable who doesn't come from a software engineering background. He's spent the past two years using AI tools to prototype ideas and build working software by describing what he wants in plain English. At Airtable, he uses this to get alignment on features faster. Instead of walking stakeholders through a spec and asking them to imagine the experience, he builds a working version and puts it in front of them. It's changed the way he runs product reviews, gets buy-in from leadership, and collaborates with his design and engineering partners. In this workshop, he'll show you how he does it, and then you'll do it yourself. You'll go from an idea to a working prototype before you leave the room.

​Everyone builds something before they leave.

​What to bring: A laptop and a free account at claude.ai.

​Speaker

​Akshar (AP) Patel

​Akshar (AP) Patel is a Product Manager at Airtable, where he focuses on helping enterprise customers take advantage of AI capabilities within the platform.

​His path to product management wasn't conventional. AP spent years in education, working as a career coach and advisor helping students articulate what they actually wanted from their lives, not just their next job. That work sharpened his ability to listen, ask the right questions, and understand what people need versus what they say they need.

​When he transitioned to tech, AP joined Airtable as a Senior Delivery Consultant, partnering with large enterprises to design and deploy Airtable solutions across complex organizations. He saw firsthand what makes software succeed or fail inside a company: adoption challenges, change management, and the gap between what a tool can do and what teams will actually use.

​Now he builds with both lenses: an understanding of individual goals from his education background and a practical grasp of what enterprise users actually care about from his consulting work. Over the past year, AP has leaned heavily into AI, both as a product focus and as a way of working. He uses AI tools daily to prototype faster, accelerate development cycles, and even help write a bio.

​AP lives in Charlotte with his wife and their little dog with a big personality, Jackson. Outside of work, you'll find running, catching up on whatever show everyone was talking about last year, or cheering on the New England Patriots. He's always happy to talk product, AI, or why the Patriots are still the team to watch.

​Location

​Raleigh Founded North Street

​509 W North St, Suite 224, Raleigh, NC 27603

​QUESTIONS?

​This session is part of Raleigh-Durham Startup Week. Click here to learn more about the event, plus get answers to your FAQs.

​TRACK SUPPORTER

​Thank you to Pendo for supporting the Product & Design Track at #RDSW26!