💡 Product Circle ⭕ Chat - Who's looking after the messy middle? with Graham Reed
Welcome to 💡 Product Circle ⭕ Chat on
🕖 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 7am (GMT - UK)
🕗 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 8am (CET - Germany)
🕒 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 3pm (AWST - Perth)
🕔 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 5pm (AEST - Brisbane)
🕕 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 6pm (AEDT - Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart)
🕗 Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 8pm (NZDT - New Zealand)
Topic: Who's looking after the messy middle?
AI tools are easy to build. Someone still has to own them 🧩
Someone in your organisation built a tool last month. Maybe a medical director, maybe a real estate agent, maybe a Product Manager with a spare weekend and Claude Code. It solved a real problem, the team started relying on it, and now it quietly runs part of the business.
Nobody asked where the data goes, who can access the code, where it is hosted, or what it costs to run every day. Nobody asked what happens when the person who built it changes roles or leaves.
Most AI conversations focus on the two ends: what we connect in (Slack, Jira, Google Docs) and what comes out (reports, dashboards, working code).
The layer in between, where tools get secured, hosted, maintained, paid for and handed over, is where the risk builds up, and it is the layer almost nobody owns.
Graham Reed has seen this from the inside. He builds Product Operations functions for a living, and he has watched informally built tools become business-critical, then break once their creator was no longer there to hold them together. In this Chat he makes the case that AI has changed how cheaply we can build, while the discipline needed to run what we build has stayed exactly the same.
"Your colleague vibe-coded a dashboard - they leave - now what..." Graham Reed
What we’ll cover
✅ The messy middle of AI workflows. Why the path from inputs to outputs skips the operational layer, and the privacy, security, code access, hosting and maintenance questions left unanswered at launch.
✅ How vibe-coded tools become BAU dependencies. What happens to a domain expert's real job while they spend weeks building software, and what breaks when they move on.
✅ Token economics. How an uncritical "startup CEO" mindset lets unoptimised processes burn through millions of credits a day, and why Graham believes most organisations are unprepared for AI providers raising prices sharply as they push toward profitability.
✅ Product Operations as the answer. Applying due diligence, checks and balances, and risk assessment before an AI tool is embedded in daily operations, even when building it cost almost nothing.
✅ From experiment to operational. A structured path for professionalising ad-hoc builds, and why change management, governance and team alignment still matter whatever the delivery mechanism.
Perfect for: Product Managers, Product Operations professionals, Product Leaders, and anyone who has built, approved or inherited an AI tool that nobody formally signed off.
About Graham Reed
Graham is THAT Product Ops Guy. He builds Product Ops functions from 0-1 in scaling businesses, from emerging cyber security organisations to £1bn unicorns. With the advent of AI, Graham has turned the function inside out to pioneer AI-native Product Ops.
He co-writes the Product Ops Confidential newsletter and resource site and co-hosts/produces the Product Opscast podcast, alongside other celebrated Product Ops leader Antonia Landi. Graham is writing his second book on Product Ops, regularly speaks at industry events and is a multi-award-winning professional in the field.
Connect with Graham on LinkedIn, and read/watch his material at ProductOpsConfidential.com
Zoom Link: See invite
You know we always have something special to give away at every Chat. This one is no different.
🏆 1 x lucky LIVE attendee will WIN a FREE 1:1 coaching session with Graham Reed.
🏆 1 x lucky LIVE attendee will WIN a FREE 1-year subscription to Product Ops Confidential (valued at £100).
You need to be there live to win.
Mark your calendar, and bring your questions for Graham.
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thanks,
Irene
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Irene Liakos
Product
irene@phronesisadvisory.com
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