Aryan Verma

Applied: SPMRank #3 of 15 SPM applicantssquad_6@pg27.mesaschool.co+91 98991 20534spm_18_aryan_verma.pdf

SPM

Shortlist

Brief · SPM

The candidate is a Senior Product Manager with eight years of experience across customs house agency operations, freight forwarding, and freight-tech SaaS product management. They ranked third with an 82/100 due to exceptional hands-on logistics operations experience and strong functional ownership, demonstrated by translating their firsthand customs house agency background into designing the DGFT ICEGATE integration and leading the entire integrations and compliance product area. Their biggest gap against the rubric is growing people who get promoted, as their CV shows they manage two junior product managers but lacks evidence or track records of coaching direct reports through to promotions.

Probe in interview

Can you share a specific example of mentoring one of the junior product managers you manage, detailing the development plan you established and whether it resulted in their promotion or expanded scope?
Can you describe an instance where you operated as the final, ultimate decision-maker for your product function without oversight from a superior product executive, and how you handled that level of autonomy?
Aside from the quarterly embed days, can you give a specific example of a critical process failure or bug you resolved and the exact standing operational practice you instituted to ensure the team permanently avoided recurrence?

SPM rubric (applied role)82.0 / 100Shortlist

Criterion	Score	Weight	Points	Evidence	Rationale
SPM-1 Hands-on logistics operations experience	5/5	25%	25	Designed the DGFT ICEGATE integration after understanding the filing process firsthand from the CHA side	Demonstrates nearly two years of direct customs ops experience that visibly shaped later product integration decisions.
SPM-2 Senior-most owner, no one above them in the function	4/5	25%	20	Leads the integrations and compliance product area — carrier connections, customs authority APIs, and ERP bridges	Clear specific evidence of owning an entire product area and managing junior PMs, though not clearly the senior-most in the entire company function.
SPM-3 Turns fixes into standing practice	4/5	20%	16	Built the team's discovery practice: quarterly "embed days" at 2 client offices where the PM team works alongside the operations team for a full day	Specific evidence of establishing named standing practices (quarterly embed days and WhatsApp status updates) adopted as standard.
SPM-4 Judgement under pressure, stated plainly	5/5	15%	15	Killed a shipper portal feature 3 months into development after realising the real value was on the freight forwarder side — absorbed significant sunk cost, made the call anyway	Plainly describes a hard decision to kill a feature after absorbing significant sunk cost with clear rationale.
SPM-5 Grows people who then get promoted	2/5	15%	6	Owns the team of 2 junior PMs	Manages junior PMs but provides no evidence, outcomes, or timelines of mentoring someone to a promotion.

PM rubric (other role)89.0 / 100Shortlist

Criterion	Score	Weight	Points	Evidence	Rationale
PM-1 Hands-on logistics operations experience	5/5	30%	30	Handled customs clearance coordination, Bill of Lading preparation, and client communication for 100+ import and export shipments monthly	Candidate has over 2 years of direct freight forwarding and customs clearance operations experience.
PM-2 Builds from observed pain; peers adopt it	3/5	20%	12	Introduced a client shipment status WhatsApp update system that was later adopted as the company's standard client communication method	Provides one clear example of an operational tool introduced from observed pain and adopted across the company.
PM-3 Sole ownership with no layer in between	5/5	20%	20	Owns the team of 2 junior PMs; accountable for the integration roadmap and all customer-impacting technical compliance decisions	Solely owns the integrations and compliance product area with attributed commercial and operational outcomes.
PM-4 Discovery directly with operators	4/5	15%	12	designed with input from 25+ freight operations staff across 4 client companies	Clear evidence of direct frontline discovery with operator staff leading to the product launch in at least one role.
PM-5 Candour: kills, post-mortems, owning what went wrong	5/5	15%	15	Killed a shipper portal feature 3 months into development after realising the real value was on the freight forwarder side — absorbed significant sunk cost, made the call anyway	Explicitly names a killed feature, articulates the strategic lesson, and openly owns the sunk cost.

Interview invite draft

draft

SubjectBody ([NAME] is replaced with the candidate's name when sent)

Redacted CV (exactly what the model saw)

[REDACTED]
Senior Product Manager
[REDACTED] · [REDACTED] · Delhi NCR · [REDACTED]
Professional Summary
Senior Product Manager in freight-tech with 8 years of experience spanning customs house agency operations,
freight forwarding, and SaaS product management. Grew up in a CHA family business — spent 3 years there
before completing an MBA and moving into product. Build software for freight operations teams because I know
from the inside what they need and what they will actually use.
Work Experience
Senior Product Manager – Integrations & Compliance
Shipthis Technologies (Freight SaaS, 120 employees), Bengaluru · Mar 2021 – Present
— Leads the integrations and compliance product area — carrier connections, customs authority APIs, and ERP
bridges
— Owns the team of 2 junior PMs; accountable for the integration roadmap and all customer-impacting technical
compliance decisions
— Designed the DGFT ICEGATE integration after understanding the filing process firsthand from the CHA side —
reduced customs filing time for clients from 45 minutes to 6 minutes per shipment
— Led the CargoWise API integration project — 18 months, coordinated across 3 engineering squads and 8
enterprise customers; became the platform's highest-revenue feature at launch
— Killed a shipper portal feature 3 months into development after realising the real value was on the freight forwarder
side — absorbed significant sunk cost, made the call anyway
— Built the team's discovery practice: quarterly "embed days" at 2 client offices where the PM team works alongside
the operations team for a full day
Product Manager
Shipthis Technologies, Bengaluru · May 2019 – Feb 2021
— Owned the core freight booking and shipment tracking modules
— Shipped the platform's first mobile app — designed with input from 25+ freight operations staff across 4 client
companies
— Grew the product from 12 to 40 enterprise clients during this period
Operations Executive
[REDACTED] CHA & Logistics, Delhi NCR · Jun 2016 – Apr 2018
— Handled customs clearance coordination, Bill of Lading preparation, and client communication for 100+ import and
export shipments monthly
— Managed the company's IEC filing and DGFT documentation for 8 exporter clients
— Introduced a client shipment status WhatsApp update system that was later adopted as the company's standard
client communication method
Education
MBA, Operations & Strategy · S.P. Jain Institute of Management & Research, Mumbai · 2018–2020
B.Com (Hons.) · Shri Ram College of Commerce, University of Delhi · 2013–2016 · First Division
Skills & Certifications
Product strategy & roadmap · Customs & compliance · Freight SaaS architecture · JIRA · Figma · SQL · CargoWise ·
ICEGATE · Miro · REST API design
FIATA FFF & FFL Modules (2017) · Pragmatic Product Management (2020)