Don't trust your first answer - dig deeper

Usually an expert is the most tenured person in the world in the domain that you're questioning, and the length of tenure, and the depth of experience actually can vary very wildly from person to person. And so what happened is like, you go ask somebody something, and they would give you an answer which is like the thing that they believe to be true, they're not lying and it's not malicious, and it's just fucking wrong.

It often comes down to asking the right question at the right time in how you figure things out.

Cagan is responding to a question about how product managers can evaluate advice from online communities when most content comes from companies doing product management poorly.

Probably the most important skill for product people, and I know this sounds awful, but is really learning how to think critically. And that involves literally evaluating.

Are you proactively trying to challenge your own assumptions is extremely important, right? As a big enough product manager as well as a seasoned product leader, if you're not doing enough of that, then I think you might not be listening. If there's no conflict, if there's no contention, then something is missing.