A quick rant on working in a startup as a PM

I have been working at a startup for close to a year now. I joined very early. I was one of the first people. From nothing to something, I helped build the product as a product manager and a founding member.

And honestly, I feel completely drained.

I have reached a point where I feel like I have nothing left to give. No energy. No ideas. No motivation. I sit in front of my screen and my mind feels empty. I cannot push myself anymore.

In the beginning, it felt exciting. Building from scratch. No structure, no product, no roadmap. Just a blank slate. I learned a lot. I really did. I am grateful for that part.

But over time, things started breaking. Slowly, and then all at once.

Every decision is centralized with the CEO. What to build, when to build, how to build. My role slowly changed from product thinking to just execution. I am told to build features. That’s it. No discussion.

There is no customer validation. No user interviews. No talking to users. No understanding pain points. No asking why we are building something. We just build whatever is told.

Feature after feature after feature.

Even after reaching what we call “MVP”, we still have no real customers. When I ask when we will get customers, the answer is always the same. “Once the product reaches that stage.”

But what stage is that?

We keep adding more things. Hiding problems under more features. The UX and UI are honestly bad, because it is just a dump of features. Nothing feels thought through. Nothing feels clean. Nothing feels simple. We don’t have time to think also what to improve or prioritise.

I keep asking myself the same questions every day.

What am I building? Who am I building this for? Why am I building this?

And I have no answers.

Product management for me has turned into project management. My job now feels like assigning tasks to developers and making sure they stay busy. Not thinking about whether something should be built. Not defining proper scope. Not saying no. Just keep pushing work.

There is constant micromanagement. Constant checking. Very little trust. On top of that, the pay is low, especially for the amount of mental stress involved.

What hurts the most is the gaslighting. Being made to feel like the problem is you. Like you are not doing enough. Like you are not thinking hard enough. Even when the system itself is broken.

I truly believe in building something small, putting it in front of users, learning from them, and improving step by step. But that never happens here. Everything is built in isolation.

I am exhausted. Mentally and emotionally.

I am proud that I learned how to build something from zero. That experience is valuable. But right now, things feel ugly. The culture, the leadership, the way decisions are made.

I am posting this here to hear from others who have worked in similar spots. I also have worked in a couple of startups, but here it is more draining me mentally. Because I am questioning what we are building and the system around it.

I just needed to get this out. Thanks for reading.