Building clarity: How Product Managers turn complexity into understanding

When you think of product management, you probably imagine roadmaps, KPIs, and endless Jira tickets. But for Karolina Kasnauskė, a Product Manager at Omnisend, the real job is something different. It’s making sense of chaos.

“I like to think of myself as a LEGO creator,” Karolina says. “I don’t make the LEGO bricks or decide their shapes. My job is to make sure we’re all building toward the same picture on the box — and that it’s one people actually want to play with.”

That image of building from shared pieces toward a common vision perfectly captures what it means to be a Product Manager at Omnisend. Beyond building new features, you strive for connection, translation, and storytelling.

Storytelling as a tool for alignment

Inside Omnisend, stories are the glue that holds teams together. Every feature starts as a problem, but it’s the solution that needs a story. A story helps everyone see not just what we’re building, but why it matters. It connects the dots between the user, the problem, and the impact of the fix. That’s where PMs come in.

“My role is to tell stories and share the broader context — where we’re going and why it matters,” Karolina explains. “A good story helps the team care, not just understand. I know I’ve done my job well when I hear someone else retelling the same story. That’s when it’s alive.”

Turning complexity into clarity

Karolina’s day-to-day involves translating abstract, cross-functional ideas — business goals, technical constraints, customer needs — into something human and actionable.

“PMs stand at the intersection of so many things,” she says. “Customer insights, design, data, tech, business strategy. We have to speak all those languages, and storytelling is how we bridge the gaps.”

But clarity doesn’t just appear out of nowhere. It has to be built deliberately. 

When she needs to figure out how to explain something complex, Karolina starts with two simple questions: “Who am I explaining this to?” and “What do they actually need to understand?” Once she knows that, she starts building the right analogy, framing, and level of detail.

Her rule of thumb is actually surprisingly simple:

“Clarity starts with you. If you can’t explain it to yourself, you’ll never make it clear for anyone else.”

She avoids jargon, starts with the “why,” and uses metaphors wherever she can. Sometimes she’ll even test her explanations out loud. If it sounds too formal or abstract, she rewrites it.

How it looks in practice

Karolina’s approach came to life recently when the team began rethinking the Partners Portal. It was new territory, full of unknowns.

“I needed everyone to see the bigger picture,” she says. “So I created a persona — a real, vivid character based on our agency partners. It had traits, frustrations, goals, and habits. This simple yet very powerful tool allowed the team to understand why some things matter, what the real problems are, and who is actually going to use the solutions that we are going to create.”

Suddenly, it became less about the specific features, and more about solving problems for someone the team could actually imagine. That shift changed everything.

“Once understanding settles, you can feel the energy shift,” Karolina recalls. “The room lights up. People start coming up with ideas. Everything starts moving faster because we’re all picturing the same story.”

Internal clarity, external results

Karolina believes the way a team talks about a feature internally sets the tone for how customers experience it externally.

“If a team can’t explain an idea clearly to each other, there’s no chance it will make sense to customers,” she says. “Once the internal story is clear — the problem, the value, and the outcome — it becomes so much easier to turn that into messaging, onboarding flows, or release notes,” Karolina explains. 

That alignment shows up everywhere downstream. “Design communicates it better. Marketing tells the right story. Sales use the right selling points. Support knows how to explain it. Even the product itself starts reflecting the right intent.”

The challenge, of course, is knowing how far to go. Too much detail overwhelms, too little loses meaning. But Karolina has a method for that.

“I don’t remove complexity that matters, I just layer it,” she explains. “Start with the core value: why would I use this? Then show the main action: how do I get started? And only add depth when someone’s ready for it.”

This approach is how Omnisend shapes every new feature, whether it’s a small UX tweak or a big, technically complex release.

The PM as storyteller

At the end of the day, Karolina sees storytelling as the essence of the PM’s role. 

“If the PM doesn’t set the narrative, someone else will, and it might be wrong, confusing, or diluted,” she says. “It’s our job to make sure the story is intentional, not accidental.”

So what advice would she give to anyone trying to explain complex topics better?

“Make it clear to yourself. Understand your audience. And find a good metaphor, as it makes your story stick.”

Her closing line sums it all up, half-joking and half perfectly serious:

“Tell your story before confusion spreads, rebellion starts, and five new versions of the truth appear.”