Product managers stare at screens, grinning through gritted teeth. Energized by AI’s raw power. Exhausted by its endless demands. Nikhyl Singhal, former Meta vice president of product, calls it ‘smiling exhaustion.’ ‘I’ve never seen an industry that’s more tired than they are now,’ he told Lenny’s Podcast . Everyone’s in a state of alert. Nothing’s constant. Singhal sees the paradox everywhere in his community of senior leaders. AI tools like Claude let product managers prototype ideas, test hypotheses, coordinate teams—all faster than before. Tasks that dragged on for days now wrap in hours. Workers ship more. They feel productive. But stress mounts. Skills obsolete in months. ‘People, even if they’re doing well, they feel more stressed because they worry they’re either not keeping up, or they worry this industry is going to change, and essentially they’ll be roadkill along that way,’ Singhal said on the Business Insider -cited podcast. If you don’t love building stuff, you’re in trouble.…