What does a Product Manager do? Due to company and team needs, there isn’t really a right answer. Even after researching about what the role is and how to become one, it is often difficult to break into the product world without already having experience as a Product Manager. This is quite contradictory, as the role is rather new and doesn’t require any specific kind of formal training. As a graduating student breaking into the industry full time, I thought I would try and clear up any misconceptions I’ve had about the role and responsibilities of a Product Manager through my own product experiences.
According to Atlassian,
“A product manager is the person who identifies the customer need and the larger business objectives that a product or feature will fulfill, articulates what success looks like for a product, and rallies a team to turn that vision into a reality.”
They did a great job of generalizing the role of a Product Manager, but the role often has more differences than similarities within different organizations. Some postings can be for the marketing side as a Product Marketing Manager, compared to diving into APIs and SDKs as a Technical Product Manager.
What is a Product Manager? What are some responsibilities that all Product Managers have in common?
A PM is a jack of all trades, and a master of one. They should be able to understand the product inside and out, and be able to describe a high level overview of it and how it works to anyone in simple terms. They are in charge of defining the vision and roadmap for a product, while keeping in mind what users want when aligning with the business and stakeholders around what the product’s functionality and purpose should be. Communication between all parties and asking questions when the smallest things are unclear is key to make sure everyone is on the same page.
Make sure to cover all the requirements from everyone involved when writing feature specs. It’s tough to do on your first attempt!
Who does a Product Manager work with on a daily basis? What makes what they do so important?
From all the cross-functional communication a PM does, they become the designated middle person for everyone involved on the product. This makes them the first point of contact for most questions, redirecting to appropriate team members, or even answering real time feedback and complaints if something goes wrong for a user.
The term ‘stakeholder management’ is thrown around a lot as a Product Manager works with everyone in a business, all the way from the executives of a company, all the departments in between like engineering, marketing, UX, and finally the actual users of the product. Product Managers can also work with external vendors, and having a good relationship with them is key to make sure the product is delivered on time.
This means talking to different people around the business and building relationships with them. Bringing snacks to vendor meetings are a great way to break the ice!
What does the day-to-day of a Product Manager look like? Does it include coding?
Product Managers are always in meetings, however they also have to find time to do their work assignments, which includes business development tasks like building roadmaps and timelines, analyzing different market trends, and managing feature backlogs.
Some tasks also include doing repetitive manual work like acceptance testing for different features of the product, or just writing an endless amount of documentation, so be ready for that as well.
In my experience, PMs aren’t involved much in coding, but SQL and other data analysis tools like Power BI and Tableau will definitely come in handy when working with those fancy BI reports to show the executives different metrics about the product or new feature releases. On the other hand, having a technical background will come in handy on any team, as it makes it easier to understand what your engineers are working on, and to align with them on timelines and the scope of the features they are building out. Another benefit is that it reduces the learning curve significantly for these technical concepts, which is where a lot of Product Managers struggle to find a balance between what the business wants and what is actually possible with the given resources.
Product Managers have an increasing importance in organizations nowadays as they embody the meeting place between the business and a technical product. Personally, I am pursuing the path of Product Management as I am fond of improving the impact a product has on a user’s life, and continuously learning and iterating on it to make it the best version it possibly can be. Even though I joke about being stuck in meetings and talking all day for a living, I find value in building relationships and making a significant impression on all parts of an organization.
All the best on your product journey!
