Achieving the above and being formally recognised for it is also known as lateral promotion acording to Promoting to a new employer It’s important not to give the impression (or have the idea) that you’re using the company only as a stepping stone to becoming the “Head of Product Management” or promoted to being the “Group Product Manager.”
Where do you, as the Product Manager, see yourself in three years time?
I always find this question challenging: the pace of product management and technology is moving so fast that it would be quite difficult to predict where or what today’s product manager would be doing in three or five years time. However here are a few thoughts that may help you answer the question and put you on track for a prolonged and fruitful career as Product Manager
Stress on seeing yourself as a successful Product Manager
I’ve always liked this quote from Allan R Cohen book “The portable MBA in Management”
“…the meaning of success has also changed for most people. No longer do people think of success in terms only in vertical terms (for example in terms of promotions). Increasingly, people define success in their own terms, measured against their own particular set of gaols and values in life. We call this psychological success. The good thing about success from the individuals point of view is while there is only one way to achieve vertical success (that of moving up), there are an infinite variety of ways of achieving psychological success.”
The Product Manager could apply philosophy of horizontal success by talking about:
"The lateral promotion is where, because of your increased knowledge, skills or experience, you earn more pay but do not get a managerial position. Many companies have realised over the past decade that one way to keep their personnel happy is not to make them supervisor, manager, partner or vice president, but to pay them better for being good at what they do. It's a simple way of rewarding - and keeping - valuable employees without putting extra strain or a new life on them."
Be sure to persuade the interviewer that you are able and ready to add value to the company and the product range(s) you will be managing before you give any impression on having a desire to climb the corporate ladder.
16 April, 2008
Where will the product manager be in 3 years time?
11 April, 2008
7 things the Product Manager needs to consider when bypassing processes
Wikipedia, states that: Product lifecycle management (PLM) is the process of managing the entire lifecycle of a product from its conception, through design and manufacture, to service and disposal. Therefore it is important that the product manager believes and supports the processes that the company has implemented. However are there ever situations when it is acceptable to break an agreed process?
The answer depends a lot on the industry and products you’re managing. Very early on in my career I worked as an Avionics Engineer – the company would periodically be audited (with little or no warning) by the CAA, FAA and internal QA department. For obvious reasons failure to adhere to and being seen to follow the laid down processes would be totally unacceptable. Other industries are bound by SOX or ISO 9001 etc…. So if asked, at an interview – it would be wise to demonstrate that you understand and embrace the appropriate processes and procedures. However it would also be good to demonstrate that you can think outside the box. Some industries are not heavily regulated and there will be times when bypassing a process may result in commercial gain. If you feel it is appropriate to bypass processes then by sure to indicate that you would consider the following 7 points:
1. Inform your line manager. The last thing you want is for you boss to approach you if something goes wrong – ensure you keep her/him in the loop.
2. Weigh up the risk and rewards to the company and product. Are you sacrificing quality and therefore the company’s reputation for the sort term commercial gain? E.g. by shipping a product to a customer before it has been fully beta tested. On the other hand if you don’t ship first will you competitor ship before you and gain valuable market share?
3. Weigh up the risk and rewards to your career – in other words would you feel confident defending your actions to corporate management? How would you explain a lost commercial opportunity to the CEO or MD?
4. Keep a record of what was not done or who was not consulted.
5. Send an email, inadvance, to those who may have actually by pass the process and be sure that you clearly indicate that you as the ‘Product Manager’ are prepared to take full responsibility for any unfavourable outcome.
6. After the event (e.g. a release of a new online feature) be sure to backtrack – tidy up any loose ends and make sure that the records correctly reflect what actually happened and why. Or continue beta testing and offer the first customers free upgrade etc…
7. Review the process that was bypassed and see if it could be improved to cater for any future emergencies.
My final thought on the topic is never by pass a process if it involves compromising on health and safety, breaking the law or deceiving the customers/end user no matter what the commercial gains.
31 March, 2008
If you want to get into Product Management - then ask a good Product Manager.
Many ask the question “How do I get into Product Management” well here are a few links to Q&As, on the topic, on Jeff Lash’s new website ‘Ask a Good Product Manager’
How can a software engineer become a product manager?
View my answer to this question - hopefully it will help not just the asker but many more software engineers who want to make the transition from software engineering to product management.
How can I become a product management consultant?
After being a product manager for a number of years you may want to change career and become a product management consultant. Read how Adrienne Tan of brainmates answers this question.
How can I become a product manager without any experience?
Saeed Khan of On Product Management shares his views on how to get into product management.
You can also read more of my thoughts on how to get into product management at:
How to get into Product Management
And read how other got into Product Management at:
How others have moved into Product Management
25 March, 2008
How do Product Managers Keep up with Technology?
In general Product Management and/or Technical Product Management is about orientating between business and markets trends and needs and
being able utilise technology to define product features and enhancements. Marty Cagan, in his article Are You Technical Enough? States that:
"When I interview product management candidates, I’m looking hard at these two points. The candidate must convince me that they are capable of understanding and applying new technology, and of earning the respect of the engineering team."
As such keeping up with new and emerging technologies and learning about technologies that could be new to you is not only a challenge but critical to being a good and well respected Product Manager. Marty in the same article gives a few tips on how to stay technically savvy or should I say technologically savvy.
"There are many ways to do this. Books, articles, blogs, extension courses, experiment with the technologies or write software on your own, spend more time with your engineers, ask them about the technology topics they are exploring and tag along."
From Marketing to Product Management: Ivan Chalif says that he
"...typically let my Engineers bring new technologies to me, but I keep my eye open for new UI features and capabilities in other products that I think might be useful for my users. I also subscribe to a number of usability- and technology-oriented RSS feeds."
Transition from Web Developer to Product Manager: Patrick Jolley said "By using sites like TechCrunch and eHub. I also really like the ‘Movers and Shakers’ section on Alexa."
Interview with a Director of Product Management: Paul Young says that he tries "... to read a lot. I make heavy use of Google Reader to keep up with RSS feeds from favorite tech sites like Engadget. I also regularly read the other Product Management blogs that I link from my site, Product Beautiful. I am always amazed and humbled by the great thoughts and posts that other Product Management bloggers are creating."
Interview with an Ex AOL Product Manager: Brunella said "By reading a lot on the Internet and getting the latest hints through friends and colleagues in the field."
Interview with Jeff Lash: Author of How to be a Good Product Manager "... I try to read as many blogs as I can manage, read general consumer and business magazines, and learn from colleagues. I try to use as many new web sites as possible -- I always sign up for the "notify me when this service is available" email notifications, since there's too many to remember. As much as I try to stay ahead of the curve, though, I can't keep track of everything. My feeling is that if something is really going to be important, I don't need to be the first to find out about it, since I'll probably hear about it soon enough if enough people are talking about it."
From Technical Support to Product Management Mark Barns states "Mostly through working closely with in house development teams on Product Requirement and Software Requirement Specs. Continuous customer engagement, Trade Shows and Standards bodies attendance also help."
Tony Bradley in his article: Keeping up with Tehnology gives this advice:
"New technologies and improved technologies are emerging all the time. It can be daunting to try to keep up with them all. Remember to focus on keeping your business needs in mind and finding the technology that helps solve them rather than keeping up with technology just for the sake of keeping up with technology."
How do you keep up with technology? – Please feel free to share your thoughts and experiences.
10 March, 2008
Interview question on under performing
What would you do if your boss called you to a meeting and informed you that your team has been complaining about your lack of leadership and management?
You would or course be surprised even shocked because you would have put things in place to ensure that you where leading and managing the team well. Once you express that you would be surprised you could then:
1. Ask if their where any particular examples.
2. List the things you would have in place to ensure that individually and collectively the team felt they where managed and led. Such as:
a. Regular team meetings – where everyone has the opportunity to give feedback and where you have the opportunity.
b. Regular one to one sessions – where you have a chance to get close to your team members.
c. Periodic review of work done – with out micromanaging your team.
d. Yearly formal appraisals where tasks are set followed through with formal quarterly reviews.
The above demonstrates to the interviewer how you would manage your team so that such a situation would not occur.
However if such a complaint surfaced and your line manage agreed with the complaint then you could suggest you work with your line manager to put an action plan together in order to get things back on track.
05 March, 2008
Interview Question: How Do Product Managers Handle Success?
The interviewer poses the folloing question:
"You, and your team, were involved in a successful launch of a new product that exceeded business expectations during its first phase - what would you do?"
First I would Celebrate [with the team of course] and then….
Follow Brian Lawley’s advice which is stay humble and give credit to the team.
Following that it would be critical to analyse all the activities that led to the success launch of the product. State that as the product manager I'd have the over view of all activities but the analyse will be designed to get into the detail.
Were standard processes and procedures followed? – If they where then that’s fine, if not find out what was done differently and then suggest that the particular process might be improved in the light of the current success.
How was the interaction between the various stakeholders? Did the requirements change? What methodology did the development use: Scrum, DSDM, Waterfall (probably not!). Were there code reviews, was there pair-programming for those real in-depth tricky aspects of the code base.
How was the marketing tasks carried out? – What budget was spent on promoting the product via to launch compared to other product launches? How was the sales team trained?
Round up your answer by stating that you would document the feedback – coupled with your own observations and recommendations and then work towards embedding the improvements into the 'departments and company culture' so that the next phase and next product launch will be even more successful. Finally state that you would share and discuss your finding with your colleagues via case-study on the departmental blog and/or team meeting, thus functioning around CMMI level 2 to 3.
04 March, 2008
Where do you see your product in two years time?
Looking into the future and knowing what the competition, the market and your product will be like is probably one of the most challenging tasks that any product manager has to undertake. This can be a tricky question to answer at a job interview. “Where do you see product x in y years time”? How a product manager answers this question gives the interviewer an insight as to how much of a visionary they are and whether or not they keep a keen eye on technology as it progresses. Here are two mini case study answers to such as question.
I carried out a few interviews over the last couple of days and asked the candidates “How do they see the web in a few years time.” A few interesting thoughts came up. One person drew an analogy between the way television has evolved over the past few years: from two analog channels in black and white to 100s of digital channels via cable & satellite. Like wise the number of web pages will continue to increase therefore competition for viewer-eye-balls will increase as well. The candidate went on to say that as TV has become an integral part of everyday life the web will become even more embedded in the lives of business professionals. We will become more reliant on information to do our jobs and that information will be provided via the types of on-line products and services that we ['we' being the company they were hoping to join] produce – our [being 'us' working together] challenge is to package the information in an easy, digestible and appealing way so that users keep on coming back for more. The subtle use of we and our came over quite well.
The other candidate focused on enabling technologies like ajax and silverlight to enhance the user experience and discussed the merits of web 2.0: social networks and web services to give users a more personalised experience – he quoted the BBCs and new home page i-google as an example of being able to move widgets around a webpage and mix and match a combination of widgets to give you the all the information you want in the format you want. Thay stressed that going forward many more websites would adopt and roll out such features- untill they become almost standard. They also mentioned how mobile device will probably change and copy the UI of apples i-phone.
03 March, 2008
How others have moved into Product Management
2. From Web Developer to Product Manager 3. From Hardware R&D Engineer to Product Management 4. From Mechanical Engineering to Software Product Management 5. The man that did all the roles before entering Product Management 6. From Business Analyst to Product Management 7. From Webmaster to Product Management 10. From User Experience Designer to Product Management
How do I become a product manager? There is no one right answer to this question however one thing we do know is that very few if any people enter the realms of technical product management immediately. I have interviewed a number of Product Managers who have shared their background, experiences, likes, dislikes and given tips on how to succeed.
1. From Marketing to Product Management
Ivan Chalif studied psychology and counselling at university as opposed to business studies or technology – however he is a successful technical product manager. Read how Ivan made the various transitions in his career that eventually resulted in him becoming a product manager. Read From Marketing to Product Management for more details.
Patrick was a web developer who produced online products for the travel industry. Patrick took an interest in the business operated become acquainted with the key business stakeholders and eventually made the transition into product managers for the travel products the business went through a restructure. refer to Patrick's interview for more details: Transition from Web Developer to Product Manager
Francois Abbe had a strong technical background and worked for an engineer led company. As a result the engineers were used in many client facing activities. This gave Francois the opportunity to perform many of the product management roles while being an engineer. This helped make the smooth transition to product manage many of the products that he worked on as an engineer.Read From R&D Engineer to Product Manager for more information
Bikram Gupta has an academic background in Mechanical engineering – he used his engineering degree to get into IT. Bikram has a wide technical background and has read his way into Product Management Follow the link to read Bikram's interview
Marty Cagan has worked for several hi tech
Andy started his career as a Business Analyst - the opportunity arose for him to temporary manage a few products. He took up the challenge, impressed his employer and then got promoted. He has since moved onto a new product management role and market sector Andy's interview can be found at Moving from Business Analyst to Product Manager to "Online Product Manager"
Daniel worked for a publisher as a webmaster. When his company went through a restructure he applied for a job as a project manager in the IS department. This gave him exposure to Product management and it was just a matter of time before he moved through the ranks and now managers a strong portfolio of online products for the aerospace industry Danile's interview can be found at the following link:
Paul Young started life studying Radio-Television-Film at University but quickly moved into web applications programming which eventually led into Product management. Paul is currently a Director of Product Management. Read
9.From Account Management to Product Management
Brunella Russo was an Account Management for a Financial Company. She moved into Product Management at AOL. Read
Jeff Lash has a strong background in User Experience Designer and has practiced information architecture. Jeff now works as the Product Director for MD Consult, a leading web site providing clinical reference information for physicians and medical professionals.
11. The man who read himself into Product Management.
Matt Rowe is one of those Product Managers who is self taught and self read. Matt was a Business Analyst (BA) prior to becoming a Product Manager. As a BA he ran several small projects – this coupled with his BA experience put him in good stead to become a product manager. Interview with a Product Manager
12. from Customer Support Engineer to Product Management
Mark Barnes found him self having to face customers in order to fix and install problems with equipment they had purchased - now he talks to customers with the aim of producing products that will provide them with solutions. Read From Technical Support to Product Management for more information.
Related articles:
How to improve your Product Management career and grow in your job
Interview Questions for Product Managers
How to get into Product Management
02 March, 2008
From Marketing to Product Management
Ivan Chalif is author of th eblog The Productologist. He is also a founding member of the Silicon Valley Product Management Association (SVPMA). In addition to creating the original logo, and managing the website and forums, Ivan was instrumental in organizing early SVPMA events and establishing the organization’s charter.
1.What’s your academic background/training?
Both my undergraduate and graduate degrees are in Psychology and Counseling. While getting my undergraduate degree, my focus was on working with individuals with severe psychological disorders like Multiple Personality Disorder, Schizophrenia (which by the way, is not the same as MPD, even though they are commonly used interchangeably by the media), Bi-Polar disorder, and Depression. My graduate school work centered on working with young gifted students with behavioral problems. Learning to communicate effectively with both of these populations has gone a long way in contributing to my success as a Product Manager.
2.What did you do before you where a product manager?
Before I settled into Product Management, I worked in a variety of Marketing roles, including competitive intelligence, marketing generalist, webmaster, and application prototyper.
3.Where did you work before you worked for StrongMail Systems?
The past few years, I have worked at Email Service Providers like Acxiom Digital and ValueClick. Before that, I was Director of Marketing at a small online agency and before that I worked in the library automation industry.
4.What inspired you to become a product manager?
To be honest, I fell into Product Management. It combines many of the business functions that I enjoy (and some I don’t) and it was only through trying out other Marketing roles that I found out what Product Management actually was and started to get more interested in moving into that type of position. I am passionate about the user experience and in many organizations that starts with Product Management.
5.How did you make the move from being in Marketing to becoming a product manager?
I moved into Product Management through a hybrid role that combined Web Producer and Product Management functions.
6. What do you like best about your job?
The part of Product Management that I like the most is solving problems. There isn’t a day that goes by that I am not working on solving a problem for a customer, prospect or internal user. It may be as simple as addressing a customer question or as complex as creating a brand new workflow for users, but it’s the challenge of overcoming the constant onslaught of problems that I find most stimulating.
7.What do you least like about your job?
Meetings.
8.How do you keep up with the latest technologies?
I typically let my Engineers bring new technologies to me, but I keep my eye open for new UI features and capabilities in other products that I think might be useful for my users. I also subscribe to a number of usability- and technology-oriented RSS feeds.
9.Describe your Product Management job in one sentence.
Balancing spinning plates on a drinking straw while walking a tightrope as fast as you can with an itch on your nose.
10.What’s your dream product to manage?
In an ideal world, I would love to be the Product Manager of a motorcycle. I’ve been a fan of motorbikes since my youth and with “standard” bikes in particular. My two favorite bikes are the 1984-86 Honda CB700s and the 1986-87 Yamaha Fazer.
11.How would you describe managing product development before you/your company adopted agile?
Most of the companies that I have worked at have used a traditional or modified waterfall development process. There was one company where we used an iterative development process, but that was more a function of lack of development planning versus actually following an agile method. I am not convinced that an agile development process is ideal for every type of product, so I am not driving a change to that from our current process, but I would be interested in working with a development team that uses the agile methodology to see how it works first hand.
12. What would be the top three attributes you need to do your job?
a. The ability to make decisions quickly and effectively.
b. Being able to communicate with both internal and external stakeholders.
c. Comfort with a rapidly changing environment.
13. What’s the key attribute you need in order to work with the development team?
The patience to see your plan through to the end. There is a constant tug-of-war between Product Management and Engineering. Product Managers want more features in less time; Engineers want fewer features in more time. There are compromises along the way on both sides, but don’t sacrifice key elements of the product plan because they are difficult or haven’t been done before. Stand up for your ideas, your product and your users. That’s what it means to be a Product Manager.
14. What do you do when you’re not managing products (outside interests)?
Besides spending as much time with my family as possible, I try to fit in a variety of physical and mental activities including, soccer (futbol for the rest of the world ), running, snowboarding, reading hard science fiction and political satire, and occasionally blogging.
16. What advice would you give some one who wants to become a product manager.
Product Management is a broad practice that is, at best, loosely defined. If you are thinking about becoming a Product Manager, try some adjunct roles first. Sales, Corporate Marketing, Support, and Professional Services (or Engineering, if you are technically-inclined) will all give you a good background and the skills necessary to be a successful Product Manager. If you are a new Product Manager, it’s easy to get sucked into doing things that aren’t really product-related. Stay focused on addressing the needs of your users and understanding your market. The rest will fall into place.
19 February, 2008
Transition from Web Developer to Product Manager
People often ask the question – How do I to get into Product Management [from being a software engineer, project manager, business analyst etc…]. Patrick Jolley is a case in point of a web developer who recognised an opportunity to move into Product Management and took it.
1. What’s your academic background/training?
I studied Business Information Technology at University. When I started I intended to do the full 4 years and come out with a degree. I soon realised that the life of a student wasn’t for me and left after two years receiving an Higher National Diploma (HND).
2. What did you do before you where a product manager?
I’ve worked for Reed Business Information UK (RBI - UK) since I finished University, initially in software support, then software development and then web development.
3. What inspired you to become a product manager?
As a developer I always enjoyed getting involved in the requirements gathering, design and specification stages of projects. SEO and especially usability are also areas I am particularly interested in, so it just seemed like the natural progression for my career. That and the fact that I’d had enough of being a developer!
4. How did you make the move from being a developer to becoming a product manager?
The group I was working in was merged with another area of the business. During this time there was a lot of change, I saw my opportunity and took it.
5. What do you like best about your job?
The creativity and innovation aspects of the role are especially enjoyable. It is also very satisfying to deliver something you feel proud of.
6. What do you least like about your job?
Every so often things inevitably go wrong and life becomes very hectic!
7. How do you keep up with the latest technologies?
By using sites like TechCrunch and eHub. I also really like the ‘Movers and Shakers’ section on Alexa.
8. Describe your Product Management job in one sentence.
I’ll use three words instead. Challenging, varied and rewarding.
9. What’s your dream product to manage?
Haven’t got one in particular – although I think I’d really enjoy the challenge of working for a start-up.
10. What would be the top three attributes you need to do your job?
Communication, organisation and market knowledge.
11. What’s the key attribute you need in order to work with the development team?
An English to Klingon dictionary. Seriously – I think being able to trust each other is the key.
12. What are the main differences you have found between being a developer and being a product manager?
I can’t be as hands on with the products anymore which can sometimes be tough when things go wrong or aren’t happening as quickly as you’d like.
13.What do you do when you’re not managing products (outside interests)?
I like to travel, play and watch football, cook, eat and sleep.
Related articles:
From R&D Engineer to Product Manager
Moving from Technology to Product Management to increase business skills
From Software Engineer to Product Manager to Founder of SVPG - Interview with Marty Cagan
Moving from Business Analyst to Product Manager to "Online Product Manager"
Transition from Webmaster to Product Manager via Project Management
14 February, 2008
How do you demonstrate that you can manage products
This is an interview question that gives you the opportunity to:
a) Demonstrate that you have a practical experience in the product development process.
b) That you have considered the user by developing a product that utilises technology to solve a problem and therefore meets the customer’s needs.
c) That you are able to lead with-out-authority by matrix managing a cross functional team of multi-disciplined professionals.
When answering this question you also have the opportunity to briefly touch on a previous area/question that you may have felt you didn’t answer too well – however you have to be brief, no detract in any way shape or form from the original question and ensure you don’t give the impression that you are labouring any particular point or trying to get one up on the interviewer. For example if you where previously asked about stakeholder management and you didn’t feel that you gave a full and impressive answer - then touch on your experience on stakeholder management while speaking about a project you have worked on.
A few typical points that you need to bring out are as follows:
- Be sure to outline the role you played at each stage.
- Ensure you highlight that you took the initiative at each key stages.
- Speak about brain storming sessions that you led out in to firm up on requirements and the products feature set and ultimately define the product.
- Your ability to create and manage a product roadmap.
- Be sure to explain how you communicated the vision and project to technical and business stakeholders.
- Show how you led the team and got buy-in at each stage of the product life cycle.
- Speak about your interaction with stakeholders from across the organisation from sales and marketing to engineering and customer support.
It is important that you take the opportunity while answering this question to speak about your domain and knowledge of the technologies you worked with – coupled with your sharp business acumen. Above all don’t be afraid to mention things that went wrong BUT be sure to speak about what you did to put things right and be prepare demonstrate what you learnt from such mistakes.
The interviewer may ask you to speak about a project that went well or not so well. If so be sure clearly demonstrate that you understand why the project went the way it did.
It's possible to spend the whole interview on this one question alone -
Bottom line is that you as the Product Manager are seen to be in fully in touch with the product at every stag ein its life cycle.
10 February, 2008
How to get into Product Management
Bikram Gupta was a developer,
ProfSvcs has left a comment on my blog post "Moving from Technology to Product Management to increase business skills" ‘asking how someone gets into product management’. The answer became what I would consider too long for a comment so I’ve written this article that I hope will help him and others who what to move into product management. I must stress that this is my opinion based on my own experience and the experience of others I’ve worked with.
Rest assure very few people leave education (college, university…) and walk straight into 'technical product management' (as opposed to 'marketing product management' which is closly related to 'brand management')– we all have had a life before product management and that life (job) helps form the basis of our current role, consider where the following Product Managers have come from:
Marty Cagan a software engineer,
Andy Wicks a Business Analyst,
Daniel Leon a web-master and then a project manager,
Paul Young a web developer,
Brunella Russo worked in Account Management/Client Support role,
Jeff Lash worked as an information architecture and user-centered (IA & UCD)design, and
Matt Rowe has a background as a business/ systems analyst.
Put the results of your analysis and action plan into a presentation – book a meeting with the Head of Product Management and make a pitch for a job. Remember you must show that you can add value.
Again you could think about raising your desire to move into product management at your annual appraisal. Ask if you could be seconded to Product Management for a period of time.
A lot depends on the culture of your company and the type of managers your dealing with.
Finnally you need to be constantly reading and studying.
You need to immerse yourself with good reading material I would personally recommend the following:
How to be a good product manager
Silicon Valley Product group
Listern to the Webinas on Product maagement View
04 February, 2008
Moving from Technology to Product Management to increase business skills
Bikram Gupta has been been in Product Management for over 3 years he has worked in various markets and technologies such as: Telecom/Wireless, Data Networking, and Security domains. Bikram describes himself as a “knowledge worker” at heart; he’s passionate about exploring different lateral business roles outside the sales funnel. Bikram used to authors a blog entitle "Thoughts on Product Management"
#1. What’s your academic background/training?
Started working in IT with a Mechanical engineering graduation course. I obtained further knowledge in computer architecture, system programming, and Internet technologies through work experience and reading. Product Management skills were obtained through a combination job experience and reading.
#2. What did you do before you where a product manager?
I worked in various roles in R&D; in development and QA, both hands on and as a project leader.
#3. What companies have you worked for?
Currently with McAfee, and prior to that worked in Lucent and IP Unity Glenayre.
#4. What inspired you to become a product manager?
I wanted to be an independent business professional. Having Technology & programming skills were not enough. I firmly believe that sound business skills can be obtained by working in various lateral product management roles – so I decided to switch to product management.
#5. How did you make the move from being a developer to becoming a product manager?
I suppose it was a combination of good luck and the interviewer being able to see the potential with in me, I would like to think that she saw that I had good systems thinking skills that could be applied and adapted to the product management role.
#6. What do you like best about your job?
Being able to take business decisions and being accountable for them.
#7. What do you least like about your job?
When I find myself questioning the fundamentals of how things are getting along and not having all the power or authority to make the necessary changes.
#8. How do you keep up with the latest technologies?
I am an avid reader and I have a background of working in various domains.
#9. Describe your Product Management job in one sentence?
Defining the right product(s), ensuring it is build right and position it right.
#10. What’s your dream product to manage?
An open standard based personal assistant, which can be your second brain.
#11. What would be the top three attributes you need to do your job?
Cross-functional communication (and I would emphasis listening skills), reading the market correctly and then quantifying it coupled with good domain/technology knowledge.
#12. What’s the key attribute you need in order to work with the development team?
Good relationship and mutual admiration.
#13. What do you do when you’re not managing products (outside interests)?
Spend time with family, and then read, read, read....and then read some more.
#14. What advice would you give some one who wants to become a product manager?
It’s a passion. It’s your love for the product, people and company and so obviously you want to do is what’s best for all these. It should be simple so keep it simple.
30 January, 2008
How Product Managers can push back at an interview
Interviews are about persuading the interviewer(s) that you are the right person for the job. That you will be able to deliver the goods even when the going gets tough. A question that I like to pose to perspective Product Managers to determine if they can deliver in the face of adversity is:
What the interviewer(s) are looking for:
#How would you, as the product manager, manage upwards?
#Do you have the product management skills to communicate at the CEO/MD level?
#Are you able to push back in a diplomatic way?
#Are you able to manage expectations?
Suggested thoughts that need to be projected are as follows:
It’s important to be in tune with the commercial aspirations of chief executives and senior stakeholders. You need to demonstrate that you share the vision and will be an asset and not an obstacle to achieving the ultimate goal. However – and here comes the but – BUT you need to be able to positively steer the thinking towards realistic time frames and firming up on the unknowns [power point presentation are generally shallow]. Details need to be properly defined – here you have the opportunity to demonstrate [to the interviewer]:
- your skills in creating a road map –
- that flows into a project backlog –
- that divides down into a set of user stories -
- that can be estimated in terms of complexity and
- time to complete.
- Who? (permanent or contract),
- When (do you need technical resources to assist in the research if research is needed) and
- How much does will it cost (different organisations have different approaches to recharges – central departments or each business unit having their own development team(s).
Ensure that you demonstrate your ability to balance your business and commercial acumen as it’s the combination of 'business sense and technical sense' that makes a good product manager. Remember organisations (and therefore processes) differ one from another - the interviewer will understand this - so it's the logical thought processes and stakeholder management skills you show when answering that determine if you give a satisfactory answer or not.