How I got into Product Management
Getting into product management is hard. This is something probably everyone knows. Especially in India, most companies have a very strong tendencies to look for candidates from the elite colleges and B-schools. So if you are someone who hasn’t graduated from IITs or NITs and do not have any MBA from IIMs under your belt, the chances are that you will find very less takers.
Now in my case, I had another hurdle. Not only was I not from an elite college, I wasn’t even a engineering grad. I have done by Bachelor’s from a college in Mysore. My optional subjects were in life sciences. I finished that and went on to do a Masters in Genetics from University of Mysore. Basically, I was a post graduate in Genetics (Life Science) from a state university. The odds were stacked against me.
However, let me be clear about one thing. Most people have said this and I will repeat it. You do not need an engineering degree or even a MBA to break into product management. I am the living example of this. Product management is more about discovering opportunities, solving problems, and managing to make different teams align and work towards a goal.
There are several paid programs for Product Management. If you are from India like me, you have the option of spending lot of money and getting a course from places such as UpGrad, Great Learning, Upraised, and Jigsaw Academy. These course are very expensive. They may or may not help in placements. Even IIMs and ISB have started to offer courses in PM because it has become lucrative.
If you can’t spend a huge some of money, you can instead opt for lesser paid courses from companies such as HelloPM, NextLeap, Growth School, and UnLearn Product. They will cost you far lesser and most of them also help in networking with existing PMs to get job offers. However, there are two places where you can learn Product management for free. Yes, absolutely Free.
First is Product Hood, run by Lokesh Gupta. He has a very long waiting period for his free cohort and demands you to show efforts. Which means he will kick you off the cohort if you miss the classes, do not submit the assignments, and/or do not take part in community discussions. Nonetheless, he puts you through the grind and teaches you how exactly it is to become a PM.
Second is the Insurjo program by The Product Folks. Unfortunately it happens once a year and I was a part of it this year (2022). They get product leaders across the world to come and teach about all things products and definitely one to look out for.
You can also take up PM course on Udemy. I did that too, because the content was great. I took the one by Cole and Evan. There is great course on Udemy by Dr Bart Jaworski. You can also look into Swag Wala PM by Shravan Tickoo on YouTube if you are Indian and understand Hindi.
Till now I spoke about learning how to be a PM. However, getting the PM job is a whole other ball game. Most companies want an experienced PM. Those who are looking to hire an Associate PM are also looking to hire an experienced APM. This makes no sense to me. If I were to have 2–3 years experience as an Associate PM, I would certainly be looking for a PM role. But then again, most HRs are clueless and our hiring process is so beyond broken, I could possibly write a whole article about it.
Instead of applying to job posting on LinkedIn, you need to target the posts to get referrals. How do you do that? Well, you should instead search for Associate Product Manager, filter for posts that are less than 24 hours old. You will end up finding loads of people hiring or ready to refer people for APM roles in their organization.
Apart from this, having a product portfolio helps greatly in breaking into product management. If you do not know how to make a product portfolio, read this article by Ankit Shukla of HelloPM. I would advice using Notion for making your portfolio. Showcase your work and your product sense to potential employers.
Please understand this, you need to be persistent. You have to target a lot of open positions. Eventually one of the opportunities will open the door for you. I have spent nearly 4 months before I got my first PM job. It is frustrating and agonizing at times, but the reward will only be that much sweeter at the end.
