Being a senior manager in Flo: how to dive into the product world
From middle to senior: what skills we value in product managers and how to find them in yourself
We strongly believe that Flo is an app that we can keep on upgrading indefinitely. New features and functions make it even more attractive not just for the end user but for the product team as well. It is no secret that our product managers are the backbone of the app’s user-friendly interface and performance capabilities. They are in constant search of effective, original solutions, and they are constantly creating new features and improving the product’s quality.
For this reason, we are very scrupulous about selecting new team members. One of the criteria is that they should have the qualifications of a senior PM. This is where most product managers face a dilemma. On the one hand, the candidate is mentally ready to function as a senior, on the other — has insufficient qualifications.
What sort of candidates can receive a senior job offer? And does the title really require expertise and experience alone? We have compiled a generic description of the sort of professional we would gladly welcome into our team.
5 steps to go from a middle product manager to a senior one:
1. Soberly assess your level of qualifications.
And that does not mean that you should only be self-critical. It also entails estimating your abilities from the perspective of their future growth. The more you inquire about how to become a senior and the less you put in real effort to grow as a specialist, the more obvious your lack of confidence becomes.
Chasing after some made-up skills, many middle PMs forget that they have already obtained the most essential one for a senior — the ability to work within unpredictable scenarios. If you are not scared of a challenge but rather fascinated with tasks where the goal is vague and the algorithm and the outcome criteria are not crystal clear, then you are on the right track.
2. Never stop growing.
It is wrong to consider a senior position as the destination point. Specialists of such rank never stop developing themselves; doing so can be career suicide. A senior’s previous experience is not a box of ready-made solutions; instead, it is a basis for the new ideas, an accumulated knowledge source that helps one go the extra mile in the product marathon.
A Senior should be open-minded. Not every piece of advice or experience from other product managers will apply to your industry. However, every additional piece of knowledge may show you a new way to achieve your goals.
When you retreat to using the same old ideas and proven theories, you delay your progress and miss career opportunities.
3. Think of career growth as a product.
From the product point of view, the goal of becoming a senior is not any different from the goal of, say, increasing subscription retention. To achieve the latter, it is not crucial to understand what retention means for a certain product, or what subscriptions are being used; a conversation with the experts will paint you the picture. These are the significant steps to take toward the solution. The same personal magic applies here: the very process of fulfilling the task of becoming a senior brings you closer to reaching this goal. Imagine how much easier the development would be if the same were applicable for the retention goal.
Here, the formation of the task and the depth of analysis will reveal the difference between Senior and Middle PMs. You have to gather information from both outside and inside; analyze it; set the goal and criteria for success; to define the milestones starting from the goal and then moving back to the present. Then you may start chipping away at it, bit by bit.
To see one’s career as an expression of the product will be quite enlightening. Any framework can be applied to this: priority for ICE development opportunities, sprint expertise growth planning, or testing of acquired MVP skills.
It’s simple. Therefore, to become a senior, one should not only focus on solving the undefined problems; it is more about readiness to accept those problems.
4. Go beyond the existing frameworks.
“I witnessed the performance of others all the time, I understand the solution’s key factors; however, I will not just mindlessly copy and paste, rather, I’ll experiment with it.”
A good senior uses a critical approach toward the existing solutions. But first, every PM should grow within the process and learn basic and effective problem solving by using well-established frameworks.
The next stage is “I know how to fill and empty the backlog; the developers and stakeholders are no longer an obstacle. What else do I need for finding an undefined problem and solving it from scratch?”
A middle PM can move to the next level once she realizes they have enough experience of the process and it is time for conceptional growth. Everyone will have their own search and their own route. Usually, that won’t mean the new frameworks or tools; rather, it will involve overcoming mental barriers like a lack of interest in details, lack of motivation, fear of responsibility, and pride. If you are ready to overcome those, new solutions will come your way.
Imagine that while studying the JTDB interview you notice some unexpected insights from users describing the case, and those insights do not match the initial picture. On the one hand, they do not match the “I Hire the Product for a job” logic and so they can be discarded; on the other hand, they can still prove useful and completely change the topic of research. The seasoned practicing product manager will be able to find that balance (not to quit on the insights but reduce the JTBD study continuation time and test the new hypothesis in the background) and, if necessary, to promptly change the strategy, saving weeks or even months of development time.
5. Move from methodology to tailormade solutions
When frameworks are replaced by creativity, the product manager’s work reaches the conceptual level. That does not mean you should stop being hands on or communicating with users. The approach is changing: any problem can be considered outside the context of applicable methodology, as well as outside the context of the problem itself.
Let’s see how this transformation works using the split-testing culture example. The rules prescribe to test hypotheses and reach statistical significance. What if there is a way to get the results of the experiment earlier by sacrificing the reasonable result accuracy minimum? At Flo, we solved this problem in a mathematical way. It was possible because the product manager has used an innovative approach instead of a verified methodology.
Another 10 methodologies mastered in theory will come in handy, especially if you use them on the regular basis. However, it is much more important for a Senior to have the ability to see the problem from a new angle and take it meta.
Obviously, it is not really possible to entirely avoid the use of the basic hard skills, knowledge, and ability to apply the product frameworks, or the ability to communicate with people, particularly to get across your point of view and grasp that of others. It is more important to be ready for new challenges. Listen and notice what you didn’t notice before. Work with projects that require strong skills. Be responsible for metrics that cannot be entirely controlled alone.
Somewhere along that path, every product manager will reach senior level. Nobody knows where and when. Still, one should be ready for that moment.
