The road to Product: How my engineering background got me to product management and the lessons I’ve learned.

3 years ago, I decided to switch roles from a full stack software engineer to a product manager.

Even though I was confident that the PM role is what I aspire to be, the decision didn’t come easily since I worked so hard to become a respected engineer.

Background

I studied Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Tel Aviv University - I was always drawn to math, physics and everything that required analytical skills. Since I didn’t have any computing technical background, I knew I needed to study hard to become a programmer, and coming from a family of immigrants without many resources, I was determined to get the best education that I can that will help me achieve my goals.

I got accepted as a software engineering student at Microsoft at the beginning of my 3rd year, and I was ecstatic!

During my 2 years of internship, Microsoft has provided me with the best software engineering school I could ask for — this was my entry to the real world of software engineering — I learned how to write clean code, how to deep dive into a huge source code, navigate through it, and even contribute to it. In addition, I learned about the different functions in an organization - Engineering, Product, Operations, Marketing, etc.

After my graduation, I accepted an offer to become a full time employee (FTE) at Microsoft. During my 3 years as an FTE, I learned how to write production code, monitor and resolve live-site issues, learned multiple programming languages and frameworks, how to find creative ideas to solve complex problems and how to educate myself on subjects I’m not familiar with — but most importantly, I learned how to work in a team.

Getting the PM itch

During that time, I found myself more and more involved in projects that I’m the main coordinator — leading complex engineering projects with dependencies on multiple stakeholders — effectively running the project execution, identifying blockers and working with several teams towards our mutual goal of delivering a great feature. At some point, it became almost a joke that every complex engineering feature that requires cross-team collaboration will be assigned to me.

Furthermore, I became more proactive in asking the PMs in my team questions and giving feedback on features I was assigned to develop — In my spare time, I read about our competitors and their product capabilities, to make sure that my comments on features are backed up by data and research.

Slowly I was able to gain the PMs trust and they have started to consult with me instead of simply giving me the finalized requirements.

In addition, I asked to join customer calls to hear unfiltered customer feedback regarding my developed feature and even became the first engineer in our team to manage an entire customer engagement with a private preview customer on my own.

To summarize — I was in a good place. So why move?

Image source: https://www.mindtheproduct.com/2011/10/what-exactly-is-a-product-manager/

It took me quite some time to clarify why I want to move to Product Management, and how I envisioned this role for me — I wanted to have the following —

• Define the product roadmap based on customer feedback and competitors — I wanted to understand and influence on development certain capabilities in the product and not just accept it as given.
• Have a direct connection with our customers — I wanted to know that what we’re developing is useful and makes an impact.
• Focus on people — I loved working with people from different teams and disciplines.

With these goals in mind, I decided to make the move and pursue a product management position.

However, the biggest problem in product management the way I saw it was that this is not an entry level type of position — who will give me the opportunity to become a PM with no experience?

How to land your first PM role? (Or how to solve the chicken and egg problem)

Image source: https://socialunderground.com/2018/09/physicists-solve-which-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg-riddle/

For those of you who decided to make the move, the first problem that comes in mind is — how will I land my first PM role if I have no experience?

Here are a few guidelines that helped me make the transition to product management and land my first role —

• I’m a strong believer that a successful next step in your career must not exceed 2 parallel pivots — for example, 3 parallel pivots can be : change profession, change workplace, change work domain (move from B2B to B2C type of product). Every change requires adaptation and has a learning curve — therefore, focus is key to success here. When searching for a PM role — stick to this rule when applying to positions, this will help you guarantee your success.
• Talk about what you want with your peers and managers — if you decided that this is what you do, there is no point of hiding it. It’s important to hear feedback and take advise from the people that work with you on a daily basis.
• You have the power. Good employees are hard to find — good managers will think of the best of the company and will try to find you a role within the company to preserve you as a valuable employee.
• A lot of the capabilities that you acquire as an engineer are qualities required for product management. Emphasize those as you rewrite your CV — ability to breakdown a big a feature into concrete tasks, map dependencies, orchestrate between multiple people and teams. Emphasize these qualities and aim to get more of those as long as you are in an engineering position.

Based on the guidelines above, I was able find a product management position in my own team. My group PM manager was familiar with my skills and background capabilities and decided to give me a chance — I actually became the PM of the team that I was once an engineer in!

This was the greatest and smoothest beginning I could ask for — I knew the product and I knew the people.

Key capabilities of a Product Manager

Based on my experience, I wanted to share what I believe are the key capabilities that will help you succeed as a Product Manager when you transition from engineering and leverage your engineering skills.

• Focus on the WHAT and not the HOW — as engineers, we want to understand the full details of the feature, how does it work, what are the technologies used, etc. However, as a Product Manager, you must always have an answer to — why are we doing this feature? What is this feature is about? What problem does it solve?
• Lead with empathy — there are numerous articles about this and how this capability can affect not only your performance, but others as well. As a PM, 99% of you work involves interaction with different types of people. Most of the time, you will not have any authority on them — therefore, you need to be able to convince them. Truly listen to your co-workers, be fully present in conversations and try not to judge. This will help you lead your to the goal your aiming for.
• Creativity, innovation and thought leadership — in order to create a truly good product, you must always think ahead, you need to solve both current and future customer problems. Think not only on what customers need today, but also what will they need tomorrow based on what they have today.
• Make time to educate yourself — people tend to immerse themselves in the day-to-day work and forget to look up. This is your responsibility — make time to learn about the product competitors, review customers feedback or even general product management skills that you want to explore. As an engineer, you constantly learn about new technologies as part of your work, make sure to keep this habit.
• Ability to juggle between detail oriented and a visionary — I found this as one of my greatest strengths having an engineering background — a lot of your work will be with engineering. When you understand the details, it actually helps you understand why developing a feature will take a certain amount of time. However, keep in mind that it is your responsibility that this feature provides the value it was designed for and is seamlessly integrated into the rest of the product.
• Master prioritization and feature slicing — every day you are faced with prioritization issues. You will need to be sharp and make a desicion. The work between product and engineering is similar to a delicate dance. Always make sure that you have a clear definition of the MVP of your feature and what capabilities are nice to have and can wait. Remember- not everything is urgent and important. This will help you in negotiation with your engineering counterparts.
• Make decisions based on customer data and feedback — as product managers, we can fall in love with the idea of a certain feature that we designed and ignore customer feedback. It is important to always have an impartial view on the features you own — after all, you are creating these features for your customers, so make sure their voice is heard and feedback reflected.

While there are lots of different paths one can take to become a product manager, I wanted to share my own journey and personal experience, hoping it will help other aspiring PMs or current ones.