44 Things a Product Manager Imagines Doing

Brain Synapses

The human brain consists of:

• grey matter, largely made up of neurons responsible for cognition, motor actions, memory etc., and
• white matter, which is the connective tissue between the grey matter, made up largely of axons and synapses which conduct electro-chemical impulses between the neurons of the grey matter

As a child grows and learns, the grey matter doesn’t multiply. Learning is a function of the growth of the inter-connections between the neurons. The white matter proliferates, learning behaviours, analysing data and extracting knowledge from information

In an organisation, different verticals or departments like Engineering, Sales, Marketing, Finance, etc. are the grey matter while the product manager is the white matter that derives insights about the user and the business and coordinates between the different “grey matter” departments: e.g. ensuring that tech work is aligned with business goals.

One way of classifying everything a product manager does is according to the stakeholders he/she represents

Users

• Understand user needs and product pain points
• Conduct unbiased user research — qualitative and quantitative
• Identify opportunities
• Ideate and develop features that address them
• User segmentation and understanding behaviour of each segment
• Regular communication with users (interact with customer success teams)
• Test hypotheses and validate assumptions through MVPs and A/B testing
• Gauge the response to every new feature
• Engage users, keep them coming back for more

Business, Sales, Marketing, Finance etc.

• Understand the goals for each team (Business, Sales, Finance, Marketing)
• Unit economics — understand the costs, like customer acquisition, fulfilment; and the revenue levers like subscriptions, freemium etc.
• Understand ROI of each possible improvement / additional feature to the product
• Develop the desired image of the company / product through product messaging, vocabulary and design language
• Sync, negotiate and arbitrate goals and priorities of all stakeholders
• Optimize workflows and conversion funnels

Tech

• Know the ins-and-outs of every aspect of the product, from SEO to workflows, from data models to APIs, from the tech stack to the system architecture; to make better decisions and understand tradeoffs
• Communicate a product concept clearly, address every use case, document in detail
• Prioritize — Collaborate with the engineering team to plan and prioritise Offensive battles (user, competition or client driven features) and defensive ones (bug fixes, technical debt)
• Empathise with the project manager, understand release process, version control, have regular conversations with the developers and understand the product development plan
• Close interaction with the QA teams to ensure correct implementation of functionalities
• Know the latest trending jargon and acronyms, be aware of where tech is headed

Design

• Work closely with designers to implement ease of use and user-centricity into the product, while ensuring revenue is not negatively affected
• Have a keen eye for design, notice nuances and always keep looking for new or better implemented design paradigms in products of all kinds
• Validate ease of use by analysing usage data for screen features / designs

Strategy

• Establish the what, when and how for the Product.
• Establish the short term and long term goals and roadmap, and plan releases for the product. Never get bogged down by present resources or market forces.
• Be the weatherman, forecast product goals and lay benchmarks with data driven decisions.

Analytics

• Gather and analyse data
• Define, collect and generate metrics against specific product goals
• Closely work with data scientists to identify product pain-points and opportunities
• Arrive at strong data backed decisions
• Publish easy-to-read reports to be shared across the organisation / stakeholders

Competitors

• Know about competitors, their products and target market segments, and how they differ from our own
• Understand the market structural analysis (competitor product and behaviour, product replaceability, comparative costs, effects of competitor’s product on the market and company’s product)
• Clearly understand the opportunity size and characteristics for one’s own product
• Know that timing is crucial, but the first mover advantage is squandered if it’s a shaky step

Self

• Be a Technophile — always be curious, informed and enthusiastic about current and upcoming technology
• Dogfooding: Be a regular active beta user / tester of the product, and your own worst critic
• Keep learning
• Know the domain
• Simplify: Processes, PRDs, interactions between teams, product goals etc.
• Love data and have a clear understanding of how to use tools to pull data
• Never be the lone wolf, always work with the pack to achieve a greater impact
• Be good at managing time and resources to cope with scale and speed of the organisation

Solved the Maze!

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