Winding Roads To Product Management
I’ve yet to meet another Product Manager — or anyone for that matter — who has a Bachelor’s degree in Product Management. Though it’s one of the sexiest jobs in tech right now, there’s still no established path for someone to take to become a PM. Engineering degrees and MBAs are certainly good jumping off points, but even those aren’t standard within the industry.
In his book Inspired, Marty Cagan says the job of the product manager is “to discover a product that is valuable, usable and feasible.” Performing such a role requires a broad set of skills and knowledge that aren’t usually bundled into a single degree or internship. At Prolific, diverse backgrounds are considered to be the best foundations for a good PM.
Martin Eriksson describes product management as “the intersection between business, technology and user experience (only a product manager would define themselves in a venn diagram).” “A good product manager,” he insists, “must be experienced in at least one, passionate about all three, and conversant with practitioners in all.”
The same holds true for Product Managers at Prolific. Sure, a handful of our PMs have degrees in business or computer science, but the majority of us fall outside of this spectrum having studied economics or politics, writing or marketing, illustration or civil engineering. The jobs we’ve had on our way to Product Management are equally diverse ranging from iOS Engineers and Strategy Analysts, to Paralegals and Radio DJs. As varied as our paths are, we were all drawn to the same career — check out how and why we got here.
John-David Brown
“Working at a startup with engineers was my first taste of tech. After writing my first technical spec — an in-app virality feature to help my marketing objectives — I was hooked.”
College Major: Government
Jobs before Prolific: Paralegal, PR Account Executive, Community Manager, Marketing Manager, Product Manager
What drew me to Product Management: Product management is a combination of a lot of different things I love, but I just never knew there was a role that incorporated them all. I was always drawn to the idea of working in tech, but it took me a while to discover how I could fit into it. At the end of the day, I think I just love seeing my ideas come to life.
Peter Granlund
“I realized my skills as an engineer were sorely lacking, and that I was much better at bridging the gaps between engineering, design, and business. The role stuck!”
College Major: Computer Science
Jobs before Prolific: Radio DJ, IT Technician, Web Developer
What drew me to Product Management: I always knew I wanted to be a software engineer, taught myself several programming languages, and wrote and sold scripts to classmates in high school to help with homework. After an argument with a professor about Agile development (he was against, I was for), I started to become disillusioned with the process.
There are mediocre products all around us. Far too many objects in the world that get by as “good enough,” but the truly great products fulfill a purpose, and are a joy to use. Those are the kinds of products I love to use, and more importantly, want to build. Product Management also lends to the best of my skills with lots of communication and bringing diverse groups together to make amazing things. I joined Prolific to further my career and work with better bigger and better brands in an environment dedicated to making great products, not just a development chop shop.
Junho Kim
“The interim Product Manager ended up leaving early on so I volunteered to fill the role. I’ve been in Product ever since.”
College Major: Economics
Jobs before Prolific: CPO, Web Developer, Head Manager
What drew me to Product Management: I was drawn to Product out of necessity. It was a great blend of everything I loved about psychology, strategy, business, and technology. I get to work with amazing people and take on new challenges everyday.
Cassie Wallace
“I have professional FOMO. I get to “be” an engineer, a salesperson, a designer, etc., depending on what’s most important to the product during a given sprint or even day.”
College Major: Professional Writing
Jobs before Prolific: Copywriter, Account Manager, Manager of Client Services
What drew me to Product Management: Although I’ve always been focused on digital, I’ve spent time learning and working on many different facets from building websites for small businesses, writing copy for the Aflac Duck’s Twitter, presenting in-store technology concepts to CMOs. This helped developed skills and an understanding that I use indirectly every day as our team roadmaps, designs, builds, measures, and repeats.
Those varied experiences are important for two reasons. First, if you as a Product Manager are knowledgeable about the areas that your team are domain experts in (design, development, content, analytics…), you’re better able to bring together all of the information in front of you (user research, business requests, constraints…) to guide the team to crafting their solutions. Second, if you as a leader understand the amount of effort, level of creativity, and mode of working that goes into being a “maker,” you’ll have healthy expectations for your team, but know when to push them for more and better.
Caitlin O’Connell
“After seeing Helen Hunt in What Women Want, I knew I wanted to have a career helping brands speak to their consumers in different ways.”
College Major: Marketing
Jobs before Prolific: Account Management
What drew me to Product Management: The continuous state of learning. You are always learning, knowledge sharing, and collaborating. You work with others to help build out the vision while putting the product in the hands of the users that you are building that vision out for. I knew in previous roles, I could only take products & campaigns so far — but with product management you are responsible for it all which is challenging and exciting every single day.
I always felt as though I was missing out on ‘something’ but could never articulate what that something was. When I joined Prolific my role was a bit of a question mark — but it took about three stand-ups, two planners and brilliant people to figure out what that ‘something’ was that I was missing. Product & Prolific!
Jose Ramos
“I’ve always had a passion for technology and creating new things. I could spend HOURS working on apps and not even realize it.”
College Major: Computer Science
Jobs before PM at Prolific: IT, iOS engineer, Product Manager
What drew me to Product Management: I’ve always had an interest for creativity and innovation. Coming up with ideas and working with different teams to make them happen is what I love to do. Although as an engineer I was able to do the actual work, Product Management gave me the opportunity to interact with different teams and help out in more diverse aspects than I would’ve as an engineer. Having an engineering background also helps me understand and help engineers with specific problems.
Jesse Weinberg
“When I saw all of the amazing products being built at Prolific I couldn’t help but want to get involved with the creation of our Apps.”
College Major: Business Administration
Jobs before Prolific: Business Development (at Prolific)
What drew you to Product Management: I started at Prolific as a business development associate and was drawn to the company because I thought what Prolific was doing in mobile was awesome, but I knew very little about the details of each role in the company. Over time, I realized the PM position would fit my interests and personality perfectly, and have been loving it since I switched over a couple months ago.
As a PM you have to constantly be thinking about not only what we can do with mobile technology, but what users can do with it that adds value to their daily life. This user centric thinking along with a team focused approach is what drew me to Product Management and what I am coming to love.
Alex Marchesano
“I happened to be wearing Alex + Ani bracelets at a friends party and was recruited for user testing. The rest is history.”
College Major: Dual Major in Information Management & Technology / Supply Chain
Jobs before Prolific: Project manager at a big financial institution
What drew me to Product Management: Being a PM allows me to interact with so many different people on a daily basis which is great. My mission is to make other peoples’ work day better and keep the project moving forward. I enjoyed learning about all the different roles in Product Development in College, but I never really landed on a favorite. I love how much I can learn from everyone here and how different each day is. If I want to spent more time diving into analytics, I can do that. If I want to tag along to a User Test session, it’s encouraged! I’m just so happy to not be glued to a headset anymore!
Mike Domingo
“I have a love for all things technology and felt that I can usually bridge the gap of communication from Engineers to Designers/Artist.”
College Major: Business Admininstration
Jobs before Prolific: Training Consultant, Marketing Consultant, QA Manager, Game Designer, Level Designer, Producer
What drew me to Product Management: I have a background in Game Design and I knew I always wanted to be in tech. I felt within Product Management I was able to wear all my previous hats from the past and bring with me the ability to communicate well across varying teams and companies while doing it within a tech industry!
Joe Minkiewicz
“I don’t think I ever would have known Product Manager was a job I would like unless I grew into it naturally like I did.”
College Major: Illustration
Jobs before Prolific: Animation Prep Artist, Flash Developer, Freelance Web Development, UX Engineer
What drew me to Product Management: I went to school for art. Senior year I started teaching myself Flash which eventually led to work after graduation. I continued learning development in general and ended up at Prolific. Early on I helped out via my jack-of-all-trades background. I became a Product Manager organically as we grew and learned what responsibilities and skills were needed to make great products.
Jeremy Browning
“I’m a deeply curious person who aims to learn in whatever environment I find myself in.”
College Major: Economics & International Relations
Jobs before Prolific: Product Manager, Account Manager, Strategy Analyst
What drew me to Product Management: The multidisciplinary nature of product development is what initially drew me to the industry. I was given an opportunity to assist with product development responsibilities with a NY-based startup my sophomore year of college. It mostly entailed competitive analysis however I later dug into user testing, information architecture and release planning after 6 months. My title went from “General — Intern” to “Product Intern”. The startup was later acquired just before my graduation, which, by that point, I had already secured employment with another company. I worked for a data consultancy for the next 1.5 years yet experienced an ever-growing interest in product management. Ultimately, I joined the acquirer of the startup I formerly worked for in college as a Product Manager. The opportunity to converse with experts in design, research and software development is a blessing I cherish each day.
Sahithi Akula
“As a marketing graduate, I knew that I wanted to understand the ever-changing needs of consumers and users in the world.”
College Major: Marketing
Jobs before Prolific: Event Planning Intern, Event Marketing Intern, Marketing Intern, Project Manager
What drew me to Product Management: I always knew I wanted to be in the digital tech industry. Unfortunately, I only learned traditional, old school, and textbook marketing; nothing taught me about the digital landscape. Then, came Prolific. Prolific was the best place for me to get that exposure. I dove right in as a Associate Product Manager at Prolific and learned the lay of the land. I love being hands-on with every aspect of a product in the product life cycle; from strategy to design to development.
