PM Advice

All advice is based on my personal experience and opinions, and is most relevant for product management at tech companies. Feel free to reach out with additional questions—you can reach me at arjunnarayen@gmail.com or schedule a hangout here—I'm happy to help however I can!

What is Product Management?

There is no single definition to product management, and if you're beginning the path to become a product manager, you'll likely find that various job listings for different companies define the role completely differently. In order to provide a succinct summary, here's a tweet from Shreyas Doshi, who has a number of great tweets and articles about the discipline.

I like to define product management as the process of "getting the right things done" where "the right things" speaks to the strategy component of product management, and "getting things done" speaks to the execution component.

How can I move into Product Management?

There are basically two groups that you can self-categorize yourself into in order to find the most relevant advice: 1) those currently working at a tech company in a different role, 2) those who aren't currently working at a tech company.

For those working in tech:

I would try to do two things simultaneously: 1) set yourself up to gain product management experience while staying in your current role, and 2) prepare as though you had an interview for your dream role tomorrow.

#1—think about how you could start gaining confidence in your ability to be a product manager even before you move into the role. Some suggestions would be to reach out to PMs and let them know you're interested in product management—ask if you can shadow them or if you can lead a small workstream with them reverse-shadowing you. Set up virtual coffee-chats with PMs you haven't yet met at your company and ask them for advice/let them know you're interested. Others can't help you move into product management if they don't know you're interested in it. It's important to remember that this is work you're doing on top of your current job, so make sure you continue to excel in your primary role.

#2—start framing your past work as a PM would. Revisit your résumé and start preparing for product management interviews (more on this below).

For those not working in tech:

My main advice would be to try to make your way into a tech company based on the skillset you currently have. Most tech companies have more business-oriented roles that are by no means easy to land, but don't require hard technical/design skills in order to succeed in. Roles in product marketing often have a great deal of overlap with product teams—I learned a great deal as a product specialist which was a slightly different role.

The other route that might be possible to some is to find a PM role at the company you work at, or the next closest thing, so that you can sell your experience as product management, even if the product isn't a software product.

How can I prepare for PM Interviews?

Résumé AdviceInterview Advice

Where should I look for jobs?

One good place to start is Lenny Rachitsky's PM Job board.

If possible, try to leverage LinkedIn to connect with folks who work at companies you’re interested in. The best way is to reach out to someone who went to your college if possible, and send a personalized note with your connection request that calls out why you’re reaching out to them in particular. It’s pretty easy to spot people who have generic mass-messages sent out, which will likely be ignored. If you can get through to them, ask them for a referral for the particular role you’re interested in, and if they seem nice maybe even ask them to flag the referral to the recruiter/hiring manager.

FAQ:

Q: Do I need a computer science degree/technical background to be a product manager?

A: No. Some of the best PM's I've worked with have studied history, philosophy, economics, design, and even not gone to college. What I will say, however, is that if you're looking to be a PM at a software company, understanding how software development works will work in your favor. I took a few computer science classes in college, but for the most part I learned how software development works by working at a tech company in a different role. There are some companies at which it's hard to become a PM without a technical background, Google being a notable example, but I would say this is atypical.

Q: What does a product team look like?

A: Different companies have different structures of product teams, and even within a company there are often different structures, but a typical consumer software company, like Facebook or Spotify, is comprised of a few key roles:

  • Product Manager (1)
  • Engineering
    • Engineering Manager (1)
    • Engineers (2-10, sometimes more)
  • Insights
    • Data Scientist (1)
    • User Researcher (1)
  • Design
    • Product Designer (1)
    • Copywriter (1)

There are many exceptions to this, for example, an ML heavy team likely won’t have a design group; they might not even need a product manager. Some groups have larger design teams if they’ve got a lot of user-facing work going on. Many teams won’t have a copywriter, and the product designer will assume those responsibilities as well.

Q: What does the day to day of a product manager look like?

A: No two days are totally alike, but I think there’s two main pieces to note here:

  1. How your day-to-day changes throughout a planning cycle:
    1. I think the job various throughout a “planning cycle” where some companies plan in quarters (3 months) and others plan in halves (6 months).
    2. Typically towards the beginning of a planning cycle, a big focus is on setting goals and ensuring everyone is on the same page about those goals. Roughly speaking, goal setting is determining what specific things your team should be working on in order to achieve your larger goals and team mission, and ensuring everyone knows what those goals are and what they should be doing in service of those goals.
    3. In the middle of a planning cycle, a lot of the job is ensuring things are on track, helping clear blockers to ensure your team can move efficiently towards those goals, and championing the work of your team to ensure the impact you’re having on the business is understood.
  2. How your day-to-day changes throughout your career:
    1. When you’re more junior, a larger focus of your job is execution and getting things done well. As you spend more time in the role, a larger focus of your job will become strategy and ensuring you’re working on the right things.

Assorted PM resources:

Podcasts

Articles

Books