PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

MRKT B8636-001
Fall 2024, 3 CREDITS

Chris LaSala COURSE/TEACHING ASSISTANTS

Professor Office Location: 731 Kravis Daniela Georg
E-mail: [email protected] [email protected]

Office Hours and Communication Preferences

● Please email me to request a meeting (virtual or in person) for office hours.

○ Monday, Wednesday and Friday: Virtual office hours only from 10:00am to 5:00pm
○ Tuesday and Thursday: 12:30 to 2:00 (in-person office hours only)
● Communications from the professor and teaching assistant about the course will take place
through Canvas. Students should make sure they regularly check for announcements and
messaging notifications.

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Product management is a fast growing field born out of the need for a single person or small team of
people within an organization to own the entirety of the end-to-end product development cycle, while
also understanding and reconciling product decisions with business needs. This course focuses
specifically on digital product management and is intended as a primer for those interested in a product
management career or those with a general interest in how technology products are made. Those who
want to play at the intersection of technology, business, and management are often well-suited for
product management, a role that is often referred to as “CEO of the product” but without direct control
of most of the resources required to build and launch a successful product. Product managers must be
proficient in a broad range of capabilities, and must lead through influence, not authority.

This is an introductory course aimed at students who are new to product management and do not have
a strong technical background and want to develop the knowledge and skills to get a leg up when joining
a technology company. This course is geared toward students that aim to work at medium to large sized
companies as a product manager or leader, where firms are expected to innovate and launch new
products and features as a means of ensuring they retain market relevance or expand into new markets
based on current capabilities. We will cover the product development cycle from ideation to
commercialization in that context. This course is not geared toward start-ups or new ventures, even if
some of the concepts are applicable.

Students will get a strong understanding of what it means to be a product manager and its role in the
organization. For those students who decide to put the skills learned from this class into practice, CBS
offers a Digital Product Management Lab, a team based experiential class that partners with member
companies to address “Problems to be Solved” that require fresh product development thinking. For
those students that decide against moving into PM as a career, many of the concepts and approaches
covered in this class will help students in whatever path they choose.

STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

The discipline of Product Management is evolving, as evidenced by the plethora of blogs, articles, books
and opinions from some of the most accomplished product managers and consultancies. The PM
curriculum at CBS, including this introductory Product Management course, curates, organizes, and
delivers the latest thinking as a foundation for students who aim to pursue careers in Product
Management at medium to larger sized established firms. This curriculum is organized (roughly) to follow
the timeline of the product development cycle. The specific topics we will cover include:

● THE ROLE OF A PRODUCT MANAGER AND PRODUCT IN A DIGITAL CONTEXT. Products that
leverage the underlying Internet infrastructure as a core delivery mechanism of their value
proposition have unique characteristics. We start by exploring what is a product versus a feature,
what are the common product development related roles in tech firms and what role does the
product manager play in setting strategy and driving execution:
○ Defining a digital product and feature
○ Defining product management
○ Understanding product management adjacent roles (e.g. project management, product
marketing, program management)
○ Defining product strategy
○ Managing the product across the full product lifecycle
○ Exploring the attributes of great PMs

● CUSTOMER DISCOVERY IN DIGITAL MARKETS: Creating a new web/app based business is

becoming easier and easier as development and distribution costs shrink every year. But most
don’t make it. The ones that do have a common characteristic: they solve a clear user problem
that is willing to pay (in one way or another). Over the course of the first few weeks we will
explore frameworks and best practices for finding product-market fit in digital products,
generating ideas and making good decisions.
○ Assessing digital product opportunities to find Product/Market fit
■ Frameworks to help define customer needs (Jobs to Be Done, Personas and
 Journey Mapping)
■ Customer discovery as iterative process
■ Lean qualitative and quantitative market research tactics for getting customer
feedback
○ Frameworks for leading teams to think expansively and seek a broad range of potential
solutions before coding begins
○ Explore the basics of User Experience design principles to ensure products meet user
needs and expectations
○ Frameworks for prioritizing features and defining minimum viable products (MVPs)
○ Validating MVPs with prototyping and low code/no code solutions

● BUILDING DIGITAL PRODUCTS: Hardware and software is at the center of every web based
product. Yet, in most cases, Product Managers need not be computer scientists nor design
experts to be effective. However, it is critical they have a baseline understanding for, and
appreciation of, how those teams operate, and be able to be a thought partner and leader
during the development cycle. Now we turn our focus to the role a Product Manager plays in
developing products in partnership with engineering and UX teams.
○ Develop a basic understanding of how software is developed in order to contribute to
technical discussions with engineering teams, including concepts like front-end and
back-end development, programming languages, database management, as examples.
○ Develop a working knowledge of the software and systems architecture that the
engineering team is managing
○ Explore how emerging tech product trends (AI, blockchain, VR/AR) and how they could
be deployed
○ Introduction to ‘Agile’ product management techniques emphasizing iterative and
incremental development including delivering working software frequently,
collaborating with cross-functional teams, and responding to change
○ Be exposed to common product development tools of the trade

● COMMERCIALIZING TECHNOLOGY PRODUCTS: As the product is being built, “Go-To-Market”

teams are responsible for deciding how the product will be priced, which customer segments to
focus on and when and how to prepare the sales and marketing teams for readiness, among
other things.
○ Understand the strategic considerations unique to launching (and growing) DIGITAL
products, the prominent business models in TECH firms and how to set goals
○ Explore the strategic considerations unique to ‘digital first’ businesses and why some of
the most valuable tech firms are digital platforms, a specific type of company that brings
together multiple sides of a marketplace that leverage network effects to efficiently clear
transactions
○ Strategies for influencing without authority and the role the PM plays in managing
cross-functional teams across alpha, beta and general availability stages of the product
life cycle to identify segments, channel strategies and pricing models to optimize for
 product launch success
○ Explore methods for evaluating progress by setting goals via OKRs, KPIs and other
relevant metrics.

● ETHICAL AND REGULATORY CONSIDERATIONS WHEN BUILDING TECHNOLOGY PRODUCTS:

Several prominent technologies have become so intertwined with our day-to-day they are
shaping how society evolves. Misinformation, social-media addiction, access and use of private
data are just a few of the challenges faced by society. In these sessions, we will discuss the
unique considerations a PM must consider when building products with so much scale the
influence how we evolve as citizens of the world.
○ Ethical considerations in the digital economy
○ Regulatory considerations for technology firms

CLASSROOM NORMS AND EXPECTATIONS

Core Culture

Students are expected to adhere to CBS Core Culture in this class by being Present, Prepared,
Participating.

Inclusion, Accommodation, and Support for Students

At Columbia Business School we believe diversity strengthens any community or business model and
brings it greater success. The School is committed to providing all students with equal opportunity to
thrive in the classroom by providing a learning, living, and working environment free from
discrimination, harassment, and bias on the basis of gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity,
socioeconomic status, or ability.

Students with documented disabilities may receive reasonable accommodations. Students are
encouraged to contact the Columbia University’s Office of Disability Services for information about
registration.

Columbia Business School adheres to all community, state, and federal regulations as relate to Title IX
and student safety. Read more about CBS’ policies to support Inclusion, Accommodations and Support
for Students here.

Honor Code and Academic Integrity

The Columbia Business School Honor Code calls on all members of the School community to adhere to
and uphold the notions of truth, integrity, and respect both during their time in school, and throughout
their careers as productive, moral, and caring participants in their companies and communities around
the world. All students are subject to the Honor Code for all of their academic work. Failure to comply
with the Honor Code may result in Dean’s Discipline. Here you can review examples of Academic
Misconduct which may result in discipline.
Course Attendance Policies

Students from all programs should review and be familiar with the MBA Core attendance policy here.
Students are expected to be present in all class sessions. Failure to attend class will negatively impact
participation grade.

METHOD OF EVALUATION
Your overall grade will depend on the mix of individual and team assignments according to the following
percentages:

Course Team Project 40%

(Breakdown of specific deliverables and grade weighting will be listed in Canvas)

Individual Case Write Ups (Note: Individual assignments may change before Sept. 40%
2024, but the percentage of the grade will be roughly 40% regardless of the type 10%
and number of assignments) 10%
● Google Glass/Apple Vision Pro 10%
● Cork’d 10%
● Ethics in Product Management
● Systems Design Negotiation

Individual In-Class Participation 20%

Letter grades for the course will be assigned in accordance with Columbia Business School’s
recommended grade distribution for elective courses. There will be several “deliverables” to be turned in
at various points in the course, but the class discussions and activities in the course and in discussion
forums are very important aspects of the course and the learning experience. Thus, grades will be based
both on assignments that are turned in and on your performance in the classroom and off-site
discussions. I will try to get feedback to you regarding your write ups as quickly as possible, so it is
important that these deliverables be submitted on time and late submissions will impact grades.