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Role of Product Manager

The document discusses the role of the product manager. It notes that the product manager role is crucial but is sometimes combined with other roles like product marketing or project management, which can make it difficult to fulfill. The key responsibilities of a product manager include identifying product opportunities, defining the right product strategy and roadmap, managing requirements through documents like a PRD, and representing both the internal product team and external customers, though they do not directly manage people. Effective product managers must use persuasion and relationship building rather than direct authority.

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36 views13 pages

Role of Product Manager

The document discusses the role of the product manager. It notes that the product manager role is crucial but is sometimes combined with other roles like product marketing or project management, which can make it difficult to fulfill. The key responsibilities of a product manager include identifying product opportunities, defining the right product strategy and roadmap, managing requirements through documents like a PRD, and representing both the internal product team and external customers, though they do not directly manage people. Effective product managers must use persuasion and relationship building rather than direct authority.

Uploaded by

9013126157
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Role of Product

Manager
• Every member of the product team is
important.

• To succeed a company must design, build,


test and market the product effectively.

• There is one role that is absolutely crucial


to producing a good product……….

Product Manager
Role and Responsibilities
Referred to by another name, or it is
lumped in with another role:

program manager, product marketing,


project management, engineering
management,

or sometimes in small companies a


founder or executive.
AT Microsoft,

Role of Product manager = Program Manager

There is one Product Manager too….who is


generally referred as Product marketing
some companies using the old-school
definition of product manager, which is
essentially the brand manager concept
from the consumer packaged goods
industry. This is primarily the product
marketing function under the title of
Product manager.
The problem with combining the product
manager role with another role, such as
product marketing or project
management, is that it is very hard to find
someone who can do both types of jobs
well.

Each of these roles is critical, and each


requires special skills and talents
The most common problem we have seen is that
a product marketing person is asked to fulfill the
role of product manager, and while this person
might be outstanding in terms of product
marketing skills and talents, creating a product
is much different than telling the world about that
product. The rest of the product team comes to
view this person as simply “the marketing
resource” that is useful for gathering market
requirements from customers or from the sales
force, and serving as the interface between the
product development organization and the
customers. While this model may yield useful
market requirements, these are not the same as
useful product requirements.
Product Manager is responsible for
• Identifying and Assessing Opportunities
Product ideas can come from any number of sources:

- Customers
- Your competitor’s customers
- Industry analysts
- Your company’s executives
- The sales and marketing staff
- The product development team
- Your company’s customer service representatives
- Your operations staff
- Your own experiences and knowledge of the market and
technology
• Right Product/Right Time

The product needs to have the right


features for the right market, and must be
able to be executed with the technology
available in the required market window.

Generally, the product manager identifies


the product requirements and captures
them for the product team in some sort of
specification, often called a Product
Requirements Document (PRD),
• Product Strategy and Roadmap

When a product team is hard at work on a


product, they want to know what is next.
Will this be the end of the product? Or will they
be enhancing the product over time to meet
additional needs or markets? This information is
not just of passing interest to the product team.
The vision for the product line and the product
strategy can be very motivational to the team.
Often compromises must be made to meet
required timeframes, and if the team
understands that features they feel strongly
about will be coming in a following version, they
feel better about their work.
• Manages Product Not People

In most organizational structures, the


product manager is not directly managing
any of the people who actually create the
product. Rather, the engineers typically
work for engineering managers, and the
designers work for design managers, and
the testers work for quality assurance
managers, and so on.
The product manager is rarely able to guide the
product solely by authority. Rather, they have
to persuade and cajole the product team
members to do there bidding. As the owner of
the product requirements, product Manager
certainly can influence many aspects of the
product through that mechanism, but the
product manager quickly finds that there are
many decisions that he does not own but which
impact his product.

For these, he must use his persuasive skills.


• Represents Product Internally

• Evangelism – championing the product


and explaining the vision and benefits of
the product.

• Executive Review- periodic review of


product plan.

• Sales & marketing- represent your product


to sales & marketing team.

• Represent Customers

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