Product Management: Dreams & Heartaches

A whole bunch of newbie product managers and wannabe PMs are a victim of content marketing.

They've imagined a discipline/role that is not practical. Their world view is based on the enormous amount of reading material, the free ebooks, the blogs, the podcasts that they get free access to. The material may be actually helpful and well received by the known thought leaders across the world. However, if one looks at the most popular material on the web, it is either from companies selling their culture or companies selling their courses. And guys who are consuming this without much context of product management practice are setting themselves up for disappointment.

I'd add two instances that triggered this rant:

Case - 1: A techie, say Kriti, is doing a formal product management course but can't see the similarity between what she sees the product managers do in her current organization versus what she thinks they should be doing based on what she is being taught. She is confused about whether she has picked the wrong course or whether her colleagues are doing it wrong. Both could be possible, but, since she's not the only one finding that disconnect, I can see that something is broken.

Case - 2: A startup maverick, Vivan is an energetic fellow. He joins a mid-sized company and he wants to become a product manager, knows a lot about what's happening around in the world of product management. The source is, of course, the internet and the articles from the product course companies and SaaS companies which have built their story on content marketing. That's the world view he comes with and when he gets a real opportunity he is not able to match it up with the imagination. He thinks there are things that PM would be doing and certain things he would not be doing. Which ideally should be the case, but, as a PM you gotta fill a lot of white space. You need to get shit done. But, he is confused. Within the first few weeks, he starts to think about whether he is in the right role.

And then I ran a quick poll on twitter to see if there are others suffering. More than 50% think they aren't doing what a PM should be doing. 

Product Management articles look so perfect. But...

Honest enough?
A lot is written in retrospect by content writers, who have to come up with a story that sells. Even when it is based on true events they can always sequence the events and modulate certain sections to make it presentable. Makes for great reading, also drives the insights home, readers can definitely learn from it. I love reading them and drawing from them. However, as an existing PM, I can imagine the missing details. Those who haven't really done product management - have no way to read what's left between the lines.

One part of the story
They tell you what they did, what was the philosophy behind it and how it turned the tide. Some may also occasionally talk about what didn't work. All carefully drafted and showcased. What you definitely miss out on is that what you see is just tail of the elephant (sorry tip of the iceberg is too cliched). There is Chaos, Failures, Frustrations that are usually summarised in a line for completeness. In fact, there is no use of writing about or reading up the gory details of things that did not work. But, since you are inspired by reading just one part of the story over and over, you are set to be disappointed by reality.

Race to the bottom
As someone who's selling a course or a certification program, you have to meet your numbers. Which means you have to get more people to the top of the funnel, get you excited about "Product Management". So they try to make it look cooler. They have to build upon the imagination of others to stay relevant and capture more market. And that's where they're setting people up for disappointment.

The predicament 

The excitement about Product Management among youth is palpable. Everyone from non-Techie technology graduates (at the IITs) to management trainees from IIMs/ISBs and even people with 10+ years of domain experience is trying to get into this field. Some of the hype is justified and some are not. And there are various articles that bust the myths around product management as well.

However, in my 14 years of experience in the industry and those 6 kickass years as a product guy - I've come to realize that any role at a progressive organization is a lot about hustling and getting-shit-done.

And it is not all about the newbies being at fault. Many startups, organizations also create PM function without much deliberation. They see a gap as they scale and think what they need is Product Management to fill it up. The lack of understanding is evident if you just have a look at the PM JDs on job portals. There is an eerie similarity in all of them, and most of them are quite disconnected with what the real job would be like. E.g. A 2 years PM experience guy  - JD says should be experienced in creating Strategy and Roadmap  - really? (Note that they are an e-commerce site being used by millions of users)

Here are some samples of JDs for an e-commerce company, a fintech, and an ed-tech company:

 

 

 

They are themselves so unsure of what they want. All they seem to be looking for is a person with some proven logical, analytical capacity and communication skills - In short, an MBA from Top Tier institute, preferably with Engineering background. How do you reckon your unsure employers will provide with certainty and job satisfaction?

There are Dreams and there are Heartaches associated with the Product Management function across the board. Anyone planning a career in this needs to be more objective and better informed. It's cool, but, there's a lot of dirt under the rag. If you aren't up for it, find something better.

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If you liked what you read, do leave a comment for Ujjwal Trivedi. That's a great way to converse with the author. 

A JD that can find Yoda!

The Job Description should be an easy hint for a smart candidate to tweak her resume and prepare for the interview. It may sound controversial, but, I believe if someone is actually able to do that and crack the interview, they are worthy of an offer. :-)

Rant: Most Startup JDs I come across are poor copy-paste jobs of a lazy junior recruiter being coerced into doing it by the hiring manager (the actual person hiring for the role). If you haven't thought about it yet - the job description is your first impression, your first interaction with a potential hire. JDs are not supposed to be outsourced to a recruiter, it should be taken up by the hiring manager/founders themselves and should be the first step to the entire hiring process. Which means you start with JD and map the entire hiring process for the role accordingly. End of rant.


Here's my simple checklist that is good for any Job Description - Tech/Ops/Product/Mktg.

1. Exciting things about the company (Readable - 100 words - short paragraphs)
• Describe in 100 to 150 words divided into short paragraphs
• Describe how you are challenging the status quo in the industry, world
• What's been your startup's achievements so far
• What's been the impact and what is the potential impact of the work you do
2. Exciting things about the role, what a person gets to do, what's the potential impact this role can have on the product, the team or the company
• List of 3 to 5 Bullets
• Don't be too salesy - you should set the right expectations
• Mention your products( for PMs), technology (for Techies) you work on, clients (for Sales) you work with, tools or anything that is relevant for the role in context.
3. Perks and Benefits
• Bullet list of 4 to 8 points
• Include Both monetary and non-monetary benefits (like generous leave policy, food, insurance, etc.)
4. Eligibility (Qualifications, Experience level, Location, Nationality, Gender)
• Be as clear as it gets.
• If you are looking for premier college graduates only, please mention that upfront. Personally, I find that a discriminatory criterion, but being honest helps both you and the candidate.
• It helps to mention which criteria are hard and which ones are flexible. Is it B.E./B.Tech/MCA or only B.Tech.
5. Expectations (from an Ideal Candidate)
• Bulleted is better, 5-7 points are usually enough, beyond 10 is unreadable
• Put both Mandatory skills and the Good-to-have ones
• Being reasonable and clear is expected. If you are not going to ask someone to handle P&L, don't put that in expectations. It works both ways, the candidate will also expect to work on stuff that you put under expectations.
• It is understood that expectations may not match 100% with someone's skills and experience so keep room for that.

As I mentioned earlier, the interview process and type of questions should map to the job description. If you expect a person to work in ambiguity and don't evaluate for that skill - it would be such a waste of opportunity.

If this was helpful, please do leave a comment for the author. 

PM Job Seeker's Checklist

I've been helping a lot of techies and accidental PMs to understand the scope of Product Management. So many times that I was able to put most FAQs and basics in this short course. So while this covers the basics, people do come up with more questions on the role, some real challenges they are facing and also about getting the job of a product manager. 

Introduction To Product Management: ChalkStreet

One guy from IIM recently took up a BA role and is now looking to get into PM. But he wasn't getting any calls for job interviews. 

Here's what I suggested. I believe it is also the checklist for anyone looking for product roles:

1. Resume. Not sure if your Resume clearly indicates you are a good fit for the role. Look at the example of another sales guy trying to move to PM role. If you are moving from a non-PM to a PM role, you've to be extra careful that the Resume states clearly you are looking for a PM role, otherwise, the recruiter might just think they've picked an irrelevant resume and trash it. Look for all relevant JDs on Linkedin and tweak your resume to use all the keywords so that it can match those. Mostly the buzzwords are around specifications, PRD, wireframes, metrics, etc. Please make sure you compress your job summary to a 1-page resume. If you have more than 10 years of experience - you can think about a 2 Page as well. Not more than that. 

Before

After

More tips about how to write the BEST resume. 

2. Where can people find you? Better places for a PM role are Linkedin, Hirist, Instahyre, Angellist, Cutshort, and Naukri. Keep all these profiles updated. In fact, if you are applying for consumer profiles also keep Twitter, Facebook and other social profiles active and updated.    

3. Patience: Keep at it. It may take 3 to 6 months if you are doing all the right things, for relevant opportunities to open up. Apply, re-apply with personalized cover letters. Btw, the email that you write is a cover letter, don't write a separate one and attach it with your Resume. That's silly. 

4. Not just what you know, it is also about who do you know. Network! Networking is not just about sending LinkedIn requests. Attend good startup and product related events, join PM communities on FB, Linkedin, Meetup, Whatsapp. Meet people, learn from them, connect at different levels, ask questions, find out what people are looking for. Be active on social media. Engage with relevant folks and comment on their tweets or re-tweet them with your opinions. This will help you understand where you stand and how you can position yourself correctly. Look for ways in which you can help people. That's the best way to network.  

5. Prepare better. The chances you get will be limited, don't mess them up. If you haven't read some of the books like Cracking the PM Interview, Decode to Conquer your preparation may not be complete. At least read one of them. In general, as a PM you should be reading a lot of good books on business, startups, and product design. There are a lot of lists of good books available - here's one of mine. You are expected to know about and have opinions on trending technologies like Blockchain and Machine learning even if it is unrelated. You should also follow some current affairs about your domain. 

I am sure he'd get a job soon. I'd update when he does! :-) 

Update: 23/12/2017 - He is placed at Zynga Bangalore now. 

Update: A More updated deck from a recent workshop I took for Upgrad. In the deck, I talk about how to deal with different types of interview questions and assignments that you get as a part of the interview process.  


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