how you see a product manager’s job what questions you would have for the author of the book.
From my eyes, the job of a product manager is to successfully monitor, understand, prioritize, delegate what tasks will ensure the best proceedings of a team in creating products. It seems important to operate from a qualitative rather than quantitative perspective on what success looks like, and to be open to changes that may improve that goal rather than focusing on traditional optics of success. Emphasized as well, is care for your team members as human collaborators on a collective success, rather than having tunnel vision on the product itself. I think that being a product manager means looking at all the people and details that come together for a project and translating between the big picture and the small components that create it. I think it is problem solving, and looking past what is most obvious to see what the root issue you must tackle. This last point hit me when the author diagnosed that many shortcomings of a product manager stem directly from insecurity. I think that this sort of two-step thinking can help you to evaluate where to reassess when you come across an issue, be it an issue with the product or an issue within your team. I think that this way of thinking, rectifying, and communicating is your skill as a product manager rather than any one task you provide. Now upon reading this I did feel called out! My instinctive response was to question how as a Product Manager, do I then subvert this insecurity and instead create an environment that encourages the best mental space from myself and my team? I also wonder, in this learning curve discussed in the reading, what outlet or support I can use to lessen the impact that my inexperience will bring to my team?
