I thought coming into this course that a product manager was something of a mysterious creature shrouded in fog. When I asked people what a product manager was, they would always answer with the same vague notion of what I did in CS147, but I remembered doing a little of everything in CS147, and surely a more structured company would be different? Why did the product management interns attend so many meetings? Why did they complain of being very busy when they couldn’t explain to me what exactly they were always busy with?
I enrolled in this course hoping to get a proper definition for what a product manager was, and early on in the quarter I started getting an answer, which has been fleshed out little by little thanks to the regular and guest lectures and readings. It turned out that a product manager really was someone who did a little of everything. Each product manager’s tasks might be very different from place to place, but they generally needed to be a problem solver despite not having all that much authority and take on the responsibility for the work of others. By the time I rotated into the role of my team’s product manager in Week 8, I felt more sure of what my role was and what I needed to do.
Over the course of this quarter, I learned the more realistic side of how startups work (or don’t) and the many, many considerations that accompany a product idea: the business model, the value proposition, the story map, and the go-to-market strategy are only a few. Just as important are the assumption testing, pivots, and ethical considerations along the way. Hearing from Christina and guest speakers about their own experiences and the lessons they wanted to teach us was a valuable way to gain takeaways that I might have either needed to learn myself later on or never heard in my life. Some of these takeaways were from personal anecdotes that highlighted the importance of interpersonal communication and relationships in a team and company. Communication is something I have been slowly improving in but would particularly like to practice more in preparation for future working relationships.
If we had more time, I would have liked to go further with our project and create an initial version of a working prototype while continuing to learn how to make it better. With how much I enjoyed the guest lectures and want them to continue, it would be great if there were a seminar like CS547 just for guest speakers to talk about their experiences in product management and similar areas. Thank you for a wonderful quarter!
