My Reflections: A Balance of Fear and Excitement
I loved this reading. I appreciate the nuance yet clarity with which he approaches these important questions. It was especially helpful when he laid out the possible distinctions between your day-to-day at a start-up versus mid-level/large companies. In some ways, this instilled a bit of fear in me when I read about the heavy responsibility without the direct control and working through really ambiguous problems with little guidance. But on the other hand, I got really excited about the opportunity that PM-ing presents as far as the ways it replicates the sports team environments I have operated in over the last decade. On my water polo teams, I’ve had to earn trust in and out of the pool by working hard, communicating clearly, and showing up for my teammates in the small and big moments. I learned how to lead without ego, how to keep everyone aligned and motivated through all the ups and downs. I think those are the exact same skills that make a great PM: keeping different perspectives aligned, building credibility, and leading or influencing without authority. Throughout the chapter, I agreed with everything he said about what the PMs job is and has aligned with a lot of the reading and informational interviews I have done on the matter.
Question for the Author: Setting and Measuring PM Goals
I have been thinking about my goals for this new school year and how this is the first time in my life that I have no water polo goals and only have school and career-related goals. It was so easy for me to come up with those water polo goals and increasingly harder to do when it came to school and my job hunt because the areas got more and more ambiguous. So it makes me wonder:
- If most of your impact on the company is hard to quantify how do you formulate personal longer term career related goals for yourself for the month/year etc. and how do I know if I achieved them?
