The job of a product manager is quite specialized and particular to the company. Their responsibility is to determine what and how to get given goals done. In addition, I think a product manager’s responsibility is to comprehend the worth, viability, and practicality of a product. I think a product manager serves as a liaison or communicator between the engineering and design sides of a product to make sure that they are on the same page and working toward the same objectives. In other words, PM serves as the glue for communication between different teams and allows prospective teams to focus on their own work. However, despite the importance of their role, PM holds very little power.
According to author Matt Lemay of Product Management in Practice, “product management is about building products that people love”. But in practice, a product manager’s duties may vary greatly. Product managers spend most of their time working on a product’s features rather than managing the overall product direction. I really like how this chapter focuses on the soft skills and not product-ordinated skills a PM should equip such as working ambiguity and people with different priorities.
Unlike software engineers or UX designers, due in large part to how variable the job requirements can be, there is also no standard background or list of qualifications for what constitutes a competent product manager. In summary, a PM will do anything and everything to complete the task at hand; they have no specific duty to fulfill. A strong PM is adaptable, modest, and a skilled communicator.
Closely related, a question I have for the author is to prepare for CS interviews we can brush up on coding skills but for product management what are ways to get hands-on experience in school?
