Product Management Cohort 1
It’s not faith in technology. It’s faith in people. : By Steve Jobs
Day 1:
INTRO TO PRODUCT MANAGEMENT
People go to medical school to become doctors and law school to become lawyers, but what do they
do to become product manager? Business school is one option, but there are many others. Product
management jobs are within reach of new graduates.
Big tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and Facebook are always hiring new graduate product
managers. If these companies aren’t recruiting at your school, you’ll need to network.
Find friends who can connect you with a recruiter or try to connect with employees from the company
using Twitter, Quora, LinkedIn, or their blogs. Many employees are happy to refer people who have
shown a genuine interest in the company and have a strong resume.
What is Product Management?
Product management is a cross-functional role that lies at the confluence of technology, sales &
marketing, and business. A PM wholly owns the product and works directly with the senior executives
(C-suits) and the customers. A PM is the only advocate who represents the customers in a company
and makes sure every decision contains a customer perspective too.
Now Let us understand the role through a movie analogy:
Chapter 1: The Blueprint of Product Creation
Imagine you're a director preparing to make a blockbuster movie like "Inception." Creating a successful
product follows a similar journey.
Chapter 2: The Vision: Crafting the Dream
Just like Christopher Nolan envisioned "Inception," start with a clear idea of your product. This vision is
your guiding star, outlining the final look and feel.
Chapter 3: The Pre-production: Setting the Foundation
In product management, this phase involves defining your strategy and assembling your team of
professionals: designers, engineers, marketers, and a product manager to lead the way.
Chapter 4: Casting and Crew: Building the Team
Think of your product team as the cast and crew. The product manager is the director, designers create
the visuals, engineers handle the technical aspects, and marketers prepare for the launch.
Chapter 5: The Production: Bringing the Vision to Life
Development is like filming. Your team builds prototypes, tests features, and refines the product, much
like shooting and editing scenes to create a cohesive movie.
Chapter 7: Post-production: Perfecting the Product
Once development is complete, focus on refinement. This is akin to a movie's post-production, where
the film is edited and polished. For your product, it means testing and perfecting based on feedback.
Chapter 8: The Premiere: Launching Your Product
The product launch is your premiere. Plan a strategy to generate buzz and reach your target audience,
just like a movie premiere aims to attract viewers.
Chapter 9: The Reviews: Measuring Success and Iterating
After launch, gather feedback and analyze performance. Like movie reviews, this helps you understand
what works and where to improve, ensuring continuous success.
Why do we need a Product Manager?
A product manager plays a crucial role in a company by ensuring that products meet customer needs,
align with business goals, and are delivered efficiently.
What do companies look for in a PM?
The background of the “perfect” PM varies across companies and even teams, but usually has the
following attributes:
• Leadership
• Analytical & Data Skills
• Technical Skills
• Initiative
• Product Design Skills & Customer Focus
• Strong Work ethics
Product manager vs. Project manager vs Product Analyst
Product Management:
Focus: Product managers drive the development of products, prioritize initiatives, and make
strategic decisions about what gets built. They are responsible for the overall strategy, vision, and
success of a product or product line.
Responsibilities: They manage the product's entire lifecycle, from concept to market to continual
improvements based on user feedback and market changes. Product managers focus on
maximizing the product's value to both the customer and the business.
Skills: Product managers need a combination of technical and business skills, strategic thinking,
understanding customer needs, and the ability to think strategically.
Software: They use product management software to organize, develop, and communicate the
product strategy, as well as product roadmap software to communicate the product strategy
visually.
Project Management:
Focus: Project managers are concerned with planning, executing, monitoring, controlling, and
closing specific short-term projects within time, budget, and scope constraints. Their role ends
once the project is completed.
Responsibilities: They lead project teams, make decisions, manage resources, and keep projects on
track by dealing with constraints like scope, time, budget, and resources.
Skills: Project managers need skills in planning, execution, monitoring, controlling, resource
allocation, task management, and risk mitigation.
Software: They use project management software to track and manage all project details, ensuring
timely completion within defined scope, quality, and budget benchmarks
Product Analyst:
Role: Product Analysts focus on analyzing data to understand user behavior, market trends, and
product performance. They provide insights to support product decisions and improvements.
Responsibilities: They work closely with product managers to gather and analyze data, conduct
market research, and provide recommendations for product enhancements based on data insights.
Skills: Product Analysts need strong analytical skills, data interpretation abilities, and the capacity
to translate data into actionable insights for product development.
Types of PM Interviews
Product management interviews can vary wildly from company to company and even team to
team. But, there's good news too. 99% of product manager interviews fall into one of three categories.
1. General "product sense"
2. Product case study
3. Cross-functional expertise
#General "product sense"
In these interviews, the interviewer will usually ask a mix of generic product questions (e.g., "What's
your favorite product and why?" or "Tell me which product of ours you like the best and three ways you
could improve it?").
These interviews tend to be unstructured and each question is an independent exercise, meaning that
the interviewer might jump to a series of seemingly disparate topics (e.g., from "critique the design of
this mobile app" to "design an algorithm for prioritizing Netflix content recommendations").
#Product case study
These interviews are structured and focused on a specific product challenge that the interviewer wants
to walk through with the candidate. Most of the time these are like presentations through your past
decks or assignments given to you by the interviewer.
#Cross-functional expertise
Cross-functional expertise interviews are all about non-product managers assessing how you'll
collaborate with people like them. For example, you might have cross-functional expertise interviews
with engineers, data science, product marketers, designers, and support and operations employees.
These interviews aim to determine if you'll be a productive partner in that discipline.
Key Difference between on Campus and Off-campus Interviews
Companies mostly offer 6 month internships in Product profile.
Stages of PM
Product Analyst-------------Associate Product Manager------------- Product Manager-
Senior Product Manager------------------ Product Lead---------------Director of Product--
----VP of Product
Bahut ho gya PM ke bare me gyan, ab dekhte hai actual km ky krte hai actually
Behind the scenes:
Real Problem identification and validating :
You saw a real problem existing in your neighbourhood or society or you faced a problem. But you
need to validate it by conducting surveys initially.
Vision and Strategy:
Crafting a compelling vision that defines the product's purpose and target audience.
Building a roadmap with short-term goals and milestones leading to the long-term vision.
Communicating the vision and roadmap clearly to all stakeholders to ensure alignment.
Product Ideation:
Brainstorming sessions with the team to generate creative solutions to identified problems.
Prototyping and testing different ideas to validate their effectiveness and appeal.
Choosing the most promising ideas for further development based on data and feedback.
HOMEWORK:
Choose any company of your choice, analyze its products and services, the markets in which it
operates, and which other companies are its competitors.
