What skills make you a successful product manager?

We see the world as we are. But we build products for others. This is the key why empathy is essential for build high growth products. In order to do that, we need to accept that we're all biased and use frameworks to help us connect with others to understand their needs in an unbiased way. the ultimate goal of every product leader should be answering the question: "what is the bias i'm adding to the product and how can I break it?"

User obsessed, thorough knowledge of outside and inside marketsjobs to be done, effective communication, ruthless prioritization, strategy, goals and metric focused and fine execution

It never fails to amaze me how many organizations launch into product development without taking the time to figure out if what they're developing is something their customers actually want or need. Putting yourself in the shoes of your customers means setting aside any assumptions or biases you have and truly listening to what they have to say.

In today's fast pacing IT SaaS understanding what customer feels vs what customer needs vs financial budget, this matrix needs to be studied by PMs very carefully. This matrix will help to not only guide customers what they feel is important for them but also give them a perspective of what can give their users a delight.

Often people ask for and describe solutions - but most don't fully express their deeper pains or desires. Albeit direct, it helps a lot to ask the customer to describe their pain in full detail, or why they really care about a problem being solved. Nudge them to express the thoughts often unsaid - either due to assumed triviality, or embarrassment. We don't need faster horses or trains where a telephone does the job. Deeply understanding the nature of their grievances and wants is critical to the decision of both if to build, and what. I once asked a stakeholder "why do you care so much about modifying this metric?" - and they told me it is how their whole department is evaluated. The solution was never to build, but move to a new one.

In short it’s the art of simultaneously keeping your eyes on the horizon, your ear to the ground, taking a step back while always being on the front foot, making a few courageous leaps, and covering your backside !!

Sometimes victory is is not about driving faster or pedalling harder. Sometimes it is about anticipating traffic, and taking a different path. Sometimes, it is about dropping off your vehicle, and taking a quick ride in a ferry or or the tube. And sometimes, it is just about waiting out the rain and deciding to buy the groceries... tomorrow. Might wins battles. Strategy - wins wars.

As a Product Manager, their is a huge difference between theory and actual practice. The requirements are not rigid and they change in accordance with time and industry. For eg. A customer might not feel a marketing automation is required but a quick change in leadership or the use of it by its competitor may make it a P1 requirement, as a PM a person should be strategically open for this change and shouldn't be rigid with the requirements even it has come as final requirements from customer.

Agreed, also being an excellent product manager is about being able to deliver and execute on what you promised. That means you need to be able to take what needs to be built, turn it into smaller packages, and order them in a way that has the most impact as possible and build a product roadmap Being able to come up with a thorough roadmap is crucial. It brings everyone together on what the new features will be, what the timeline is, and what the overall product vision is. It gives critical context to all the stakeholders and ensures that the product will be shipped as planned. It also lets you have a bird’s eye view of the product’s path forward, which lets you understand better how to assign resources, and know what to focus on.

Totally agree. We need to be relying on the experts, just as much the experts should rely on our ability to create end to end connection I do believe that the world doesn't need either specialists or generalists. We need both doing what they are best of.

In addition to the technical skills highlighted earlier, emotional intelligence and foresight are crucial for a product manager. These qualities allow them to understand user needs and anticipate future trends, ensuring that the product is not only technically sound but also resonates with its audience and remains viable in the long term. This balanced skill set—combining technical acumen with people skills and visionary thinking—is what elevates a good product to a great one.

Absolutely essential to have here: understanding the business side implications of the technical choices being made. There is a lot of emphasis placed, typically, on the importance of coding for PMs, but knowledge of solution architect is a topic seldom mentioned.

New products being launched today invariably either ARE technology or are highly dependent on technology for support, distribution, marketing, and so on. It can be daunting become familiar with key technology concepts but so critical for a product manager today.

As a product manager, your most important partners are your user experience designers and user interface designers. And although they are important also, a web developer is not a user interface designer.

It's an amazing method. But be aware that one size does not fit all. As a product manager, you need to have repertoir. That is to have the knowledge of tools, methods and experiences and to match the project needs with the right method, tools.

In R&D, one can either adapt to trends or pioneer new solutions. A successful manager communicates the product need clearly and recognizes the team's knowledge limits. Clear goals keep the team motivated and aligned. Multidisciplinary brainstorming invites diverse perspectives, fostering innovative solutions. Post brainstorming, ideas are evaluated and prioritized to focus on the most promising solutions. Effective R&D blends clear communication, goal-setting, and diverse expertise to both address market needs and push innovation boundaries.

It depends on what we're building. Sometimes, when the level of confidence is low and the cost to develop is low, the best option is to ship it. And by that, we keep iterating based on data.

Building innovation require change management. A change never fails because of the tech. It fails because of the non technical perspectives.

Strong PMs are constantly looking for simple ways to confirm their hypothesis. They are curious. They frame customer needs/opportunity and iterate to validate and deliver value. They are obsessed by finding solutions to problems, not the other way around.

I agree, But also the three pillars for a successful PM which are essential and are as follows - Direct access to users and customers Direct access to engineers Direct access to stakeholders.

Many other important attributes for PMs are missing here: curiosity, lifelong learning, business acumen...the ability to work both at a tactical and at a strategic level.

The culture of R&D within a company plays a crucial role in its success. For genuine innovation to flourish, there must be an atmosphere that promotes open sharing of ideas and solutions. This openness, however, should be underpinned by values of integrity and honesty. Such values not only build trust among team members but also ensure transparent discussions related to intellectual property, preventing potential disputes and fostering collaborative growth.

A project manager, is somewhat a vague term, projects come in all shapes and sizes. Ultimately you need to be able to trust your team, and they need to be able to follow(and trust) your decision making process. Keeping your engineers, engineering managers, technicians, etc all focused on the larger picture will align the decision making process regardless of who has to make what decision along the way. Communication and leadership skills are probably the most important tools to making this happen.

One of missing skills is domain knowledge. Are you product manager in payments, wealth management, e-commerce? You should know how things work in your domain. How payments are made, what exceptions occur. You should also have high level understanding of product breakdown for your area - what are key functionalities that products in that area offer? Part of domain knowledge is updating your understanding and checking what new trends are emerging in the market.