The Master Product Manager - Part 11

When I was part of the technical R&D team for the first part of my career, I always looked at the people working in the commercial side of the business as a bunch of know it all people that didn't have that extensive idea of how the product works and how it can actually change the life of customers or how much effort was put inside the product to bring it to life.

I have realized how regular it was, that engineers always view the businesspeople in not so effective ways and that technical members understand more about the product that those punches of expensive suit know it all members working on the commercial side.

Yet, what I seriously realized when I moved to the other side of the equation several years later is that the commercial product manager is usually very much under lots of stress from every direction.

He/she is not sales, so he has no direct influence on sales, he is not directly involved with the development team, and he must go through the technical/innovation product manager to influence the new product development directly.

He doesn't own the innovation roadmap, but he is directly impacted by it. He usually comes from a non-technical background, so he must immerse himself a lot on the technical side to stay up to date with the trend.

Yet, the commercial product manager is seen across the organization as the deal closure who ensures that the business goes on being profitable and growing year over year.

So, what does this commercial product manager do that makes him quite valuable and at the same time, how does he/she ensures that the customer feedback and market reality is highly incorporated into the product roadmap.

Continue reading the article on Substack below