Who is a product manager and why is he a bigger superhero?
'With great powers come great responsibility' - spiderman
Are their superheroes who take responsibility without powers?
Yes, such real-life superheroes who exist to impact the world are Product managers.
These unsung heroes are not often understood as people think :
"You are not an engineer who can write optimal code"
"You are not a designer who can craft pixel-perfect screen"
"Are you a postman ?"
They think who are you, how did this even come into existence and what skills do you possess?
Who are we and how did we come into existence?
The musicians play their instruments and I play the orchestra, where the sum is greater than the individual units, I am a product manager!
It all began way back in 1931 when Neil McElroy wrote a memo where the evolution started where he wrote "Experiment and recommend wrapper revisions" in 1931 where this thought process is tough even today.
Eight decades later this transitioned into software products and evolved into the role of a product manager who takes the entire responsibility of the product with the following attributes :
What skills do we possess?
- Dissecting and facilitating decisions
- Saying no to things on the whiteboard that shouldn't go to the sprint board
- Having the right intuition
- Working with experts across various teams
- Energetic, amicable and organized
- Perpetual learning
- Working with constraints
- Prioritize, prioritize, prioritize!
Our success is measured based on the success of our product by taking full responsibility, understanding the context of the company to devise a winning plan.
Depending on the stage whether we are finding the problem-solution fit or building for the next billion users there would be different hats to adapt to play a position to the best of the abilities.
With a deep sense of responsibility when done right undoubtedly this is the best thing to do on this planet earth, creating a great impact without superpowers!
Respect to all the product managers and product makers who are the reason you are seeing this post now :)