31 Aug Product Management: Installment 1 of 5
Last year, we published a 5-installment blog on product management tips and innovation improvement. It received so much positive feedback that we have decided to reprise it. Over the next few blogs, Axiom’s Rob Beachy, a nationally recognized speaker, leader and writer in the fields of innovation and management, will be sharing the tips that make his teams so successful. Here is the first installment.
Unless you’ve been living in a cave (without tools) your whole life, you’ve probably, at some point, been responsible for a project. Whether it was school-related, work-related, or your own innovative concept you wanted to pursue, you were the lead on that project. Maybe you thought you excelled at it so much that you wanted to pursue it as a career. Problem is…when you got down to the nitty-gritty of the work, you realized it wasn’t exactly what you imagined. It’s possible that in the art of translation, you missed the difference between project management and product management. While subtle, those differences are crucial to success.
So, what the heck is product management? It’s important to note from the outset that the term has many variations across business segments, so while each field might define it somewhat differently, it’s helpful to start with this: a product manager ensures that, over time, a product or service strategically and profitably fulfills the target audience’s needs—he or she must constantly monitor, and subsequently change if necessary, the elements of the marketing mix, including the product itself, channel distribution, product safety, brand support, communications strategy and price.
In other words, a product manager is not a man/woman on an island. Instead, he or she must be willing and able to work cross-departmentally. This means establishing key relationships with the research and development team, engineering, production, physical distribution, packaging, finance, marketing, market research, sales, advertising and promotion. That can get very complicated, but when you think about it, it makes sense—with these requirements, each product receives the full attention of one person responsible solely for its success. (This is normally where we’d insert the famous quotation about great power and responsibility, but we’re sparing you the torture).
Now for the critical question. If a product manager has all these responsibilities, then what is the difference between a product manager and a project manager? Think of it like an olive.
The middle part is project management, and the entire olive is product management. A product manager has to do everything a project manager does, except with the added responsibilities of profit and loss, portfolio management, and a total business perspective, from marketing and operations to sales and finance. What’s the rub, you ask? Well, a product manager may not have line authority over the functional units that execute plans, and success in achieving product goals (i.e. sales, profits and market share) is largely dependent on his or her expert knowledge, project management skills and overall persuasive ability—which, of course, brings us back to the original supposition regarding the requirements of relationship building with other teams and departments (and, yes, communication skills).
Without further adieu, then, here are the top 12 characteristics of the ideal product manager, as identified with the help of the Product Development and Management Association (PDMA) and a handful of my other colleagues:
Product Manager Profile
1. Total business perspective (globally)
2. Goal, team and process-oriented
3. Customer and quality focused
4. Strategically driven, tactically innovative
5. Efficient, multi-tasking, sense of urgency
6. Prioritizes, motivates, delegates
7. Objective, organized and timely decision maker
8. Effective communicator, politically astute
9. Prudent risk-taker
10. Trusted, respected, responsible leader
11. Financially, technically and operationally astute
12. “Heart of a warrior”
Stay tuned for the next installment, in which we examine the first three attributes in depth. And if you’re interested in learning more or need training in product management, contact Rob Beachy at rbeachy@axiomcom.com.
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