A product manager is a professional role in an organization responsible for the development of products, from concept to launch to its improvement. Product managers are responsible for developing the business strategy behind a product, specify its functional requirements, and generally manage the launch of its features.
The scope of a PM’s role depends a lot on the organization’s size. A product manager will have a great deal of input from early research to quality assurance and even marketing efforts in a start-up. A product manager is usually responsible for user research and execution in a large organization. Several product managers work parallely on narrow bands of a single product’s development in even larger firms. While one may focus on collecting and analyzing user feedback, the other may help develop the technical features.
While product managers are laser-focused on developing the best products for an organization, they should respond to the following questions.
These three pillars are at the heart of a product manager’s job function. But there is much more to the role than what meets the eye
The key responsibilities of a Product Manager includes:
Often referred to as the “glue that binds user experience with business requirements,” product managers have become integral to organizations.
Most product managers come from a wide range of educational and work backgrounds; therefore, there is no single path to this profession. Being a senior position, most professionals migrate to this job function mid-career. According to a survey by BrainStation Digital Skills, 88% of product managers start their careers in a different field like marketing, engineering, or business analysis.
There is no hard and fast rule to becoming a Product Manager. Although to become a Product Manager, you need to demonstrate exceptional skills in either UX, tech, or business. However, you can leverage any experience as long as you supplement it with the additional skills a Product Managers require.
When it comes to conceptualizing, scaling, and launching a product, no other tech company does it better than Google. With a wide range of products, from Gmail to Google cloud, the product managers at Google have huge responsibilities. This role is often highly challenging and can draw massive competition.
On the surface, the job description of a Product Manager at Google is pretty much similar to the others. Since Google has a culture akin to that of start-ups, the Product Managers have greater control over the entire lifecycle of a product. Also, each Product Manager in Google is responsible for different products.
To further elucidate the role of a Product Manager at Google, here are a few of their responsibilities.
As a product manager, you are a central knowledge hub. From critical information about the product to the market, you are responsible for various constituencies. To grow in this role, you need to develop specific skills. These include:
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