
Product managers know that there’s much more to it. Many people think of “product” as the merchandise that sits on the retail shelf or an Amazon listing, waiting for you to buy it.

In order to understand the role, you need to understand what needs to be managed. It’s a deceptively simple designation that seems like it should be self-explanatory, but it’s not. What does a product manager do? Manages products, of course. And ensuring that he or she uses data to inform both new features and product optimization techniques to improve online conversion - whether in the form of sales, leads, signups, or engagement metrics. The product manager’s whole job is ensuring that a new product in development, or a new feature of an existing product is viable, functional, and profitable. A great product manager has no turf to protect-not engineering dependencies, not stakeholder hypotheses, not marketing objectives. For example, Netflix is a digital product. In a nutshell, a product manager is the champion of a digital product. A fabulous product manager is not a salesperson, an engineer, a developer, a designer, or a stakeholder … but it helps the product manager immensely to know a little bit about all of the above.

Introduction to Product ManagementĬompared to other roles within an enterprise, a product manager is a generalist, a jack-of-many-trades, and a cross-functional leader. So let’s dig deep into what a product manager is, what a product manager does, and what makes a product manager good. One of our consultants will get back to you within 24 hours.Ī good product manager will enjoy job security, career longevity, and financial prosperity.
