#Product manager skills how to

Mastering innovation practices and tools (such as design thinking, design sprints, idea assessment, prioritization rapid prototyping, and validation methods) is essential for this role.Īdditionally, Product Leaders have the mechanisms to deal with 'failure' - they accept it as part of the innovation process and as a source of learning - in the context of continuous improvement. Successful Product Leaders realize the value of innovation for product development and establish the right processes to empower a special culture - fostering ideas sharing, collaboration, creativeness, and experimentation. → Check also: our unique Innovation Toolkit - a collection of seven innovation templates that empower teams to frame problems, shape ideas, run hackathons, and more. Having good product sense also requires the ability to think 'as a user': Succesful Product Leaders demonstrate a ‘user mentality’ and use empathy to relate to user problems, frequent customer needs, and stakeholder expectations they are able to feel the pain points and deeply understand the problem and the ecosystem in which it exists.ĭefining a product with clarity implies an increased ability to capture and process the wider ‘landscape’ - that is, the key players in the market, their differentiators, the current monetization models, the involved technology, and the partner ecosystem. Having the ability to define concrete, coherent products with high business potential is a rare skill. Good Product Leaders have the talent to 'easily' obtain a holistic, strategic view of what the right product might be for a given problem space they can identify the riskier assumptions and they know how to test them, learn and adapt they define what success looks like with clarity, and set the measurement framework that helps the team to execute fast - in a truly agile fashion. In other cases, great concepts were abandoned simply due to the limited ability of the team to see the 'big picture' and 'how to get there': the product development process - and especially the agile, iterative approach - is often misunderstood, and thus, not applied in the right way. I’ve met teams struggling to understand the notion of a product - and how it is different from a project. After 20 years in the technology innovation and product development space, I’ve witnessed many promising ideas and concepts failing due to insufficient framing, definition, or work prioritization. Thinking in terms of products is not as easy as it may sound.

true Product Leaders tend to have the following nine abilities and talents. Regardless of the actual title - Product Manager, Architect, Chief Product Officer, etc. More specifically, in a digital context, effective product leadership requires a wide range of skills and competencies, spanning across technology and commercial domains. They act as the ‘CEO of the product’ - they bring a bold vision, strategy, and the ambition to deliver value to end-users, customers, and stakeholders - while using corporate resources wisely. Talented Product Leaders make epic things happen - by releasing the right instances of their product, in the right order and at the right time.

#Product manager skills how to

In fact, I prefer using ‘leadership’ over ‘management’ in the context of product development: True Product Leaders don’t just manage a product they envision great products and features out of the blue they spot those critical differences between a superior product and an average one they know how to build a product from scratch - how to handle ambiguity and shape the scope where to focus and how to prioritize features in a smart and strategic way. It requires a bold vision and, at the same time, a strong connection with reality: successful Product Managers are both visionaries and pragmatists - they are strategic thinkers and have the ability to see product opportunities when others are ‘lost’ in ambiguity. What are the key leadership qualities that inspire teams to build amazing products?īuilding great products is a difficult and complex job - but also fascinating.