From Product Management To Product Leadership

Many want to be product managers, but few take the time to think larger than the actual product in the shrink wrap. Be a product leader. Make a difference to customers, partners, compatriots, stakeholders, and the shareholders.

if every enterprise is a digital enterprise, we, as an industry, are going to have to elevate our understanding of the product management role. We need the advanced version of the function. One that can determine how to sequence development, because being early is the same as being wrong. One that can not only build products, but also terminate products. One who know how to say no to noisy customer or executive. One that can form and coach a team, because product management is a team sport.

still in use [legacy functionality cannot easily be replaced without large up front costs], or engineering won’t let go of the product and resources working on them. The list of reasons could go on for quite a while

There are multiple reasons these products are zombies including: business stakeholder won’t let go, customers have older versions of these products

How You View Yourself

To do so requires an evolved product manager who thinks beyond building the product right, but, rather, to build the right product

Market Definition – Map needs with target markets and analyze the market segments to actively pursue. Ensure that the targeted segments are large enough to support the current and future business of the product.
Distribution Strategy – Determine which channels best align with your markets’ buying preferences.
Product Portfolio – Integrate products into a coherent portfolio of products, focused on the market. Manage the portfolio like a “product” (business plan, positioning, buying process, market requirements, and marketing plan).
Product Roadmap – Illustrate the vision and key phases of deliverables for the product. The roadmap is a plan, not a commitment

Any Product Manager who has been assigned the anchor product in an organization will tell you the first day on the job is like being placed in the position of running a small country. There is so much activity across all of the various functions

If you are hiring PMs, try to find the ones who have both a strategy and an execution aura. Also try to find the ones who were practitioners in the spaces you are trying to get into. If selling a product to IT people, make sure your PM leader has worked in IT before. Even better, find those who have been to the battle you are about to enter and have returned with their insight.

I once had an executive who told me that you can have great strategy, PowerPoints, financial models, and customer/market data to show why your strategy is right, but without top notch execution, you are doomed to failure. Additionally, he mentioned the pithy wisdom that success has many parents while failure is an orphan. You cannot argue with these statements. And, while they are sobering, they should jump start your thinking as a product leader around execution issues