What is Product Management?
Product Management focuses on bringing better products to the market by reaching across various teams to plan and design. Successful product leadership along with shipping goes beyond the scope of software engineering team.
It is an independent function that needs relevant business acumen, product knowledge and a deep understanding of UX design. Product Management includes envisioning the product, defining a strong product strategy, and developing a plan to meet company goals as well as user needs.
Why Do You Need Product Management?
- Product Management has become crucial because of various reasons. First and foremost, product management is needed to build the right products. It is imperative to determine the effectiveness of each product so that valuable resources aren’t wasted.
- It is also important to factor in the functional dependencies to ensure that the right functionality is available when required. Successful product management goes beyond merely developing the product.
- The product also has to be marketed to the end users. People are hardly likely to buy the product if they aren’t acquainted with its functionality.
Agile Product Management Mindset
- There are various lean/agile philosophies that are critical for the success of your product. The best approach is to be customer driven while making important decisions. Analyze the entire customer experience rather than just focusing on products.
- Instead of asking the customers what they want, it is better to show them minimal viable products (MVPs) that will make it easy to determine the requirement. Always adopt flexible strategies as the customer needs keep changing due to the evolving market.
- Having an agile approach is a key to successful product management.
What Does a Product Manager do?
- A product manager looks after strategizing the product development. They are focused on the long-term vision for the product and ensure that the product is in alignment with the value system it is designed with.
- Similarly, Product Owners (PO) ensures that the right functionality is built within the stipulated time. PO ideally transforms the overall vision of the product manager into detailed requirements.
- They work closely with stakeholders such as finance, security, audit, and operations among others.
Processes Involved in Product Management
- The processes in product management bring the product to fruition. A roadmap for products needs to be developed as a first step. This is followed by exploring the potential products and experimenting to bring forth a perfect model.
- The products are then prioritized as per budget constraints. Product managers allocate relevant features as well as outcomes to the product and manage functional dependencies. Products are also marketed to the potential customers in order to increase the usage.
- Marketing is a crucial process as it drives sales and improves the product outreach. Finally, the success of products is governed and necessary amendments are made accordingly.
To sum it up, product management plays a pivotal role in an organization. It is an amalgam of engineering, the business and the end user. The growth of the PM function is imperative for a business along with streamlining of the processes.