My talk on leadership skills for Product Leaders at Institute of Product Leadership's seminar on Oct 22

1. Hacking Your Way to The
Top: Essential Skills for
Product Leaders
Tathagat Varma
Knowledgepreneur
http://thoughtleadership.in

2. What is your “top”?

4. PM Stats…
Execs didn’t
understand
PM!
No PM role,
or not well
defined
75 %
48 %
PMs
undergone
training
2 %

5. Evolution of PMs…
Factor Then Now
Business Rela+vely long business cycles, Low
compe++on, Longevity, Protec+ons
Vola+le business cycles, Intense
compe++on, Ephemeral, Open
Tech Largely stable tech Mostly evolving tech
R&D Mostly large R&D / Capex / IP / First
World
Mostly frugal / Opex / Open
Source / Global & Distributed
User Rela+vely consistent / basic user
needs
Highly fragmented and constantly
evolving user wants
Market Long market windows in largely
proven markets (MRDs ~3-5 years)
Short market windows in new
markets (where is the MRD?)
Product Long gesta+on cycle (1-3 years),
Global products
Short gesta+on cycles (1-3
quarters), Local products
Focus Focus was mostly tech Largely Product + UX + Design
Specs Market-research / Monolithic PRDs Hypotheses-valida+on / Dynamic
product backlogs
Dev Forecast driven / Predic+ve Feedback driven / Adap+ve
Talent Techies grew into PMs Growing trend of hiring PMs

6. So, who is a PM?

7. What do PMs do?

8. What do PMs don’t do!
• They don’t sell
• They don’t do design
• They don’t write code
• They don’t launch products
• They don’t create marketing campaigns
• They don’t support customers
• They don’t fix bugs
• They don’t do siteops
• …
• …but…knowing and doing it doesn’t hurt!

9. So, how can I get to the “top”?

10. Do your job Develop passion

11. Develop a fixed Medici mindset
“T”

12. T-shaped PM
Core
PM
Skills
Market
Research UX Engineering
Business
Analysis
Finance &
Pricing
…
Tech Compe++on

13. Find opportunities solve messy problems

14. Wait for orders Take initiative

15. Think conservative creative

16. Start writing

17. Be a expert critic coach maker
hZp://www.sloma.org/images/makers2014.png

18. Learn by doing experimenting shipping

19. Avoid Mitigate Accept Embrace failures

20. Be a scribe newscaster storyteller

21. Work hard smart hard really hard!

22. Influence with without authority

23. Manage Control Trust the team

24. Fear Enjoy the ride!

25. Recap
• Product Manager is an orchestration role. Be a
leader, not a boss!
• While expertize of various functions is not really
required, knowledge of them could be handy
• The “top” for a product leader is making the dent
in the universe!
• You surely need to know PM skills (IPL could
help – and yes, this isn’t a paid endorsement J)
• More importantly, a product mindset is a must!

26. References
• Good Product Manager / Bad Product Manager,
http://a16z.com/2012/06/15/good-product-managerbad-product-manager/
• The Myths of Product Management,
https://medium.com/@cwodtke/the-myths-of-product-management-7376eaf549a3#.ruyqduarj
• The Product Manager’s Essential Reading List for 2016,
https://medium.com/@sicross/the-product-manager-s-essential-reading-list-for-2016-
c7fd4c0491bf#.ej9qnsx0d
• So you want to manage a product?,
https://productcoalition.com/so-you-want-to-manage-a-product-c664ba7e5138#.sdzh5mmhz
• Where do product managers come from? An analysis of 1,000 PMs,
http://hackingrevenue.com/product-management/where-do-product-managers-come-from/
• Do Product Managers need a Technical Background?,
https://www.productmanagerhq.com/2014/08/do-product-managers-need-a-technical-background/
• Behind Every Great Product, http://www.svpg.com/behind-every-great-product
• Learning by Shipping,
https://blog.learningbyshipping.com/2015/01/11/ces-2015-recap-for-makers-and-product-
managers/
• What is a Product Manager? A Different Perspective,
http://www.productmanagerclub.com/2016/10/12/what-is-a-product-manager-a-different-
perspective/
• http://www.slideshare.net/280group/product-management-survey
• Gapingvoid for some great visual ideas!