Learn how the skills you already have can make you a great PM, and how to build the skills you're missing. Includes the Venn Diagram of PM Skills

1. DIFFERENT SKILLS =
DIFFERENT STRENGTHS
AS A PM
AS A PM
AS A PM
Jackie Bavaro - @jackiebo

2. PRODUCT MANAGEMENT IS ALL ABOUT FILLING IN THE EMPTY SPACE
ANY EXPERIENCESYOU’VE HAD CAN MAKEYOU A BETTER PM
ANY EXPERIENCESYOU’VE HAD CAN MAKEYOU A BETTER PM

3. • TheVenn diagram of PM Skills
• Examples of how different roles have built up those skills
• How to build the missing skills
• How to find a company and role that’s good for you
• How to use your unique skills to succeed as a PM

4. Design a great
product
Ship
It
Smar
t
Gets Things
Done
Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Customer
Focus
Product
Design
Analysis &
Synthesis
Action
Oriented
Prioritizatio
n
Project
Management
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n

5. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Customer
Focus
Product Design
Analysis & Synthesis
Action
Oriented
Prioritizatio
n
Project Management
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n
ENGINEE
R

6. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Product Design
Analysis &
Synthesis
Action Oriented
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n
MARKETIN
G
Project
Management
Customer
Focus
Prioritizatio
n

7. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Customer
Focus
Product Design
Analysis & Synthesis
Action
Oriented
Prioritization
Project
Management
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n
DESIGNE
R

8. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Customer
Focus
Product Design
Analysis &
Synthesis
Action
Oriented
Prioritization
Project Management
Technical
Skills
Communication
PROJECT
MANAGER

9. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Customer Focus
Product Design
Analysis &
Synthesis
Action
Oriented
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n
CUSTOMER
SERVICE
Prioritization
Project
Management

10. Strategy &
Vision
Leadershi
p
Product Design
Analysis & Synthesis
Technical
Skills
Communicatio
n
BUSINESS
ANALYST
Project
Management
Customer Focus
Prioritizatio
n
Action
Oriented

11. INDUSTRY EXPERTISE

12. HOW TO BUILD THE MISSING SKILLS

13. CUSTOMER FOCUS
• Spend time with people
• Watch them use products and look for where they run into problems
• Learn what their goals are
• Practice framing products in terms of customers and goals
• Build up some compelling anecdotes to make the customers real for you
• Check out the IDEO Human Centered Design Toolkit

14. PRODUCT DESIGN
• Use a lot of products
• Always think about how they could be improved. Double check your
improvements for customer focus
• Stay on top of new trends, notice what you like and don’t like, and why
• Consider ways that you could apply something that works well on one product to
another kind of product
• Read some books on product design

15. ANALYSIS
• Learn the fundamentals of data analysis
• Check out Lean Startup and the KISSMetrics blog
• Practice if you can
• Sit in on data analysis meetings
• Play with the data yourself

16. TECHNICAL SKILLS
• Take some courses
• Optimize for learning skills that you could actually apply at your job: CSS, Scripting,
SQL
• Discuss technical issues with engineers
• Ask them to help you ramp up

17. BEING MORE ACTION ORIENTED:
SCRAPPINESS
• Be Brave
• Make a habit of stepping up
• Do, Delegate, or Decide you don’t need it
• Look for times you or a teammate feels blocked - that’s a sign there’s an opportunity
to be scrappy
• Yes, this is hard work

18. PRIORITIZATION
• Get comfortable with the need for prioritization
• If you waited until the product was perfect it would never ship
• We’re not always right about how important things are
• Once the product launches you’ll learn much more from your customers
• Decide what you’re optimizing for
• Are you testing a hypothesis? Making a use case possible? Aiming for a quality bar?

19. PICKING THE RIGHT ROLE FORYOU

20. • Consider making the transition at your current company
• Consider going after a TPM or EPM job
• Look for a role where your skills will be valued
• “How do you split the work with designers and marketing?”
• “What do you look for in a PM?”
• Look for a company where you’ll be able to learn a lot
• You might want to pick a company with lots of PMs so you can learn from
them

21. USEYOUR UNIQUE SKILLS TO SUCCEED

22. • Use your skills to identify areas where you can be helpful
• eg. put together a marketing plan, do some data analysis
• Especially great if you can use your skill to be helpful early on
• Pick up experience and ask for advice in the areas you don’t know.
• Ask how to learn, don’t just pass questions along
• Share your skills
• Build up your credibility by teaching other people what you know

23. ...oh, and maybe buy our book
THE END
Also:
pmblog.quora.com

24. PHOTO CREDITS
• http://flic.kr/p/aEHMU
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Soyuz_TMA-09M_rocket_in_the_assembling_fac
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Decisions_Decisions_(Horton,_Oxwich_Point_o
• http://flic.kr/p/99XzqQ