Example Job Description
A typical Product Manager job description will read something like the below:
The Product Manager will have full autonomy over developing the products lifecycle as well as scaling and adapting the product to maximise growth.
The Product Manager will report directly to the Head of Product and will work alongside a team of designers, developers, and analysts. The key driver is to increase engagement and improve the relevance of ongoing content.
The Product Manager will:
- Work with customers and stakeholders to understand needs and build business cases
- Understand the opportunities, requirements and customer problems for each new product release and on-going growth optimisations
- Build the product strategy and roadmap
- Testing and delivering new features and optimisations that positively enhance the business KPIs and improve customer experience
- Work collaboratively with developers to release best in class products that users love
- Roll out product trials and product launches
- Driving innovation in the market
- Consistent UX throughout all products
- Creating high quality user stories and acceptance criteria i.e. data driven mindset
The Product Manager must have:
- A track record delivering great product portfolios
- Experience with AB and multi-variant testing
- Experience using data and analytics tools to prioritise your roadmap
- Excellent stakeholder management skills
- Experience in new product development and the innovation cycle
- Have a passion for digital, agile, software product management
Product Manager skills
Creating a job description is a difficult task for a product management role – each business will have different requirements depending on its size, how established the business is, the budget, and what product the business sells, from software, a service to a tangible product. Saying this, businesses looking to fill a product manager vacancy, are more than likely looking for these skills:
CUSTOMER FIRST APPROACH
Evidence of combining product experience and knowledge with market insight to deliver a product roadmap that has met and exceeded the actual needs of customers – rather than the perceived needs.
AGILE WORKING
Defined as ‘bringing people, processes, connectivity and technology, time and place together to find the most appropriate and effective way of working to carry out a particular task. It is working within guidelines (of the task) but without boundaries (of how you achieve it).’This is an important team management skill, creating the right environment for success.
PROBLEM SOLVING
The ability to foresee pain points and roadblocks within the product roadmap and creating a plan to overcome these in a timely and cost-effective way.
COACHING
Evidence of taking teams on a journey, from understanding the business vision and buying into the product direction completely. Businesses will want to see candidates who have showcased influencing skills and can give proven examples of coaching teams towards success.
LIFECYCLE EXPERIENCE
Becoming increasingly popular is the requirement for candidates to have ‘full stack’ experience and taking products through the whole product lifecycle, from research and development to maturity.
Technical Product Manager jobs
A Technical Product Manager role has similar responsibilities to a Product Manager. The difference in this case, is that a Technical Product Manager requires enhanced engineering and design skills, focusing more on the product itself, how it is built and its development. On the other hand, a Product Manager focuses more intensely on the customer, ensuring first and foremost that the product is customer centric.