Ask HN: Product Managers, how did you get there and what's your background?

I work for a software company in the product management and product space, and we do a ton of research on this.

We recently published the results from our annual survey of 150 product managers:

https://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/429921/Content/2017%20PM%20In...

We’re also publishing a pretty surprising article in the next couple weeks about what separates product leaders from product managers.

P.S. We see plenty of "junior product" positions.

Currently PM on Firefox, formerly PM at NPR Digital and other past companies. Breaking in to PM is hard because it's such a squishy a role, and therefore hard for hiring directors to know they’re getting someone who can deliver. There's general agreement on what engineers, UX, analysts do (and how to screen them in hiring). Companies hiring for PM want something harder to quantify: people with a demonstrated track record of getting things done. The best way to ensure that is to 1. hire an internal candidate in another role with a demonstrated track record, 2. Hire someone who was a successful PM elsewhere. Some companies (or some roles) specifically look for MBAs in roles that require more market or pricing analysis.

Breaking in as an MBA is one way for positions that prefer it. The other, more common way is to come into PM from another role. I was a mediocre developer, but a great generalist. I bounced around a lot of ENG roles and shipped a lot of stuff. I was deeply interested in how things got used by real people. I went to research. My first true PM role at a dotcom had a job title of "Producer" (a lot of folks came from media and imported the title). I worked for a Fortune 500 CMO and watched every aspect of the consumer experience. I've come to really really love the role.

My .02 on how the role should work: PM is about service. You are in service to your team, to your execs, as you build for the user. You lead the process of defining the product but you also carry water and do whatever it takes to ship. You carry the narrative and the vision for the team not because wrote it (sometimes you do), not because you're a visionary (sometimes you are). You carry it because as a practical matter, you are the only person on the team who can, because everyone else is building and in the weeds. You're the one person with the luxury to look around. You are the voice of whomever isn't in the room. The team gets the credit when you succeed, but you get the blame when you fail. This “single, wringable neck" philosophy hasn’t been the official policy at places I’ve worked, but it keeps one humble. Especially since as a PM you will mostly rely on soft-power, which is the most powerful kind if you can convince your teams and execs to trust and follow you.

(EDIT: adding a few soft-skills )

Communication: the most important PM skill. You'll write a ton of briefs. You must to be clear. You also need to be good at verbal communication. You're a storyteller, you'll pitch and ask to be greenlit. You have to fight for resources or to keep your project alive. You need to get ahead of bad news and also remember to trumpet your team's successes.

Empathy: it goes with the service mentality. The user doesn't live in Silicon Valley, they barely understand how their PC/phone works. They're important, they're human, and they have needs. You also need to be empathetic to your teammates, if you want the most out of them.

Discipline: PM's generally overindex on blue-sky thinking, may struggle with discipline. You often have to kill your baby to ship on time.

PM @ Google, before that PM @ Twitter for 2 years. Before that CEO/Founder of a SaaS startup.

Did a BA in Anthropology & English. Learned to write, think clearly, and communicate effectively.

Moved to China, founded a company which failed but gave me the entrepreneurial bug and the realization that I didn't know nearly as much CS as I thought I did.

Went back to school, did a Bachelors of Computer Science w/ Math minor. Learned to think systematically & rigorously, how computers work, a bit of ML/algorithms/etc, and how to code.

Applied to Google APM program. Thought it would be an ideal job before founding a company. Didn't get in.

Founded a company with my best friend, who had a Masters in Computer Engineering and had worked in industry. Spent the first year coding everyday, all our first employees were engineers. Learned to write real software and work with an engineering team.

Transitioned into the CEO role in practice. This happened because my co-founder and I had very different motivations. He wanted to build great systems (and not have to go to meetings / talk to customers). I just wanted to do whatever was needed to move the business forward, I was equally happy coding or talking to investors / taking meetings. Learned (through multiple failings) how to think about markets, interview customers, how to motivate and lead, build realistic roadmaps, raise money, do sales.

After 5 years, sold my company as a 1st base hit exit. I had no problem getting mid-career PM interviews, despite having never been 'officially'a PM. Focused on big scale consumer because I wanted maximize my leverage/impact.

Junior positions? See todd_sherman's response (Hi Todd!).

Skills – well covered elsewhere. The short version is "Get the right things built & shipped." To do that, you need to know (1) what the right things are (user problems, strategy, markets, corporate politics, etc) and (2) get them built & shipped (working with eng & design, leadership, resourcing, more politics). It's harder than it sounds, there are many many more wrong things than right things (and many wrong things can sound pretty right).

I'm sure I'm biased, but I think founding a company is an ideal pre-PM curriculum. When big tech co's acquire companies, the CEOs almost always become PMs, for good reason. This knowledge changes the risk equation as a founder, being a PM at a great company is a pretty awesome backup plan.

Threads like this is why I keep checking HN. Thanks to the people who responded with in-depth answers.

Hey!