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The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

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Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#141

Post by icedchai »

NearAP wrote: post #134
icedchai wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Creative writing, maybe? Outside of founder-level product managers, of which I have worked with several who are actually creative, I remain unconvinced there is much real difference.

Product Managers - identify problems to be solved, decide/play a role into what features goes into MVP or a release, talks to customers, comes up with/designs the solutions (functional solutions) to the problems (aka features and how they interconnect), do UI designs (major UI designs can go to the UX team, smaller UI designs stay with product manager), etc If your company is using the sprint model, the Product manag…

So you say. However, I've been at companies where PMs are running the daily sprint / scrum meetings.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#143

Post by Xcelerate »

onion2k wrote: post #115
efields wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're worried apply for another job and tell the hiring manager on the other end what you're expecting for a salary. Don't be ludicrous, but maybe ask for 20% more than you're making. See what they say. If they don't blink and want you to come in, you're right: you're not making enough. I've gotten, "Well, we should probably stop this call soon because my cap is X and you're asking for more than that." It was rea…

My advice is be to be ludicrous. Ask for far more than you think you're worth. As most people undervalue themselves you'll often find companies saying yes, or at least negotiating down to more than you'd have asked for if you capped your wage raise to 20%. If they hire you you'll then be faced with the feeling that you're out of your depth, overpaid, and incapable of doing the job you took, but that's a different set…

> My advice is be to be ludicrous.

For recruiters who contact me from companies that aren’t my usual area of career interest, I do this to see what the upper bound is. It once backfired on me. Shortly after finishing grad school, a recruiter contacted me about a quantitative finance position and asked what range I was looking for. I replied “about $350k”. He responded, “We can work with that.” I think I had to scrape my jaw off the floor. I didn’t go any further with the process because the job seemed to require extensive travel and 80+ hour work weeks (and who knows if I could have even passed their rigorous interview process), but his reply was quite the revelation for someone who had never been in the workforce.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#144

Post by wjossey »

gnulinux wrote: post #88
reggieband wrote: post #73

I swear, every time I read an article on HN about salary it gives me anxiety. I'm perpetually worried that I'm not earning as much as I should be earning. I don't think it is healthy but I can't look away.

I have the same problem. I'm actually intentionally underpaid because this way (1) I have less anxiety about getting fired (2) I have less problems with imposter syndrome (3) I worry less about being underpaid since I know I'm underpaid. I know most people will think this is extremely irrational, but I'm paid about 3 times more than I can spend (I live very cheap and am happy this way) so I already save 2/3 of my tak…

I applaud you for finding a way to manage your anxiety, which allows you to live a sustainable and full life. You only get so many years on this earth, so live it however you want!

Best of luck to you.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#145

Post by NearAP »

mazatta wrote: post #17
c0nsumer wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good PMs have a much broader scope and much greater knowledge of the business -- the problems the engineers are tasked with solving -- than many engineers do. When doing a good job they bring together the technical might of the engineers, the designers/architects of the system, and the business folks to be sure something is completed when needed, the way it needs to be done. A good, technical PM who is great at worki…

A good PM knows that all they should own is the definition of "what" should be worked on, but the bad ones seem to gravitate towards the "how" as well. I suspect this has something to do with many PMs transitioning out of engineering roles, but it can be very frustrating to work with a "Product Micromanager".

It depends on the company. For some companies, the PM is responsible for "what" should be built and "how" (functional how) it will behave. Developers then try to implement the PM's "how" and then there's a back and forth between Dev and PM. For example, Dev might say - there's a better way to achieve this but it will change the functional behavior; or if we implement what you want, the page load time will be slow so is it OK if we do it this other way...

At the end of the day, the PM's focus is - how will the average user use this product, what does the average user expect this product to do. That is generally not Dev's focus. Dev's focus is typically - what is the best way to get this done so that application loads quickly, doesn't place undue stress on the server, etc. Sometimes, Dev doesn't pay attention to how the UI looks, they just care that the code runs efficiently

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#146

Post by sepehrhm »

How do you become one? I always assumed Product Managers should be former engineers, but looks like business folks have taken over it. I am not a good engineer but I really excel at production. In fact, what keeps me employed is the fact that I can see an idea through almost every time.

But whenever I look at PM jobs, I have exactly zero qualifications for them.

Not to mention the interview process is much, much easier and in fact most of the jobs you apply to does not need a "LeetCode grind" but confidence in your prior experience.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#147

Post by stuartaxelowen »

g9yuayon wrote: post #103

This hardly comes as a surprise. How many companies, especially startups, really need to tackle tough technical challenges? On the other hand, how many companies desperately need product talents to figure out what is valuable to produce? In addition, engineers have commoditized many technical solutions that used to be challenging in the past 15 years. Scaling used to be a tough challenge, not any more for many compan…

Most companies still have a very hard time building a good machine learning pipeline.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#148

Post by pm_throwaway »

sepehrhm wrote: post #146

How do you become one? I always assumed Product Managers should be former engineers, but looks like business folks have taken over it. I am not a good engineer but I really excel at production. In fact, what keeps me employed is the fact that I can see an idea through almost every time. But whenever I look at PM jobs, I have exactly zero qualifications for them. Not to mention the interview process is much, much easi…

Startups can be a good opportunity to jump into the deep end of product management. Startups tend to appreciate engineering backgrounds more than business backgrounds in my experience. On the other hand, startups have a much higher risk of failure in general.

Inside bigger companies, the key is to demonstrate progressively more ownership and leadership over time. If your boss mentions an idea or critical need, put together a proposal for how you would accomplish it. Take ownership of difficult projects and knock them out of the park. Get good at concise reporting and presentation skills, because communication is 50% of the job.

Re: The highest paid workers in Silicon Valley are product managers (2016)

#150

Post by zer00eyz »

reggieband wrote: post #73

I swear, every time I read an article on HN about salary it gives me anxiety. I'm perpetually worried that I'm not earning as much as I should be earning. I don't think it is healthy but I can't look away.

The answer: talk about how much your making - write the number down and publish it.

The whole cultural bias against talking about how much money one makes has to go away - it serves no one except the people writing checks.

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