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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)

#111

Post by gonehome »

p1esk wrote: post #86
gowld wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are more than "slightly" different. A product manger is a creative professional. A project manager is an administrative professional.

Not really. When I had a "product manager" title, I had to do plenty of "project management".

I've found there's some status thing with 'product manager' (particularly at Google) and product managers will make sure you know the difference.

In practice I'm not sure how different they actually are. Typically when someone is desperate to say how much better/harder their title difference is it's because it's not really obvious otherwise.

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

#112

Post by ryandrake »

luckydata wrote: post #64
dawhizkid wrote: post #46

As others have mentioned, this is because unlike developers few companies hire PMs straight out of college. As a current PM, I'm actually fairly bearish about the sustainability of this role as far as a long-term career outlook goes. It's an extremely nebulous role, hard to prove your value, wildly differs from company to company, and most of your time will probably not look anything like what is considered textbook…

I'm exactly in the same boat. I love the job when I actually get to do what the ideal product manager job should be. It's very stressful, not very rewarding and it's very unstable work because EVERY fuckup down the chain will just be absorbed by the PM. We're always the first in line to be fired if someone else decided not to do their job (can be Eng, marketing, sales... doesn't matter).

Yea one of the major up/downsides of being the PM is the buck usually stops at you. Priduct couldn’t deliver on its promises? PM is accountable. Product couldn’t sell? PM. Product getting bad press? PM. Product succeeds wildly? PM.

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

#113

Post by samstave »

robviren wrote: post #92
analog31 wrote: post #14

In my view, they can have it. I was a project manager (granted, a slightly different title and role) for a couple years. I went back to the bench. Fortunately I took a pay hike in both directions. Those middle management jobs seem to be super high stress, long hours, and low reward. Literally everybody I've known who went into one of those jobs did so upon the birth of their first kid, when they felt the financial pr…

It is a job where your goal is to try disappoint people most slowly. You are pretty much rigged to disappoint everyone. Gotta spread that around though. Marketing, sales, and the business end all have expectation of perfect execution, on-time delivery, bug free, and the development, testing, support teams all just want realistic requirements and timelines. Somewhere in the middle is the island of slight disappointmen…

This was very well put. And one of the hardest topics to navigate in an interview process: "how would you handle a case when peron X is failing to meet requirement Y or delivery date Z?

I freaking hate this question as there is no magic answer aside from "whatever it takes to minimize the overall negative impact of the outcome for the company/project/product"

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

#114

Post by g9yuayon »

someguydave wrote: post #106
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…

Why should engineers agree to work for a regular salary from you? Why wouldn't they hold out for ownership in your product venture?

Supply and demand? My assumption is the less challenging a technical project becomes, the more supply of engineering talents can work on the project. There should be more generalists after all. And dynamics of supply and demand will determine if engineers will be able to "hold out for ownership".

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

#115

Post by onion2k »

efields wrote: post #94
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.

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 of problems.

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

#116

Post by mud_dauber »

dawhizkid wrote: post #46

As others have mentioned, this is because unlike developers few companies hire PMs straight out of college. As a current PM, I'm actually fairly bearish about the sustainability of this role as far as a long-term career outlook goes. It's an extremely nebulous role, hard to prove your value, wildly differs from company to company, and most of your time will probably not look anything like what is considered textbook…

Exactly true. You have no idea what a great PM looks like until you work with one.

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

#117

Post by [deleted] »

someguydave wrote: post #106
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…

Why should engineers agree to work for a regular salary from you? Why wouldn't they hold out for ownership in your product venture?

[deleted]

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

#118

Post by someguydave »

g9yuayon wrote: post #114
someguydave wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should engineers agree to work for a regular salary from you? Why wouldn't they hold out for ownership in your product venture?

Supply and demand? My assumption is the less challenging a technical project becomes, the more supply of engineering talents can work on the project. There should be more generalists after all. And dynamics of supply and demand will determine if engineers will be able to "hold out for ownership".

What, precisely, limits the supply of people who have "product talents to figure out what is valuable to produce"? Why are are people with such skills apparently more rare than people with technical skills?

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

#120

Post by vasilipupkin »

dasil003 wrote: post #65
vasilipupkin wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To each is own, for sure. I have the exact opposite philosophy. I would rather my kids see me as someone who is trying to achieve something big. After a while, they have their own interests and don’t want to do projects with you anyway.

How old are your kids? A word of advice: your kids will never be impressed by what you do, to them you could be POTUS and it would just be the normal set point for them. What they will remember is whether you cared more about your work than you did them.

Completely disagree. Kids need attention from their parents but a lot less that you might think. Best way to raise them is by example. Sure, if you never spend time with them that’s bad, but you don’t need to spend 5 hours every night with them either.
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