We need to reframe how product managers talk about project management.
Too often, the discussion is a simplistic denigration of project work.
But, the lives of great PMs involve tons of project management.
I think we should reframe it as Deep Product Management.
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Letās define Deep Product Management.
This is when the PM is actively adding to the executional success of the project:
Ā· Removing blockers
Ā· Helping make decisions that come up
Ā· Being the EM's & engineers' best friend
They can speak to what's happening on a daily level.
This is in contrast to Shallow Product Management.
This is when the PM is hands off on the executional details:
Ā· Rely on the EM
Ā· Trust the designer to make decisions
Ā· Focus more on why & what then when & how
They don't know on a day-to-day basis how things are going.
What does life look like when you excel at the art of Deep Product Management?
Ā· Read and comment on the tech specs
Ā· Attend stand ups to get daily updates on progress
Ā· Volunteer to help unblock issues
Ā· Think through all the flows and corner cases with design
Ā· Run a great UAT
As a result, a conversation with leadership might go like this:
Leadership: āWhere are we at with X big new feature?ā
PM: āWeāre at risk. I am working to try to unblock Z issue with Y team.
Or:
āWeāre on track. X & Y engineers are tracking to timeline as of this morning.ā
On the other hand, in shallow product management, the conversation goes something like:
Leadership: āWhere are we at with X big new feature?ā
PM: āI think weāre okay. Let me check with the EM.ā
Or:
PM: āIām not sureā¦ Let me find out.ā
As you can guess from the conversations, the Deep PMās features have less risk.
In Shallow Product Management, features often:
Ā· Have bugs
Ā· Get delayed
Ā· Miss some analytics
Deep PMsā features rarely do.
What is appropriate depends on your environment and the time.
Environment:
Ā· What does eng want?
Ā· What is the product culture?
Ā· How many engineers are you supporting?
Time:
Ā· How much do you have?
Ā· Are you good at managing it?
Ā· Do you need to focus on strategy?
But in most organizations, front-line PMs should strive to Deep Product Management.
There may be heavy planning cycles.
Or a high eng:PM ratio.
Then theyāre shallow.
Otherwise, the best IC PMās go Deep.
They become glue between engineering and a quick, metric-moving release.
This all comes back to how product managers talk about project management.
In all the talk of āproduct thinkingā and āFacebook PMs donāt write PRDs,ā the art of execution has gotten lost.
I would argue the pendulum has swung too far.
I have found Deep Product Managers are better strategists for their detailed execution.
They donāt make it about strategy OR execution.
With good prioritization, they do strategy AND execution.
Their deep project management drives deep strategic insight.