Product Management Career Path
Product Managers are responsible for various stages of product development throughout the product life cycle. This means that they have to plan and allocate resources, offer important insights, manage risk, coordinate with cross-functional teams, work on product/feature feedback, align with stakeholder requirements, and more.
To land Product Manager roles at top companies, you must possess strong leadership, planning, execution, and estimation skills. PMs must be well-versed in Technical Product Manager systems, Scrum, Agile, and total product maintenance systems.
Product Manager’s Roles and Responsibilities
The typical Product Manager job description will include:
Developing and managing end-to-end technical product solutions
Working with engineers, QAs, designers, and developers to build robust cross-team systems
Helping define the product strategy and roadmap
Designing systems to track metrics and impact
Articulate the technology, requirements, goals, and milestones of the team
Identifying dependencies and developing risk-mitigation strategies
Budgeting, creating reports and offering updates to stakeholders
Establishing shared goals with product teams across the company
One of the main focus areas for technical Product Managers is the technology involved in developing the product. The technical Product Manager job description entails translating business requirements from clients into technical requirements for the final product.
Qualifications and Skills Required to Become a Product Manager
To meet the responsibilities in a typical Product Management job description, you must possess certain qualifications and skills. Let’s look at the qualifications and skills required to land Product Manager roles at FAANG+ companies.
A Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, IT, or an equivalent field
MS/BS degree in Computer Science, Engineering or equivalent preferred
5-10 years of experience in the software industry and at least 3+ years experience in Product Management or as an Associate Product Manager
Agile or Six Sigma certification
Ability to develop product and marketing strategies and effectively communicate recommendations to executive management
Possess computer science and software engineering skills that allow them to manage engineering and software development teams directly
Solid technical background with understanding and/or hands-on experience in software development and web technologies
Skilled at working effectively with cross-functional teams in a matrix organization
Career Roadmap for a Technical Product Manager
The typical career progression for a Product Manager role looks like this:
Associate Product Manager -> Product Manager -> Senior Product Manager -> Director of Product -> VP of Product -> Chief Product Officer
Want to know what Product Managers at FAANG+ companies do? Find out their jobs and responsibilities here: