What if you could be the driving force behind the next big product, owning its development across the product lifecycle, right from the initial concept to its launch and beyond?
As a product manager, you’ll do just that. Product managers connect the dots between technical teams and business goals, making sure customer needs are met and market demands are exceeded. This role might be for you if you thrive on problem-solving, leading teams, and having a hand in every part of the product journey.
But how to get product management experience? This blog will discuss the core skills needed for product management, common paths to enter the industry, the necessary qualifications, salaries, and more. 💼
How to Get Product Management Experience (Required Skills, Entry Strategies, Salaries, & More)
- Benefits of Working in Product Management
- Core Skills Needed for Product Management
- Utilizing product management tools
- Tackling any problem by developing a strategy to resolve it
- Practicing execution
- Using varied communication styles
- Offering leadership through influence
- Making decisions based on data
- Building great products
- Always being prepared
- Bonus skills to excel in product management
- Common Paths Into Product Management with No Prior Experience
- Necessary Qualifications and Certifications to Become a Product Manager
- Market Trends and Salary Expectations in Product Management
- Become a Product Manager and Upskill with ClickUp
Summarize this article for me pleaseBenefits of Working in Product Management
Before we break down what product management is, let’s see why it’s a great career choice. There are some awesome benefits to being a product manager! 🧑💻
- Market research and analysis: You’ll build a solid understanding of market trends and customer needs via surveys, focus groups, and data interpretation to make product decisions
- Strategic planning: You can learn to strategize product development roadmaps and go-to-market strategies by setting long-term milestones like efficient resource allocation and feature prioritization
- Technical acumen: For aspiring product managers, collaboration with engineering teams will improve your technical know-how, as you bridge the knowledge gap between technical and non-technical stakeholders
- Project management: Overseeing the product lifecycle from ideation to launch teaches you how to manage risks, partner with cross-functional teams, and adapt to changes in the product’s scope
- Customer impact: Creating products that solve real problems is a great way to learn about decoding user pain points and delivering quality outputs
- Career advancement: Successful product managers can expect to be promoted to senior leadership roles like Director of Product, VP of Product, or even Chief Product Officer (CPO). At leading tech companies and product companies, this can mean a sizeable salary as well
- Innovation and creativity: Working at the forefront of innovation, you’ll participate in countless brainstorming sessions and learn to apply a differentiated approach to keep your product ahead
Summarize this article for me pleaseCore Skills Needed for Product Management
Building solid product management skills means diving into a product’s strategic vision, market data, agile methods, and more. These highly transferable skills are a product manager’s ticket to steering successful product projects.👇🏼
Utilizing product management tools
Creating and ideating on your product’s development and growth phases on an end-to-end product management tool can set you up for long-term sustenance and success.
ClickUp’s Product Management Software is a full-service tool for managing your product and informing your product team and relevant stakeholders about its evolving vision and latest feature updates.
You can build product development roadmaps for large teams and use product management templates from ClickUp to track and execute your brainstorming sessions.
Set up automated tasks with ClickUp’s Automation features and monitor department-based views to streamline your product lifecycle.
Product managers can leverage ClickUp Docs to align their product team members through conceptualization, iteration, and sprint marketing stages.
You can also collaborate via real-time discussions with ClickUp Whiteboards, link your files to standard workflows, and modify the style and functionality of these documents with tables, custom buttons, and widgets.
Growing comfortable with these features can improve your product management skill set and tighten the way you manage your product:
- Use agile and customizable ClickUp Dashboards to track progress via time-tracking, workload distribution, and KPIs
- Draw flowchart diagrams and merge them with notes, tasks, and other collaboration features
- Use ClickUp Brain to assemble and assimilate all your product details, including briefs, documentation, and task-specific communication, in one place
- Create flexible workflows across dozens of pre-installed templates and organize your tasks
Tackling any problem by developing a strategy to resolve it
Great product managers must be adept at problem-solving. Because the reality is that there’s always a problem to solve when building products.
Product management includes identifying issues and creating strategic solutions without disrupting the product vision. You may be responsible for tackling application bugs, common customer complaints, and functionality setbacks.
This means product managers must cultivate an analytical, solution-oriented mindset to decode the root cause of problems and develop actionable and innovative solutions.
Practicing execution
Creating strategies for product management issues is only half the job. Executing them into result-driven tasks is critical if you’re looking to become a successful product manager. This involves being familiar with resource allocation and timeline management—or core project management skills.
Practice using product management tools to monitor how effectively you achieve project milestones. See how you can leverage digital tools to assess and maximize productivity from a budgetary, sales, and conversions perspective.
Once executed, continue iterating on your end product by assessing product management KPIs and metrics. These pre-set metrics will help determine whether your product performs as expected.
Using varied communication styles
Good communication isn’t just about talking—it’s also about listening. You can achieve successful product outcomes by clearly expressing your ideas and understanding your team’s input.
Communicating effectively is crucial to getting things done right, whether that’s updating stakeholders, discussing feedback, or collaborating with designers, developers, software engineering teams, or top executives.
Adept communicators excel in crafting clear and easy-to-follow documentation for product requirements, user stories, and reports. Use this skill to establish foolproof mechanisms for incorporating feedback from users and team members and cement your product manager position.
Offering leadership through influence
As a product manager, you’ll find it’s often better to lead through influence rather than authority. This means you need to inspire and motivate your team and gain buy-in for ideas.
Cultivate a collaborative spirit among your product team by making your team members feel valued and heard. Be open to understanding their perspectives and concerns.
Keep your team energized and eager by celebrating small wins, catering to their needs, and occasionally providing motivational examples from competitors and leading personalities in your niche.
Making decisions based on data
A NewVantage Partners assessment highlighted that only 56% of organizations are innovative with data. It’s a fact that data-driven decision-making is the backbone of quality product management. Product managers must be organized and diligent about collecting data from several sources, analyzing it for product-specific insights, and utilizing it for better product performance.
Start by exploring market research techniques and popular user analytics metrics.
Combining these with customer feedback allows you to use statistical models to make sense of data and spot trends. And don’t forget to test your ideas with experiments to see if they hold up!
Building great products
As a product manager, building reliable, above-benchmark products that solve real-world problems for users requires more than just innovation. You need experience developing user-centric designs to help your customers adopt your product with ease. A product with a long learning curve may not be as attractive to customers.
Use agile methods to refine products based on user feedback. Start by prototyping and running usability tests to see if your ideas hit the mark. Remember, always prioritize feature upgrades based on what users want and what’s technically doable.
A portfolio of top-notch products proves you’ve mastered working with product management frameworks.
Always being prepared
Being ready to handle unexpected setbacks and adapting to changing project dynamics can make you a top product manager candidate. Master contingency planning by creating backup plans for potential risks.
Stay updated on industry trends and the latest technologies to aid your preparation and optimize your product manager skills.
Bonus skills to excel in product management
To exceed the baseline competency, these skills can help you accelerate your product management career:
- A background in software development, coding, and technical architecture
- Strong marketing acumen
- Financial literacy
- High emotional intelligence
- UX/UI design principles
- Agile and Scrum mastery
- Legal and compliance knowledge
Summarize this article for me pleaseCommon Paths Into Product Management with No Prior Experience
Is product management calling your name? There are many ways to break into the field, even without prior experience. Let’s look at some of the most common and creative paths to get you on your way. 📈
Transitioning from related roles
Shifting from roles like project management, data analysis, UX design, or marketing can make it relatively easier to transition into product management. Many of these roles have transferable skills.
For example, project managers who have experience overseeing projects from inception to completion can use their planning, execution, and stakeholder management skills to qualify as great product managers.
Likewise, data analysts who are familiar with studying user behavior and measuring product performance can make informed decisions about product direction.
Even UX designers with fundamental know-how in building user-centric products can use their design intuition and knowledge of interfaces to support the product management process.
Choosing educational paths
Consider volunteering for cross-functional projects to shadow existing product managers within your organization. This might mean investing extra time after executing your current responsibilities. But if product management is the career you’re aiming for, then the extra hours could be worth it.
Alternatively, you could enroll in online courses and boot camps to build your product manager skills.
EdTech platforms like Coursera, edX, and Udemy can teach you the foundational principles of product strategy and user research. At the same time, boot camps by the General Assembly and Product School offer intensive, hands-on training for end-to-end product management.
Consider certifications from recognized institutions to help you transition into a product management role. Many hiring managers highly value Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) and Pragmatic Marketing Certification (PMC) certifications.
Your learning could also come from reading product management books that provide detailed breakdowns of common concepts.
Ideally, seek pathways that expose you to real-world product management projects and mentorship from experienced product managers.
Improving your network and finding a mentor
Building a network and finding a suitable mentor can be critical in your product management journey.
Look into professional organizations like the Product Development and Management Association (PDMA) and join local meetups for product managers. Online communities like LinkedIn groups, Product Hunt, and several reputed product management forums on Reddit can be helpful starting points.
Connect with mentors experienced in training amateur and aspiring product managers. You can partner with them as a virtual assistant or request feedback on your projects. Your intention must be to use their guidance to adjust to the complexities of a PM role.
💡Pro Tip: Request informational interviews to understand what a day in the life of product managers looks like for a behind-the-scenes look.
Acquiring side projects, freelance gigs, and internships
Considering you have no product manager experience, look for pro-bono projects to get the hang of the typical responsibilities of a product manager.
Showcase your initiative and product management chops with a side project. It doesn’t matter if it’s personal or for a small business. Getting your hands dirty on a real product, from concept to launch, proves you can take an idea and make it fly.
Also, pitch your existing skills from a product manager’s point-of-view to find freelance gigs on platforms like Upwork and Fiverr. Besides building a portfolio, you can collect testimonials and apply for full-time, high-value product manager roles.
Don’t steer clear of internships. Although unpaid, many startups offer internships where you can wear multiple hats and gain a broader idea of all the aspects of product management.
Applying to entry-level product management roles
Many companies offer entry-level product management positions designed for beginners with no experience. Here are some ideal starting points:
- Associate product manager (APM): Large enterprises like Google, Facebook, and Uber offer APM programs specifically curated to train aspiring product managers. The blend of structured training, mentorship, and rotational assignments help you kickstart your career as a product manager
- Product coordinator: Usually suitable for beginners, this role supports product managers with administrative tasks. This may include coordinating with different teams, assisting in product marketing, and developing sales strategies
- Junior product manager: This role makes understanding the elemental aspects of product management easier. Expect to spend time on market research, user testing, roadmap support, product documentation, and reporting tasks. The inclusivity in this role also gives you room to share your innovative suggestions
Consider skimming through common product manager interview questions before applying to these roles.
Summarize this article for me pleaseNecessary Qualifications and Certifications to Become a Product Manager
Landing that dream product manager job requires a mix of education, skills, and certifications. These qualifications prove you can lead teams, grasp customer needs, and steer products toward success.
Below are a few qualifications and certifications that hiring managers seek in your educational background. 🔍
- Pragmatic Marketing Certification (PMC): Provided by the Pragmatic Institute, this certification covers the entire product lifecycle and emphasizes strategic market understanding and practical application
- New Product Development Professional (NPDP): Certified by the PDMA, this certification focuses on the methods and tools necessary to manage new product development
- SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager (POPM): This certification, provided by Scaled Agile, is designed for those working in a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) ecosystem. It’s best to learn how to align strategy with execution at scale
- General Assembly Product Management Course: General Assembly offers hands-on product management programs that cover product development, user-centered design, and market strategies
- AIPMM Certified Product Manager (CPM): Offered by the Association of International Product Marketing and Management, this certification provides comprehensive training on managing the product lifecycle from ideation to retirement
- Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO): This certification focuses on Scrum practices and the role of the product owner within agile teams, enhancing skills in backlog management and stakeholder collaboration
- Product Management Certificate by Product School: Product School offers various certifications focusing on real-world applications, product strategy, and leadership taught by industry experts
Summarize this article for me pleaseMarket Trends and Salary Expectations in Product Management
43% of global companies today actively promote new openings for product managers. So you’ve chosen a career with great prospects. Despite the prevalent economic uncertainty, product management roles continue to be among the high-paying roles in tech.
A Bain & Company report suggests that around 80% of organizations readily intend to grow their investments in product management in the coming three years. Even better, the report indicates that at least 60% of these organizations label project management as a high priority for boosting sustainable growth.
Product manager positions have more scope than ever, especially with the surge of new tech stacks equipped with AI-run engines.
New products in telehealth, sustainability, data-dependent SaaS products, and new-age marketing are considerably advanced and require the assistance of a product manager to fit into market trends.
Here are some average salaries of different product manager roles as of 2024:
| Product Manager Roles | Salary Range |
| Project Coordinator | $55,000-$75,000 |
| Associate/Junior PM | $77,000-$100,000 |
| Product Manager | $128,000-$175,000 |
| Senior Product Manager | $175,000-$255,000 |
| Director of Product Management | $255,000-$275,000 |
| VP of Product Management | $275,000+ |
Summarize this article for me pleaseBecome a Product Manager and Upskill with ClickUp
Entering the product management field without prior experience can be overwhelming, but it is possible. With some hard work and scrappiness, you can build skills in the business and technical aspects required of a product manager. If not, upskilling through learning programs and acquiring formal certifications can help.
Nonetheless, spend some time familiarizing yourself with the tools product managers use on a daily basis. Doing so will help you become familiar with the workflow and framework of the job.
With ClickUp’s extensive features, you can update your teams about product ideas, customer feedback, and short and long-term tasks. This ensures your product stays front and center with the target audience.
Get started with ClickUp for free today!
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