7 behaviours all successful Product Managers must have and why

Leading a product team is a multi faceted and challenging role across all industries and regardless of the size of the company. In our previous articles we have touched upon a few factors as to why this is, mostly connected with the limited leverage PMs have over cross functional team members who might have a different line manager and different priorities altogether, company vision not aligned with product vision and scattered success metrics which make it harder to prove value and direction to be pursued.

Product Managers are probably in one of the most challenging positions to exercise leadership. They have to rally their teams behind a vision without much formal authority. They can influence and persuade people, but they don’t necessarily have authority over individuals or teams in the same way a traditional manager might do. So, product people need to lead by influence and example, through motivating, guiding and keeping their teams focused.

Detaching ourselves from this realistic and complex challenges, we want to focus on traits each successful PM should have in order to make sure they can, in fact, influence what is in their control rather than battling things which might not be.

Jack-of-all-trades, not-necessarily-master-of-any

First things first, our role is messy. It is a role with an extremely broad scope and whose tasks on a daily basis might differ completely depending on size and industry and even phase of the product development cycle. This is why there is no standard hard defined definition of which specific skills (hard and soft) a PM should have at any stage. This is also the beauty of why our role is seemingly easily approachable by professionals across very different career backgrounds.

There is a trick to it tho, PMs are expected to be generalist at heart yet able to go to the nitty gritty details of each step of the way, be it needed. If they are lucky, they can delegate some of the most granular tasks to fellow team members who are capable of delivering them, however this might not always be the case. Those are the scenarios in which a Start Up is asking their PMs to drive product discovery, product vision, strategy and roadmap, as well as carefully describe each and every user story, test UAT and launch, run research after launch and align stakeholders throughout the full process. Fun times.

This is the reason why i often state PM role is NOT for everyone as it takes a very specific set of built-in skills as well as a intrinsec predisposition to be able to be ‘Jack of all trades’.

Advocating team spirit

‘Easy one’ you might think. We all need team spirit. Then again, not really. In some roles you are free to decide when and how to be a team player depending on how large is your team and the goal or project or result at stake. However, successful Product Managers understand the very dangerous repercussions flying solo has, being it a limiting and isolating choice.

Connecting to what we have said before, Product managers must really work on team spirit and team bonding in order to shape and define the resulting performance of the group, being the two variables strongly interconnected (back to biology for this one — when there is trust established, people WILL go the extra mile to protect you and the tribe by delivering what’s needed, as a safe and successful tribe means happiness for all).

The only way to be a good team player is to really trust your team. Trusting your team means you are not the only one pulling the strings, and you avoid making people feel micromanaged. Absence of trust always leads not only to individual’s but also to team’s underperformance.

Effective communicator

Product Managers are communication routers. This is not far from reality if you consider Product Managers constantly act and operate in the middle of an information triangle among market, team and company. In other words, you need to find the best method and style to communicate the thoughts, ideas, and feedback you get from all these information exchanges under every context (team meetings, business meetings, user interviews, pitches, etc).

Regardless of style, communicating often and restlessly about vision and next steps and progress will ensure all people involved feel informed and can in fact trust the team to do their job.

Process builder

There is no rule of thumb or set-in-stone approach in setting up product development processes, as the culture of the company and team dynamics really vary. Hence part of Product Manager’s job is to be able to cherry pick aspects from different frameworks and apply them to the team, while nurturing an environment of creativity, openness and collaboration.

This includes frameworks for problem fit and product discovery, team interaction and communication, expectations around the product, the vision, KPIs and what success looks like. Last but not least, how decisions are taken within the team can also result in a combination of techniques and processes adapted from known-to-be-working approaches.

Problem finder & solver

How to find problems and how to solve the most important ones is maybe THE trait any PM should take care of cherishing and nurturing.

Not only solving problems, but finding problems worth solving is where a successful and experienced PM can and will always add value. From there, another subset of questions should arise, such as: is it the right time to solve this problem? Will it beneficially impact my users and customers compared to another problem being solved? Will it make sense for my business? When and how should I move from tactical to strategic and viceversa with regards to backlog, roadmap and vision shaping?

Curious

One of the common faults that I find in newly-minted Product Managers, and occasionally even in veteran Product Managers, is a lack of humility. And, to be honest, it’s easy to fall prey to this trap in your career, when everyone is asking you what should be done, or what the users want, or what the competition is doing, it’s entirely natural to begin to see yourself as the hub around which all the spokes of the company revolve.

Truth is, there are other stakeholders, there are real users, there are new technologies, apps, propositions, challenges popping up every day which should teach us better. Curiosity feeds humility, and humility is the attribute which allows us to accept being wrong and start over, with the exact same drive and fundamentally not taking failure personally, but focusing on just delivering value, no matter if it means we were wrong and our stakeholders were right.

Empathetic

I left the most important last. Empathy, kindness, good heart, respect and putting yourself in other people’s shoes. This alone will make sure you accomplish your PM purpose by deeply connecting and understanding your customers’ pains and react to those with solutions and improvements. This alone will enable you to be the best cross functional leader you could be, by empowering and enabling functions in your team and discuss different opinions to enable greatness.