Product managers are not here to change the world

Users don’t need heroes who change the world, they just want people who do things right.

For a new product manager, the first thing to think about is not how to make a world-changing product, but what experiences make users feel negative?

The first problem for new product managers is to improve their knowledge system and optimize the experience of existing problems.

The first question for new product managers is: Why do you want to be a product manager?

Or, another question: What exactly does a product manager do?

Never answer both of these questions with the same answer. You can’t say: Product manager changes the world, so I want to be a product manager.

Please remember that product manager is a down-to-earth position to solve problems. Product manager seems to have no technical threshold, but in fact it has a very high threshold. In the future, the development trend of product manager is bound to be: specialization in subdivided fields wins the world.

2.1 Problems of new product manager

Forget the phrase “product managers change the world”, this is more of a boastful slogan, a fickle orgy.

We’re in the Internet age, and the Internet industry is really changing the world, and every job in it has the potential to play a key role in changing the world. However, 99% of people are cannon fodder.

As the saying goes, “one house cannot sweep the world without sweeping it”. People without basic professional qualities can only be cannon fodder and cannot change the world. Back to the daily work of most product managers, the only thing that can change is the user experience when using the product. If you only care about your own feelings, you will only bring worse and worse user experience.

This is a common pitfall for new product managers: too much pride.

I often hear in HR interviews that they meet too many “gifted product managers” who are “self-taught.” The case is that before entering the industry, these “talents” are not in the Internet industry, and they majored in a major that sounds nothing to do with “product manager”. Finally, they come to the Internet industry, starting from product assistant and becoming product manager step by step.

There are so many of these cases, it sounds like a mockery of the product manager who can do anything, and the product manager who is new, is very superior.

This attitude is very dangerous. First, proud new product managers look at things from what’s known as “the customer’s point of view,” as if they were respected leaders. On the other hand, due to the influence of the environment, forcing them to continue to learn, to achieve progress, in the process of absorbing knowledge, the new people have a kind of “I am actually very modest and studious” illusion.

Then there is the danger of pride: humans are a multi-dimensional species with multiple identities, and pride leads newcomers to subconsciously classify themselves as “single-identity.” When human beings have feelings of pride, doubt and laziness, they will divide themselves single. gradually, their vision will become narrower and narrower, and they are more likely to conflict with the outside world.

This paper also advocates that product managers should not always imply that they are “single talent”, but to tell themselves that they are “T-type talent”, in order to achieve the real crossover to specialization. It is not to say that crossover and non-professional courses are necessarily failures, but to get rid of the problems of new product managers, we can really grow up. About crossover cases, we will discuss in detail in the following chapters.

The second problem with new product managers is that they really think of themselves as managers.

Please remember a word, to be a product, not a manager. A lot of people see Jobs assertive, expert, love curse, and learned that he claimed to be a product manager, only to learn his temper, but did not learn his skills, new product managers overconfident, often think they can dictate the world, anxious programmers, designers, operations, marketing all listen to his arrangements.

If new product managers always dream of becoming “romantic” leaders, they will forget that they do not have these qualities, and in the actual work process, they will feel the gap when they have conflicts with colleagues.

2.2 How to be a new product manager

In the last section, we listed the biggest flaws of new product managers. After eradicated the distorted notion that product managers change the world and get rid of the arrogant and superior attitude, we will focus on what it takes to be a new product manager.

Before that “how to do it” said one interesting phenomenon, that is: with the new product manager in high spirits, old people’s attitude will be more interesting: they toward the road of “walk to the black” is one of the few, some product manager, go to the upstream and career path to the supplier, others swim downstream, change channels. And because product managers need to know a little about everything, many old people change to operations or design, or even become programmers.

Old people choose to “rush to retreat”, will make people reflect: is this a job that can only eat youth?

Of course not. After years of savage growth of the position of product manager, it finally ushered in the reshuffle stage. Many product managers who took advantage of the bonus period and broke into the short-term training gradually could not adapt to the era of higher professional requirements for segmented fields, and were either eliminated in the cold winter, or left voluntarily.

As for the topic of “winter” and “downsizing”, we will give detailed examples in the following chapters.

Only by becoming a T-type talent and continuously ploughing business in segmented fields can we become a qualified product manager and gain a firm foothold in China’s Internet era.

Basic job description of product manager

This article is aimed at new product managers who want to enter the industry. So, first, it’s about changing your misconceptions about product managers, second, it’s about getting rid of the common pitfalls of new product managers, and then it’s about telling you what a product manager does.

The basic work of product manager is not “drawing PRD, writing requirements document, chatting with users and quarreling with colleagues”, but “collecting information, submitting plans and communicating with multiple parties”.

After mastering the foundation, can develop toward the subdivision field, after having the breadth, go digging depth again.

First, gather information.

Many new product managers have a huge misunderstanding of the concept of gathering information. They think that the so-called source of information is to chat with users, easily ask users for information, collate users’ suggestions, select the top problems, and then solve them, that is to meet the needs of users.

Big mistake! If the product manager’s source of information is only the user, then it will never be able to meet the so-called needs. In addition to users, it is also necessary to search for information from superiors, technology, design, operation, marketing, sales and other multidimensional dimensions. Only by filtering, selecting, sorting and summarizing according to specific processes, can the information be integrated into informative and readable information.

Only when the source is processed in this way is it called gathering information. The information finally obtained can be used for two purposes: one is to correctly reflect the current situation, and the other is to play a supporting role in the final decision.

Second, submit your proposal.

This link is also a misunderstanding of new product managers, many people think that the focus of the submission plan is “submission” — after the collection and sorting of information source submission, you can rest easy.

In fact, it is not true – the important thing is to hand in the plan, and if the information source is not processed, it is still useless. Product managers, in this link, need to repeatedly analyze the integrated final information sources, constantly interpret, draw in-depth conclusions, and then combine the reality and adjustable budget to measure gains and losses, stabilize the input, consumption, output and results of each department, and sort out the best plan.

The program must be implementable, operable, and optimized, and can quickly solve the existing problems, and be able to deal with both short-term needs and long-term development.

Third, cross-departmental communication and coordination.

The product manager is not a manager. When facing other departments, the role of the product manager is not a leader, but a coordinator.

Often new product managers think their job responsibilities are strategic planning and top planning, while other departments such as technical, design, operations, marketing, sales, do filler work and complete the details.

However, this is not the case. The harsh reality is: Products to you, you must be what will be, what jobs to bear most of the time, in the eyes of others, a product manager are nothing, nothing, when many newcomers in complacent and cocky, forget the workplace struggle and the domestic current situation of the professional, the time consumption on squabbling with other departments, which can neither specialization in the hi, cannot crossover, Let alone be a compound talent.

What you need to know is: without programmers, all requirements are impossible to talk about, without UI and plane, interaction and beautiful experience will be terrible, without marketing, products will be difficult to be recognized and used, without operation, users will not be retained.

Therefore, after submitting the plan, still do not take it lightly, the link of self-cultivation has just begun, hard strength makes your products survive, soft strength makes your products carry forward. What you should do in this link is to communicate with the staff of each department patiently and coordinate the relationship between them to achieve your goal.

If other departments disagree with each other about what you want, don’t stand by and let them fight without finding you. Understand that arguments result in procrastination and ultimately affect your progress.

As a product manager, you need to think about more than just the KPIs at hand. In fact, the indicators of other departments are also your indicators: beautiful design, strong interaction, fast growth, high retention, clear profitability… These KPIs that seem to have nothing to do with you are your KPIs.

Let’s put it this way: To be a T-product manager, to be the go-to person on a team, is about more than a few acres in front of you. As the “product manager”, you are responsible for the “product”, so the final form of the product and its derivatives are your responsibility.

So, what do you do?

As you already know, product manager is a position that crosses paths with almost every department. Only by cooperating with all departments, paying attention, you cooperate with them, not they cooperate with you, communicating all needs and coordinating all relations, can we finally accomplish the task.

In communication, you have to put in the scheme, and according to the time node, and the actual situation (uncontrolled factors such as personnel, budget, for example) the task reasonable elaboration, dismantling, next to each department, and continue to follow up daily issues, daily checking, should be in constant change, solve problems, achieve requirements, finally let your products from a paper prototype to assume form.

2.3 Soft skills that product managers can learn

Before we talk about soft skills, let’s talk about self-exaltation.

The advantage of a new product manager is that he is enthusiastic and energetic. The problem is that he can’t distinguish between life and work and can easily fall into a state of ecstasy.

Therefore, in the last section of the communication link, will make often immersed in the high state of product managers grief spontaneously arise: should be a distributor, not expected to end up even a performer are not, just like a runner! Mentality from “arrogant since hi” change “heart play more than hi”.

Many product managers think that they spend too much time communicating in their daily work, and that they are not “professional”. Instead, this part, it is a product manager in the rapidly increasing part in self cultivation, with many different positions and colleagues docking process, is exercised in virtually make various quality, communication and exchanges of the harvest, your career will not benefit from, and will affect your thinking, life style, finally make the whole people of sublimation.

The reasons are as follows:

First, experience has taught us that the best way to master a subject thoroughly is to tell it to others, and it is even better to teach it to others.

This is why the best students never hesitate to give lectures and share their experiences with others, because execution and explanation are two different things. Execution, can be in accordance with gourd gourd gourd gourd gourd gourd gourd, in accordance with the experience of ancestors, teachings and even template to do; And explain, must thoroughly master the knowledge system, first absorb, then summarize, then decompose, and finally form a framework and explain one by one.

The process of explaining again and again will make you familiar with the knowledge framework, and will also let you keep thinking, so that you become an expert, and then produce innovation. You will become more handy in execution, and even avoid the mistakes of the past to achieve the optimal solution.

Therefore, when product managers connect and communicate with multiple departments, although it is not the same as teaching, it is close to explaining — using professional knowledge to persuade others to accept your idea is also a kind of explaining. In this process of communication, communication, and persuasion, you need to state your ideas, ideas, and knowledge over and over again. It can be said that every communication, even an argument, is a replay for you.

Review is a very important ability in your career. It will let you know more about the process and advantages and disadvantages of the project you are responsible for. If you have good ability to summarize and disassemble, then this review will benefit you a lot.

Do you still feel like you’re wasting your time when you’re talking to tech to confirm development needs, design to confirm pages, marketing to confirm promotions, and operations to discuss retention for your product?

Second, if you take the time to successfully “go through” the devil’s initial career training as a product manager, you will be training your heart, not your thick skin.

After going through the life cycle of product conception, development, modification, on-line, update and maintenance, these work experiences will definitely make your ability to bear significantly increased. You should know that everything you do must bear pressure from all aspects, and after repeated polishing, you will be trained into a typical outstanding “T-type talent”.

Product manager is a job that can train you to work under pressure. When you witness parallel iterations of products, you will feel very different. Even if you are just a small part of the product army, you will experience the tremendous pressure of the process.

By the time you’re past the “handyman” rookie phase, and have actually seen and participated in product development, you’ll be able to work under pressure.

To be competent for a position, soft power is often underestimated, and stress resistance is the foundation of all soft power. Being a product manager can be very stressful, and when you get through it, you go from being a product manager to being a product manager to being a product manager.

Thirdly, spending more time communicating with others will improve your emotional intelligence. Product managers are not required to be lively, talkative and communicative, but too quiet, introverted product managers who do not have strong enough business skills will indeed encounter some inconvenience at work.

Therefore, this self-cultivation is also the cultivation of emotional intelligence, the so-called emotional intelligence, not so mysterious, easy to understand, is the ability to control emotions. No matter what your nature is, if you have been engaged in this profession for a long time, you may still be dull in life, but in the work scene, you will be able to talk when you need to talk, and more and more infectious language.

This is because the job nature of the product manager, to some extent, is just like that of Party B, who needs to control the emotions of various parties all the time so that the project progress will not be delayed due to communication. Multi-department cooperation and multi-event process will inevitably lead to different opinions, resulting in opposition and conflict. What product managers need to do is to control personal emotions, solve conflict problems and guide others’ emotions.

A person who can always control his own emotions and guide others’ emotions is naturally a master of emotional intelligence. The ability to use emotion to achieve goals is a necessary soft power for an emotionally intelligent structure oriented person in the workplace.

Fourthly, spending more time communicating with others will train your judgment and executive ability. The so-called T-type talent refers to both vertical vertical segmentation of the depth of professional ability, and horizontal breadth of knowledge and soft power. When you finally after a novice is not a long period (because of the product manager is a let a person grow fast post), the first thing you have is the information, data collection, sorting ability, inducing and summarizing, you can quickly determine what information is valid, and will it through some effective methodology report, this aggregation ability is both vertical and horizontal.

Aggregating information to get the best solution and achieving the best solution is your executive ability. Product manager is one of the most executive positions in the Internet field. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, the rookie period of product managers is short because they can improve their abilities quickly in a short time. But at the same time, product manager is always a “novice” position, because it is always an implementation position, and the new problems you face are far beyond your imagination.

These are the four soft skills that product managers can learn, not only on the job, but back in your own life. Remember, before you change the world, finish your training as a T-product manager.

With these soft skills out of the way, I want to highlight the four basic skills that a product manager must have.

It can be said that product manager is the foundation of a website, a product or even a brand. Therefore, no matter in any Internet company, product manager is indispensable in the enterprise.

However, with the arrival of the second half of China’s Internet, the requirements of enterprises for product managers have changed, and there will be more and more specific requirements.

In the Internet era, what kind of product manager is more popular with Internet enterprises?

As we all know, the average annual salary of product managers is more than 200,000 yuan, and hot product managers can make 400,000 to 600,000 yuan.

The salary of product manager can reflect that, on the one hand, nowadays Internet enterprises are willing to pay a high salary to hire an excellent product manager; On the other hand, with the gradual increase of product managers’ income, it can be predicted that more and more product managers will choose to enter the Internet industry in the future.

So, what abilities does an excellent product manager need to have to achieve better development in the competitive Internet industry?

I interviewed dozens of designers in the Internet industry and came up with four essential skills for a good designer. Let’s see if you’ve got it all.

First, product managers need to understand design.

Ms. Wang shared with me one of her failures.

In 2011, Ms. Wang, who just graduated from college, joined an Internet start-up company and was responsible for the two products of PC official website and mobile official website. She focused on the art design of marketing and publicity page, background and software interface, as well as the page design of PC official website and mobile website.

She decided to innovate: since users like beauty, my products can start from beauty.

Ms. Wang always believes that most products on the market are too pleasing to users. She thinks that products should absolutely reflect their own style, without considering market factors. Once, the company needed to launch a special page for a small event on its website. Ms. Wang didn’t have anything to do, but she took a risk. She asked two designers in her management to jointly design an “avant-garde style” special page and put it on the product.

The result is predictable.

On the night of the page’s launch, nearly 100 people sent messages to the company’s official wechat account satirizing Ms. Wang’s page. Ms Wang didn’t think much of it until a few days later, when she got word that the number of applicants for the event had hit a record low.

“I reflected for a long time, and finally came to the conclusion that the product should be artistic while satisfying the needs of the public. On that special page, the publicity copy was floating, the entry for registration was not obvious, and no one could understand what the event was about. Now that I look at it, failure is inevitable.” That failure in design made Ms. Wang reflect on the product level, she understood the importance of user experience, and she began to pay attention to the service functions often ignored by designers.

Through Ms. Wang’s case, we can see that for an Internet product, the user’s experience should come first, followed by personal feelings.

“Good products are built around user experience, no matter what the product is,” said Wang, who has five years of work experience. Good product managers work with user experience and make adjustments based on user feedback.”

In fact, there are so many layers to ux design that even a small H5 page is a reflection of the product manager’s thinking. In addition to the human-computer interaction mentioned earlier, visual design, layout design, functional structure design, page switching design, etc., need to be considered clearly.

For users, the conversion of every page on a web page or APP, the interaction of every plate, the setting of every button, and even the increase or decrease of every pixel are all crucial and directly affect the user experience.

Second, product managers also need to understand copywriting.

In the course of the interview, I learned a small episode.

In a discussion meeting, the designer pointed out that there was something wrong with the copy, which was not smooth enough, and the length was too long, which affected the typesetting. Before the copy even spoke, a product manager took the blame and said to the designer, “You designers have no writing skills, so don’t raise objections to the copy.”

In my opinion, in the Internet industry, product managers need to have certain copywriting ability. This is not to say that the product manager is required to write the good copy, but the product manager needs to know how the copy and design and product should be integrated.

Multiple design versions are often required for the same piece of content. A design on the PC, mobile phones and offline poster presentation is different, the product manager in communication with the copywriter, designers, need to consider the present technique in different channels, and copy don’t know the difference, the size of the various channels, may give too much or too little words of copy, outstanding product manager should be able to glance at the problem of identification document, And give corresponding suggestions.

Mr. Lin, a product manager in a classified information website, once received a copy, as long as 500 words, logic chaos, disorderly, and the requirements of the document only said that three versions: PC end, mobile end and offline poster.

Mr. Lin rejected the document, and in an email he made clear his rejection proposal. Under Mr. Lin’s supervision, the copy was revised more than a dozen times, and the final version of the copy was quite a few words, with 300 words, but with clear priorities. After Mr. Lin got the copy, he personally made the last revision, and made different designs for different channels, which was widely praised.

Mr. Lin also worked as a copywriter, and he knows where the link between copywriting and products is. As for whether designers need to know copywriting, he said, “Copywriting and products have something in common: they are connected to users, but copywriting is never an accessory to products. Product managers are not the direct producers of copywriting, but they work with copywriting all the time and have a better understanding of how copywriting is reflected in the product to make it more attractive to users. If a product manager blindly follows the advice of the planner and copywriter, instead of giving play to his initiative, he will not achieve long-term development.”

A good product manager needs to have the ability to write, to know what is good copy, but also to know how to present good copy.

The same goes for APP product managers. For example, in the interaction design of APP, there are a lot of copywriting on the page. Although the product manager will roughly indicate the position of each copywriting in THE PRD, it does not mean that the product manager does not need to think about copywriting. The communication with copywriter and every detail of copywriting processing all reflect the professionalism of the product manager.

Third, product managers should have strong logic.

I interviewed about 60 product managers. As for logical ability, each product manager has his or her own views. After summarizing their views, I come to the conclusion that logical ability required by product manager can be divided into the following two aspects.

● Logical thinking ability

Logical thinking ability determines the efficiency of product manager in work communication. Product managers, regardless of the segment, will carefully analyze the needs of all parties and consider the cause and effect before making the final plan.

Product managers may be an artist, products in the Internet industry is also an art, but not in the traditional sense of the art, the Internet industry product managers usually according to the company plan to design requirements, in the face of each post colleague, need to use strong logical thinking and language ability to convince his colleagues to realize your need, This process of persuasion requires a strong logical thinking ability of the product manager.

● Design logic ability

Design logic ability refers to the layout arrangement in the process of product planning and launching, which determines the intelligence and novelty of the whole product. In terms of products in the Internet industry alone, the design rhythm and product quality should be more accurate.

Logic is used to analyze and explain products. While in the process of implementation requirements, there is no logical imagination can break through the limits of the imagination, but in the Internet industry, there is no logical products, ignored user requirements will drown in the huge amounts of information, transmission of an Internet products, need to direct expression content and intention, and how to render the content and intention to acquire a higher conversion rate, It depends on the logical ability of the product manager, and the expressed process requires the logical ability of the product manager.

Fourth, insight allows product managers to go further.

“Product managers have to understand what’s going on in different eras, and they have to be up to date and know what’s going on and what’s going on. Capable design can lead the trend.” Ms. Lin, who is engaged in product management, said that she just came back from overseas after finishing her master’s degree. She thinks that the Internet is a subversive trend, and the birth of the Internet makes product managers bloom with new vitality.

She believes that the market is trendy, and product managers often stand at the forefront of the trend of each era. Therefore, she agrees with the idea that excellent product managers have better insight into the market.

For example, Coca-Cola is not an Internet company, but their products are market-aware and internet-minded, as evidenced by their iterative bottle designs over the years. Coca-Cola bottles are part of their product.

As is known to all, Coca-Cola has achieved great success in the market. In addition to the efforts of the marketing team and business team, the product team also made great contributions.

Product managers have a keen insight into the market, and they achieve the impact of their products on the market through the following three aspects.

Respect startups

In the early 20th century, the bottle design of Coca-Cola had undergone a radical change, but Coca-Cola finally chose to respect the original products and traditional products in design. For a brand, the products that respect the original, traditional and classic products can reflect the brand connotation.

The same is true of the Internet age. Steve Jobs always insisted on the product concept of “less is more”. Minimalist design has become apple’s brand connotation, and product managers need to respect the start-up spirit of a company when taking over products to reflect the brand connotation.

● Continuous innovation

Although Coca-Cola has not changed the bottle significantly since 1915, it has always been refined and improved, introducing new bottles. These seemingly imperceptible details of the design changes, will let consumers always keep Coca-Cola fresh.

This is the iterative capability of the product, which is now popular lean entrepreneurship theory.

Similarly, Coca-Cola’s product managers are internet-minded. In 2015, Coca-Cola launched a “friend” coke. The product manager designed the function of the mouth of the bottle. The coke could not be opened by one person, but only by two people putting the coke together and exerting force in opposite directions.

The marketing campaign exploded on the Internet, and the value of the product manager’s continuous innovation was reflected in this, and the product manager was instrumental in this.

● Highly unified

Coca-Cola in more than one hundred countries have a high market share, even in different countries, different nationalities have bigger difference culture, commercial atmosphere and consumption idea, Coca-Cola is still maintained a brand core elements together on design style, at the same time in the brand operation and detail design and did do in Rome as Rome does, that Coca-Cola has high sales around the world.

As can be seen from the case of Coca-Cola, excellent product managers in the Internet industry need to have market insight. Even the font design, size setting and position of each copy show the product manager’s insight into the market. Excellent product managers not only pursue practicality, but also want to understand the product they do, and how each small adjustment will have an impact on users. Product managers with market insight will improve the market conversion rate through their users’ feedback, and constantly update.

An APP, a web page or even a company’s official account are all products. Product managers need keen insight in page interaction and section design. If the product manager does not understand the market and user needs, it is very likely that the location of a button or a page jump will cause user loss.

Among the dozens of product managers I interviewed, 70% came from the Internet industry and 30% from traditional industries. In this interview, they all had the same thinking on “a common basis” —

For product managers, whether it is user experience, copywriting ability, logical thinking or market insight, their success is based on a common foundation: solid theory and plenty of practice.

Product is a science and an art, for the product manager in the Internet industry to go further, natural not only to position itself as “the written word, PPT” and “talk”, but to keep up with the trend of The Times, while maintaining the ability to innovate, knows the market demand and user psychology, achieve the harmonious and unified art and market.

As a new product manager, do you have the above four basic skills?

Finally, in this chapter, we will talk about the essential qualities of a product manager.

For product managers who have worked for many years, career development in the future is no more than three options: continue to specialize in products, promotion to product director and transition to senior management.

Next, I will analyze this topic from three aspects: how important a product manager is in a company, what qualities an excellent product manager needs to have, and the development status of product managers.

How can a product manager become an excellent manager?

I hope that through this discussion, product managers can understand the market situation, understand the development prospects of product managers, and help you make a clearer career plan.

This article is excerpted from From Crossover to Specialization: Self-Cultivation for T-type Product Managers

The big shop hot pre-sale

Jingdong: item.jd.com/12249783.ht…

Down-down: product.dangdang.com/25196617.ht…

Asynchronous community: www.epubit.com.cn/book/detail…

This is not a product manager skill book, it focuses on the following issues.

Are you ready to become a product manager?

Product managers are not here to change the world.

Career paths for product managers.

Crossing boundaries? What exactly is crossing boundaries?

Specialization? What exactly is specialization?

Experienced product manager, job-hopping how to choose offer?

How do product managers choose between large and small companies?

How should face capital winter?

How do laymen cross over to be product managers in the Internet industry?

How does an experienced product manager specialize?

Zhihu big V, a brand new work, product manager in the line of work this book will give you enlightenment.

This is not a “10 Days to Become a product manager” book, but rather a real product manager experience that gives you an outsider’s perspective on the job.

This book will guide you to understand the Internet industry, understand product managers, and understand yourself as a crossover to a specialist T-product manager.

Click on keywords to read more new books:

Python | | machine learning Kotlin Java | | | | mobile development robots contests | Web front-end | book list

Click on keywords to read more new books:

From Crossover to Specialization: Self-Cultivation for T-type Product Managers