 Hello everyone, my name is Manasai and I'm going to talk to you today about generalizing your PM skills It's a really fascinating subject area It covers a lot of different topics around how much of a specialist versus generalist you may end up feeling like you're delving into in your PM career There's pros and cons to both sides The focus really of today's talk is to think about what types of skills you have that you can master and take with you No matter what kind of job You're in in terms of your current PM focus area no matter what kind of product feature domain Thinking really about the core PM muscles that translate really well From job to job and become kind of your foundation for being able to tackle any new space that you might be involved in so first we'll Talk a little bit about my background just to give you an idea of kind of the types of roles I've been in Then we'll do a little bit of definition just in terms of specialist versus generalists These are terms I'm sure many of you have already heard before but we'll lay that foundation just so that we're all on the same page and Then the focus of my talk really is to think about highlighting three skills that I think any PM Should be focused on mastering This could be early on in your career. This could be still mid-stage and even later on The way that I'd like to think about these is again for any PM these would be core Really critical muscles to develop and take with you throughout your hopefully long and illustrious PM career And lastly, we'll conclude with some takeaways in terms of guiding principles to be thinking about So let's jump right in All right, so just to give you a little bit of background about myself. I am currently a PM at Google I work on Google Maps. I look after a Few different surfaces on the social side of Google Maps So primarily focused right now on consumer experiences Both on the web as well as the mobile apps iOS and Android Just in terms of my previous backgrounds and experiences. I've been a PM pretty much in many different permutations of the PM role I started off my career as a PM at Microsoft Where I never worked with the designer my entire time that I was there. It was a very technical PM coming from a more traditional engineering CS background and I focused on API style product development with my team there after that I moved on to vivo where I worked in more Zerda one consumer tools and products with the goal really of figuring out how to launch new apps and experiences focused on connecting artists to their fans and Lastly at Google. I've worked on now a couple different products before maps. I was working on internal marketing tech tools really focused on a different type of customer base with Google marketing as the primary customer constituency so I Definitely can say even in the course of my career. I've worked on many different spaces on surface They don't really have much to do with each other if you're looking at what translates between each of them and I tend to think of myself as appropriately so a generalist PM because I love diving into new spaces and Learning more about the complexities and the nuances within these domains. I find that very fascinating So there's you know Some commonalities in terms of that being just the theme that's carried throughout my experiences Which I'll speak to in general Why that is? and beyond that, you know, I just love product management, which is Always interesting in terms of where it might take you in your in your in your career in terms of types of Experiences types of domains and products that you might touch all right, so we'll focus by first just Covering the foundation of the PM job, right? so we know that typically people Have defined the PM job as being at this intersection of many different disciplines, right? We know it's a role that interfaces up down Horizontally, it sits at this very messy intersection of different business functions within an organization The classic diagram that I've depicted here is really thinking about the core other parties that a PM would interface with we've got UX your research design writing Partners, you've got the core tech team, which typically consists of your engineering manager your tech lead manager and the IC engineering team could be multiple engineering teams Depending on the type of product you're on and then you've got your business stakeholders, which is a really catch-all term for Many many different functions sales marketing legal privacy executive leadership it really can span the entire spectrum of What basically makes up the rest of the company and you're sitting at the middle You're required to definitely interface with all these different parties to keep them informed to make decisions I like to think of the PM job also as a really Difficult balancing out act between strategy and execution So depending on who you're talking to you might be flexing one muscle over the other But overall your goal is really in terms of moving forward the team making sure that pointed in the right direction Getting things done by getting the right things done that move the business forward as well The end of the day of what you're working on what you're shipping doesn't advance the metrics and the measures that matter to the business Is rather new in terms of what impact you would be having as a PM? So everyone I think is pretty aware and familiar of this definition of the job The dimension that we're going to add to this is the notion of what kind of PM's You might encounter what kind of PM you yourself might be So there's many different types what we're going to focus specifically on Two types here the first is the specialist right and the specialist we think about as a type of PM that is extremely familiar and well versed in a particular domain or a particular problem space and this tends to be a space that they will continue to play in despite Changing companies changing products changing roles Types of spaces here that we could think of as examples, you know AI ML autonomous vehicles mobile app development music technology streaming video technology They have this healthy Healthy road map or healthy future of constantly being Interrated on they are not Mature or declining industries Because there is still a need and a growing need for specialists in this function So you can see that some PMs really focus on branding themselves as specialists and bringing a certain level of expertise With them into the domain that they're taking on It's a domain typically with a significant learning curve So the fact that these PMs are branded as specialists in these domains creates a certain level of job security as well for them So long as that domain itself is protected and continues to be in demand I think a great example here we can talk about is actually in the autonomous vehicle space You know, if you've got PMs who come from backgrounds where they may be done Some electrical engineering some embedded systems work in addition to CS kind of have that mix of software and hardware backgrounds Maybe dabbled in robotics that tends to be kind of a really great prerequisite or precursor into going into a Rather technical field at least if you're working on the actual technology that makes the car the car work So there's very much a need for this type of role It helps these PMs also to have this background and join these Rather focused teams and hitting the ground running and especially as you get later on in your career You might see that specialists tend to do really well and the higher ranks of the PM ladder as more and more they are rewarded and hired for the Knowledge base and the expertise that they have built up over time. I think you'll see this very common As as you progress through your career The other area that we have in terms of our PM job type are generalists As saying goes, you know, these are the jack of all trades. They may not be the master of any of those trades It's another type of PM and you know, you can think of these PMs as Really really well oiled machines. They're almost PM mercenaries They can you know dive into any new problems face our domain. They know how to become effective you would think that Even if they don't know anything about the space coming in, they're able to pick it up Relatively quickly, you know, their superpowers are being really fast learners asking the right questions Building and earning trust with key stakeholders earning and building Credibility for themselves as PMs who can get things done they're effective in building relationships and You know, it's obvious that what they bring to the table. It's not deep subject matter expertise. It's almost The counter to that you don't want them to necessarily have deep subject matter expertise because they bring a fresh perspective and they recognize the patterns of General problem-solving and so they're able to apply this to any new role any new space Because they effectively Pick up on what's common in terms of product management, you know, whether it's hardware or whether it's software You're working with people you're working towards a goal Figure out what those problems are figure out what the right things to be working on are The rest of it becomes an execution challenge, but they true to their name Generalize the aspects of the PM job and figure out how to succeed in any environment So this is the type of PM we're gonna go a little bit deeper into today. I Recognize that not everyone is necessarily one or the other You know, there's definitely additional nuance here People tend to think of themselves as Either I shaped or T shaped. We've got generalists in the middle. They're capable of a lot of things You could be a mix across these as well, right? These labels are I think shorthand but not meant to capture every single type of PM that exists out there But certainly today we're gonna we're gonna be talking about the one in the middle here as sort of people who are capable of a lot and the focus of Disexploration is to be thinking about how to make you a stronger PM by helping you figure out What general skills you can take from job to job role to role company to company? Just how do you keep building your brand of being a capable PM that can succeed in any kind of environment? So we're gonna focus on three This list could obviously go on for a lot longer But we're gonna call out kind of the top three here And we're really gonna be thinking about how to embrace these skills no matter where you are currently in your PM trajectory All right, so the first thing that we're gonna discuss is The art of framing So what is framing? We've definitely thrown this term around many times as PMs. I think we're all guilty of it I like to refer to framing as your own ability to take disparate pieces of information things that are not connected to each other that at least on surface seem unrelated or rather unconnected and your Superpower here is to Synthesize these different inputs into a wholly packaged perspective PMs do this no one else really does And PMs do this in many different shapes and forms. There's no one way to do this This comes across through a combination of techniques can be written artifacts presentations Just conversations and meetings with folks but the more common theme here is whenever a PM starts a job the first thing they try to do is try and make sense of the lay of the land what what's going on in their space and Figure out what the goals are figure out what the problems are Identify the risks identify the opportunity. They're just trying to figure out, you know where they are maybe where's the product in its arc of Growth or maturity where is the team in terms of its ability to execute or building credibility? the PM's kind of piecing all these different puzzle pieces together and It's not just taking this information it's being able to then synthesize it and Tell a really good story around What is happening in the in the space with their teams work with the team's progress? Packaging and synthesizing all of this is the pure spawn left framing here that we we think about in terms of what the PM does No one else as I mentioned is doing this on the team No one else is telling the story of why the work matters. What else needs to be accomplished? And again, this isn't something that a PM, you know writes one dock down and says there I framed up the space. It's a constant constant practice. You're Consistently iterating on it whether you realize it or not whether you acknowledge it or not it's it's a PM's ongoing attempt to make sense of the world and This is absolutely critical As I've mentioned already a couple times Everyone else on the team looks to the PM to do this to to have You know enough of an opinion enough of an insight in terms of what's going on to be able to identify where the team should go and Figuring out where the team should go comes from framing a problem space Thinking about it in a structured manner So oftentimes when you practice for PM interviews when you're told to have a very structured thought process To be very clear in your reasoning your rationale your prioritization all these are techniques and and mechanisms for Perfecting and and improving your our framing this comes up a lot in interviews, but even on the job Even if it's not as pronounced or rehearsed as you know walking through a four-step interview It is still something pms are constantly doing and it's absolutely a general skill that translates between Any role that you might have as a PM? All right number two This one I think is as well stated in the sense that everyone recognizes the importance of it by this point It's the art of communication Everyone expects that pms are the face of the product right? You are the advocate for your team You are constantly selling up selling in Selling down in every which direction you're communicating with people as we talked about the PM sit at the intersection of the Organization in many many roles so it's super critical to be intentional about who you're communicating with as well as how you're communicating with them and even more than both of these the Most effective pms are the ones who realize they must always be telling a story in the way that they communicate Constantly reinforcing a narrative so this builds upon the point number one Which is that you must have a frame for the space that you're operating it and Effective pms build on this frame by constantly telling and communicating why that frame matters where the opportunity in that frame is Exceptional pms are are really really effective storytellers. They do this Whether it's verbal and presentations whether it's written in docs and in emails It doesn't matter the exact form, but what what you say and how you say matters a lot Effective pms also know how to adapt their style They know when to be friendly and affable versus Or opinionated vocal they know when to focus on harmony and bringing people together versus focusing on Conviction and convincing people and bringing out per per space of hours in their communication At the end of the day, there's no one size fits all solution here You have to find the style that's most comfortable for you and that tends to to vary significantly from PM to PM, but the Conclusion behind it all is to be comfortable and communicating in the way that allows you to convey your points and can convey them with clarity and effectiveness It's difficult to be an effective PM if people have a tough time interpreting or understanding what you mean to say Not just what you say So it's very clear. It's very important to be clear in the scenario of being an effective PM And this skill as well translates no matter What kind of PM you are you might be the most? Technical PM working on some very very low-level features that Constantly requires communicating with their engineers or you might be someone who's really involved with the front end only feature Partnering really closely with their designers your marketing team constantly doing user research In either scenario you're working with other people often these teams require you to speak in their languages as well So it's very important that you don't underestimate How you adapt your style in your language to make sure you communicate effectively and this skill will translate 100% between the roles that you may up may be operating in lastly The third skill to call out is the art of moving forward now. What do I mean by moving forward? I'm referring to the more tactical or execution oriented side of the PM role And I'm calling out specifically that the power of progress moving forward as a directional influence is Vastly important, you know on my old team we used to say Shipping fixes problems and it's so true on Many levels. It's really really important to ship and to move forward Why is it important? Shipping and moving forward builds your credibility as a PM it gets results and Improves morale and gets people excited and perhaps most importantly It tells you when your own assumptions are wrong if you don't attempt to move forward You'll never know if you're moving in the wrong direction So the worst thing is to sit still and to not be moving at all and to be spinning That's when you're in a dangerous spot of not really knowing whether you're headed in the right direction or headed in any direction at all the most important areas of growth come from when you're moving forward and you're learning and Trying new things. So it's super important. It cannot be stressed enough how Important it is for you as a PM to find ways to unblock your team and make progress You have to hit dates if you have to hit launch timelines if you need to validate or invalidate hypotheses there's actual benefit and playing in that role of being a master executor and ruthlessly unblocking things that are getting in the way of your team and Believe me other people expect this out of you again, whether you're a PM at the most technically Complex ML company that requires you to know how to write code how to be very very in the weeds with the rest of engineers or You're an experience focused PM who stays away from the code and really loves working in the world of design Both of these scenarios require you to just be able to identify where you need to get to and move the team forward You need to rally folks around you need to be able to build consensus and momentum and get everyone moving This skill is super generalizable and super critical And it has to be one of the skill sets that you master Because at the end of the day the credibility as a PM as an effective PM Depends on your ability to make progress do it on a timely and impactful manner So in summary we discussed three different PM skills We discussed the Art of moving forward and making progress The art of communication The art of framing all extremely critical skills for a PM So now the question becomes how do you go about incorporating these and how do you use it to become a better PM? What can you do tactically? I want to leave you with a summary of the principles we covered which is to say These are sort of the mindset Attributes to be thinking about while you try to apply these skills and framing communication and moving forward Number one and most important I would argue is you have to embrace a growth mindset Attempting to be a generalist PM requires you to learn and constantly relearn no matter what product you've been working on This means you might be 15 20 years into your career and working again in a new product space that requires you to Unlearn some of the assumptions that you made over time Granted there will be some level of pattern recognition and some level of the challenges being the same But it's a challenge nonetheless and it requires you to adapt and consistently maintain a growth mindset number two You have to recognize the importance of building strong Relationships whether you work at a hundred thousand person company or a ten person startup the end of the day You're still working with people all the time Your best days might be the ones that you enjoyed working and making a lot of progress with a solid group of individuals And having fun doing it and your worst days might be when you had to write some very long emails to push back and to Sort through a very contentious debate with some unpleasant tones with the other people on the other end of the email but at the end of the day You have to be people first remember that you're working with people whether you're shipping software or hardware no matter how important or Seemingly mundane your your mission may feel Remember that together as a team you all are trying to accomplish the same thing So remember and keep in mind to treat other people and to respect other people well and Take that as a skill set of building strong relationships no matter what kind of role you're in And the third thing Just enjoy the actual experience of getting to build and ship things that users But get to put their hands on no matter what kind of product It might be the smallest internal tool. It might be the largest consumer mobile app Going end-to-end in the experience taking an idea from just a mere concept or thought in your head All the way to a launch product that's living and breathing in the real world is an exhilarating process And you sure it may take months or years depending on your time frame and your set of constraints But at the end of the day you should enjoy it and it should be fun It's a privilege that you get to have that kind of impact and it's honestly a continuously challenging and Fun experience to be doing something that taps into so many different parts of your skill sets So why not enjoy it got to make the most of it? So I hope you enjoy these top skills and takeaways The last thing I wanted to leave you all with is a quote from a really relevant book Great book that I would recommend folks check out It's a book called range why generous generalist triumph in a specialized world and David Epstein in this book talks a lot about How society overall is moving towards? Specialization or has historically moved towards specialization whether it's doctors whether it's engineers folks tend to believe that Specializing itself is how you move on up in the world Which is you know an argument that has both sides Epstein's counterpoint, which I think is encapsulated perfectly in this quote is We discover the possibilities by doing by true trying new activities building new networks finding new role models We learn who we are in practice not in theory so embrace the growth of Generalizing what you do and trying to apply those skills in different environments If you do that, I think you'll learn a lot about yourself I think you'll learn how resilient you are in terms of being able to conquer and take on any new challenge that comes your way I hope you learned a thing or two from today's talk You can find me on Twitter And LinkedIn feel free to reach out and let me know what you thought. Thanks so much for tuning in