“So what do you do?”

“Uh - I work in technology, making apps and websites”

“Oh cool! So you’re a programmer?”

“No, not really, more like focusing on how the app should work”

“Ah ok, same as my friend then - she’s a designer”

“Well not really. I’m more responsible for choosing what the app should do, and managing the whole process of creating it”

“Got you, so kind of like a Project Manager”

“Um - yeah sure, kind of. Anyway, so what do you do?”

All product managers will have had a conversation like this at some point, where they fail to properly explain what it is they do. Surely, Product Management is the most misunderstood, misinterpreted, under-appreciated role in software product development, evidenced by the hundreds (thousands?) of blog posts and books that try to explain the role. The mistake is often that they focus on what the Product Manager does, when they should be focusing on what the Product Manager is for.

The reason that product management is so hard to explain is because the output is hard to define, or rather the role is not defined by its output. Developers write code, designers create wireframes and visuals, and copywriters write copy, but Product Managers aren’t defined by creating anything obvious and tangible. Or at least they shouldn’t be. I’ve seen many who think their job is to be spec-writers, Jira curators, slide deck creators. They have not been good PMs.

Good PMs should know their purpose very clearly: they are responsible for ensuring that the team is building the right thing, and that the thing is built right. This means that they decide what things could and should be built, and amongst those things which is the right one to build next. Then, they execute the plan to get the thing built to the right level of quality to achieve the thing’s aim.

The tools and techniques they use to fulfil this purpose are varied, and there are many excellent and helpful resources on the subject. But we shouldn’t worry that our role is hard to explain because we can’t point at a specific thing we’ve made.