Having recently transitioned from a software development role to product management, I am penning this article to share my journey along with some of the resources I referred to.
Before we dive into “how to transition into Product Management”, it is very important to understand “Why Product Management?”.
Take a few minutes to think deeply and jot down why you think you want to be in such a role. My motivation to move into product was the realisation that while I was a great developer, coding was not my biggest strength. I am a people person with a knack for collaboration & innovation.
How did I start?
I signed up for LinkedIn learning and completed the Product Management pathway. This gave a very good overview of all things PM. From what the role entails, good-to-have skills to product mindset.
I also referred to Lenny’s blog which covers the PM prep very holistically.
The Product Folks have some great resources but what stood out for me was their Insurjo cohort. They invite PM leaders from the industry to talk about/ explain various concepts and share real life examples.
So, what’s next?
My next target was to get my hands dirty with some actual problem statements. To do that, I :
It would be helpful to also acquaint yourself with common frameworks like AARRR!, CIRCLES, HEART and common metrics especially for e-commerce companies. They will be holistically covered in above links or can be found easily on various blogs.
An additional thing that I did was to reach out to PMs on LinkedIn - people who have been in that role for good amount of time and can give insight on what the day to day actually looks like.
The above resources helped with both the case study round as well as the product interviews. One question common across interviews was - “Why PM”? So make sure you have prepared a good and convincing answer for this.
I also felt that setting up my website would be good for my personal brand. While I don’t know if there was any direct impact of this website on my candidature (as I got my interviews mostly through referrals), I was able to share my insights with the community in a manner I liked. Till date, I have had 1500 unique visitors. 🙂
Check out my solutions to some cases and 100 Days of Product journey here.
Group Product Manager, UniAcco
My Background
I am a Computer Science Engineer from Delhi Technological University (formerly DCE), 2014-18.
Being a software developer at Citi for 3.5 years gave me a wide exposure in terms of technology.
I led a number of initiatives which helped me hone my management and communication skills.
More on me: www.akrititewari.in/all-play-no-work