Ambiguity: Product & Project Management

Photo by Jason Goodman on Unsplash

We interact and meet with people all the time and one of the first things we share about ourselves is our profession. While some professions are relatively straightforward to comprehend in terms of the job description and responsibilities, Product Management & Project Management are examples where a lot of ambiguity exists, therefore surprisingly far from being self explanatory. My recent interactions with folks who curiously asked questions like ‘ What does it entail?’ or ‘How is Product Management different from Project Management?’ helped me realize the lack of clarity around it.

So strictly speaking, how are Product Management and Project Management different?

Product Management

Product Management, in short, refers to the practice of building and maintaining products. Though this practice is challenging at many places as we dig deeper, at the high level the role of the Product Manager entails the following:

1. Identifying problems and user groups impacted: A PM helps identify and understand problem areas/ pain points in the existing environment/ process for a specific category/ categories of users. This could be within a fully manual process or within an existing product.
2. Defining the problem statement and the target audience: A PM then analyses the extent to which each problem identified impacts the recognized user groups, the level of urgency to implement a solution , and the immediate benefits of the same to help narrow down on the target segment of users and the immediate problem to solve — essentially defining the product goal and vision.
3. Identifying and prioritizing product features: A PM along with its team then identifies product features at the high level (Epics in the Agile world) that will help solutionize the pain points of the user segment. But beyond that, a PM also helps prioritize the order in which each of the identified product features should be implemented.
4. Working with the development team: A PM socializes the product features with the development team, breaks down each product features into user stories for the development team size effort for and start building.
5. Identifying & measuring Key Performance Indicators: When a PM has narrowed down the problem and the solution for the same, it is important to 1. Identify relevant KPIs that can truly help capture and reflect the efficacy of the solution 2. Track these KPIs once the solution is implemented to help analyze trends and areas of improvements in the upcoming product releases
6. Owning & maintaining the Product Backlog: A PM is responsible for continuously monitoring, maintaining, and enhancing the product backlog based on incrementally identified desirable features to be built into the product eventually.
7. Collaborating with Product Stakeholders: A PM also continuously engages with the product stakeholders to socialize and discuss on the features planned for implementation to highlight its alignment with the product vision and strategy.

Note: Each of these are a lot more rigorous in real life and are best executed by following the Agile Methodology that leverages various dedicated agile ceremonies to help the team stay organized and on track — a topic for another time.

Project Management

As evident from the name, it essentially summarizes the efforts around managing a project where a Project Manager interacts and coordinates with various teams to achieve a project goal and ensure its successful implementation within a target timeline.

1. Identifying the scope of the project: A Project Manager works closely with the Product Manager to socialize on the scope of the project across various levels such as 1. Epics — to identify the features planned for development 2. Releases — to recognize which features will be bundled together and launched in the Go-Live, and many more.
2. Identifying & quantifying efforts : A Project Manager then works with the development and testing teams leveraging Agile story-pointing and sprint planning guidelines to quantify 1. Development effort (converted to time) needed to complete each feature 2. Testing effort needed to thoroughly test each feature developed 3. Any additional time needed for technical set up 4. Additional integrations with ancillary platforms and dependencies with their teams 5. Time needed for defect fixes 6. Go-Live preparation
3. Preparing & tracking detailed timelines: Once the effort needed each step of the way has been captured in time units, the Project Manager then finalizes milestones such as ‘Dev Complete’, ‘E2E Testing’, ‘UAT Testing’ , ‘Go-Live’ for the Product Release with target dates. The Project Manager also continuously works closely with the Product Manager, Scrum Master and the Development Team to help track project progress and any potential delays every step of the way.
4. Preparing Cost/ Budget estimates: A Project Manager may often have to drive conversations around resource availability, pricing and its impact on timelines and deliverables. A concrete understanding of varying skills needed within the dev team, capacity of individual developers with varying levels of experience, and the velocity of the team helps Project Managers arrive at various options/ versions of the project timelines when interacting with stakeholders.

Where does the confusion lie?

One of the reasons why this differentiation is so vague in our heads is because both these roles require one person to take ownership of these responsibilities even though the entire team needs to socialize and collaborate for Product and Project Managers to play their part effectively.

Another reason why this is so confusing is because many organizations define these roles and its responsibilities according to the fit they are looking for within their organization/ teams. They might want to have one point of contact who can perform both Product and Project Manager responsibilities since many of the skills needed overlap and much of the information that Product Managers possess help Project Managers perform their roles effectively.

Lastly, in many industries such as Consulting, you are often expected to wear multiple hats, performing multiple roles within a client engagement that adds to the blurred distinction between these roles.

Why is the distinction important?

The obvious reason is that a better understanding of the distinction will help us perform at our roles better and designate, own or coordinate with relevant data points. For example if you are a Product Manager/ developer lead meeting up with your Project Manager, you are better prepared to talk around potential delays, or need for an additional sprint or hardening sprint in the project timeline.

The second reason is that when we are in a role where we function as the Project as well as the Product Manager, we approach each of the responsibilities diligently with a broader lens of the Project timelines. We are also able to identify our responsibilities better, and accurately elaborate on our individual value proposition at interviews in a way that helps firms gain confidence in our skills and the understanding of our holistic capabilities.

Why are these roles important?

This is a question that has sparked many debates across the industry. Many have argued that some of these functions can be performed and shared across team members instead of having a separate role altogether. In my opinion, each individual possesses a unique mix of skills and yes it is possible that an individual possesses the necessary skills to perform a combination of roles (say development and project management for example). However, it is important to keep in mind two things:

1. Most individuals choose to pursue a role that leverages ONE of his/ her many competencies based on interest
2. There are only 8 working hours in a day and the concept of a team is based off of ‘divide and conquer’ where each individual willingly exercises his/her stronger competency.

I truly believe, this is a classic example of a case where the absence of something makes you realize its importance.