Darryl.net

You know what’s good for your business. But you don’t know what’s possible with your product. Sure, you have an engineering background, and you know generally how things work, but let’s be honest - you don’t know the half of what is the plumbing behind your product. This is why you have to tell the team how the business should work, not just what the product should be.

Many product managers usually concentrate on one or the other - the product, or the business. It depends on the PM’s background, their role within the organization, what they are comfortable with, etc. The product is more fun. The business is what feeds the family. One cannot survive without the other. Therefore, you must further both in tandem.

One easy way to do this (if you know the business behind your product) is to tell the team about the business. How do you make money? What are your costs? If people are logged in to your website, is your advertising more targeted? If you drive 30% more page views, will you see 30% more revenue? Or will you see 60% more revenue and 100% more in costs? If people open your application just 1 more day out of the month, do you gain any benefit? What are all the levers that are important to feeding the family?

Tell your team about these levers and dials and they will start to push and turn them in ways you never imagined. Even better - set up a program that rewards them in proportion to the amount of money they gain or save for you.

As a product manager, you are often the gateway between expectation and reality. The powers that be who circle above hear great things and expect the world. Your team knows what is and is not possible, and often, what is best for the user. But the two groups do not talk to each other - except through you.

Since you spend most of your time with the team making sure you ship, they might find it a bit strange if you start emailing them every day with the team’s latest status. So don’t. Now, the powers that be circling above might also find it a bit strange, but… once you realize that you are at the top of their mind and that they know exactly where the product is and what you need to be successful, you’ll be spamming them on a regular basis.

Ok, so maybe not every day, but at least once a week. Use some majordomo program or an Outlook group. Just get them the goods, be honest, SHOUT when good things happen… and savor the well-deserved attention.