AMA: Care Solace CPO, ex-Headspace Senior Director, Vasudha Mithal on Product Management Career Path

Understand if your skills and interest align with the path: IC: Become a topic expert, typically going deep in more technical topics e.g. you really love doing SEOs or healthcare billing. You like to work more independently, actively driving implementation, staying much closer to engineering a solution. You are not shy to take multiple technical courses to become an expert in an area. People Manager: You know enough about a variety of topics to guide the work of someone else, ask the right quest ...Read More

As a general rule of thumb - always be on the lookout. Dedicate whatever time works for you: 1hr/week or 1 hr every other week in making connections outside, thinking about a new problem to see if that area is exciting to you, talking to new recruiters to see how your skills are being perceived in the market. If you are thinking about this question, that might be a signal itself. Having clarity on what you're looking for professionally can be useful as well - what do I want vs. what am I getting ...Read More

It is important to understand the product culture of a company. PM work is very often confused with project management (as you are experiencing). Your manager is the biggest lever in this scenario - define your goals clearly with your manager (typically companies follow an OKR based process for this). Goals should be business objectives and then actual tasks to accomplish the goals should be defined by you vs. someone assigning tasks to you. There will always be some part of project management i ...Read More

As you continue growing, both the number of years and the kind of work, impact matters. Here could be some important steps to consider: Observe the work being done by senior folks at your company - ask if you can shadow them for any important sessions (e.g. strategy reviews). Find opportunities to help them out with any small pieces of that work. Usually, when you are moving along in your career, you have already started assuming the future responsibilities. Participate in any opportunities to t ...Read More

Understand how commercial teams are setup, how products are priced, what's a typical sales cycle and even more top of the funnel - how is marketing run, target customers and the value props. Build a basic empathy for a B2B buyers journey - which platforms are potential buyers already on, what influences purchase decisions, what are the funding sources and budget constraints. Expand your product sense to be product+service sense. What are the workflows your are enabling or making more efficient? ...Read More

Learning on the job - you already have broken into a product role. Work will give you the most time and mind space to acquire skills for growth. Observe the work being done by senior folks at your company - ask if you can shadow them for any important sessions (e.g. strategy reviews). Find opportunities to help them out with any small pieces of that work. Usually, when you are moving along in your career, you have already started assuming the future responsibilities. Widen your exposure to a var ...Read More

Unfortunately, there is no set formula for this. Here are some ideas for quantitative research: Look into salary benchmarking data. Levels.fyi is a great resource for researching. Understand internal pay policies (e.g. if the company is targeting 50th percentile among your specific industry). Ask HR for aggregated salary insights - data on pay gaps, etc. Talk to external recruiters and see what they are willing to offer for your unique experience(s). Depending on the relationship you have, close ...Read More

Innovation is best achieved by diversity of ideas. Diversity can be achieved by many ways - one of which is including views from multiple industries and domains. While hiring for a generalist role, it is important to leverage interview questions that are going after the skill vs. domain knowledge - I try to use questions that are not from my current industry. There are always a few specialist roles that require a deep understanding of the domain - but we're clear on those job requirements from t ...Read More

Generally, a good way to transition is when you change one dimension at a time. So, either change your company, role or industry. Trying to move across several things is hard (not impossible). In that context, the best shot is at trying for a product role within your existing company. Build relationships, try to stick around product work (e.g. exploratory analysis to help product teams prioritize, understand usage, measure impact, etc.), and ask mentors to let you drive some work (usually, there ...Read More