AMA: Gainsight Director, Product Management, Sailaja Kalle on Product Management Skills

July 13, 2023 @ 10:00AM PT

What is the qualities of a Product Manager that impresses their Engineering counterparts and thereby allows the PM to build influence with the Eng team?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

A great Product Manager is being a good partner with the Engineering team, as well as the rest of the cross functional team. A good partnership means inputs from the entire cross functional team are valued and encouraged. Including engineers early in roadmap plans or design studio sessions increases collaboration and engineers should bring in Product Managers to weigh in on different levels of implementation and tradeoffs.

497 Views

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What are the most important soft and hard skills Product Managers can build to become successful in their field going forward?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

Apart from being a good product managers, natural propensity to build epic stuff, passion for impact, data-driven, ability to execute , great collaborator and communicator along with wide combination of skills - from software engineering, product development to monetization and growth is something that helps product managers be successful in their field.

779 Views

1 request
What real world experience and skillset do your product org look for in potential candidates?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

Problem solving capability, Communication skills, Empathy - User and Product, Learning curiosity, Passion to impact and comfortable with failure are some soft skills we evaluate when we hire for the team apart from the necessary skills and relevant experience for the role

478 Views

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What hard skills are must haves to be a Product Management leader? What are nice to haves?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

Product Manager Leaders essentially act as CEO of their Product. They bring 5 key traits to the table Product and User Sense - Good Product Leaders have the talent to 'easily' obtain a holistic, strategic view of what the right product might be for a given problem space; they can identify the riskier assumptions and they know how to test them, learn and adapt; Successful Product Leaders demonstrate a ‘user mentality’ and use empathy to relate to user problems, frequent customer needs, and stakeh ...Read More

1,102 Views

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There is often a huge emphasis on analytical skills, instead of UX skills, when it comes to product management job descriptions. What role does UX play in product management?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

User experience (UX) plays a critical role in product management, as it is the overall experience of a person using a product or service. A positive UX can lead to increased customer satisfaction, loyalty, and advocacy, while a negative UX can drive customers away. As a product manager, it is important to prioritize UX in the development process and regularly gather feedback from customers to improve the UX of the product. This can involve conducting user research, usability testing, and analyzi ...Read More

463 Views

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I get a lot of critical feedback from my boss and I don't always know what to do with it or how to improve. Sometimes I don't even agree with the feedback. What should I do when I don't think the feedback is correct?

Sailaja Kalle

Gainsight Director, Product Management • 2y

Feedback, as they say, is a gift. Research bears this out, suggesting that it’s a key driver of performance and leadership effectiveness. Negative feedback in particular can be valuable because it allows us to monitor our performance and alerts us to important changes we need to make. But processing and acting on negative feedback is not always easy. It can make us defensive, angry, and self-conscious, which subsequently impairs our effectiveness. Dont rush to react Get more data Dont be a lonel ...Read More

407 Views

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AMA: Gainsight Director, Product Management, Sailaja Kalle on Product Management Skills

View AMA Answers

What is the qualities of a Product Manager that impresses their Engineering counterparts and thereby allows the PM to build influence with the Eng team?

What are the most important soft and hard skills Product Managers can build to become successful in their field going forward?

What real world experience and skillset do your product org look for in potential candidates?

What hard skills are must haves to be a Product Management leader? What are nice to haves?

There is often a huge emphasis on analytical skills, instead of UX skills, when it comes to product management job descriptions. What role does UX play in product management?

I get a lot of critical feedback from my boss and I don't always know what to do with it or how to improve. Sometimes I don't even agree with the feedback. What should I do when I don't think the feedback is correct?