Product Management 30/60/90 Day Plan

I’m assuming the question is about setting a ‘team’ vision/mission and one doesn’t exist yet. The mission statement is the “What” and the vision statement is an ambitious future state of what the worl

Every new job I've taken has had a pretty specific challenge I was hired to solve, and I was fortunate to have that clarity (at least at a high level).  When I start in the new role, I focus on the f

I like to start by understanding the historical context and how teams arrived at where they are. What decisions were made and why. What worked well and what didn't go according to the plan. Starting

As a first PM, you will need to be very judicious with how you allocate your time and resources. In fact, I think that’s true for larger companies as well. There are always going to be more ideas than

Honestly, the first product manager for a company is probably not ready to establish a prioritization framework. The first PM probably needs to focus on customer discovery, market discovery, MVP intu

There are many great approaches to this question – and to some extent, it will depend on what the company values. If you're a first Product Manager, it is most important that customer needs / expectat

The great thing about being the first hire is something that is also great about Product Management: there is room for interpretation. My philosophy has always been more heavily focused on understandi

First PM in a company! I have not done it, nor have anyone in close network to have a good understanding. My guess is that they have to establish right roles/responsibilities on what to carve out from

When you are the first PM, you are straddling several priorities: Finding product market fit Scaling the team Scaling the product The biggest failure mode is trying to do 2 and 3 before you do 1: As

In my experience a prioritization framework is foundational to establishing a great working relationship within your own team and stakeholders. I'd also argue that if executed well in the beginning, t

There are a few different vectors to consider here. There is the effort/impact matrix, which is pretty good at helping identify low hanging fruit - essentially mapping out potential workstreams on a 2

Thank you for the question and I'm sure this is exactly not the answer you're looking for which is, "it depends" You're balancing building trust and relationships, understanding your users and the bu

The fundamentals of prioritization are not too different when you're the first at a company. But in the early stages of a company or product, it's even more important to focus.  At an early stage com

This is a great question about how to pave the way for two things: product strategy and product management execution. I can see this being applicable to not only first Product hires at start-ups, but

The product manager's primary responsibility is to ensure that the right product is delivered to the market at the right time. In order to do this effectively, you will need to establish a framework f

Know your customer - Often this can just be the investor in the company/company owner. Meet their basic expectations from the product first, and win their confidence. Aim to build a functional protot

There are different paths that each product manager takes, but the common ones I've seen are: 1. Joining a tech company as an Associate PM or an intern straight from college. For college grads, I sugg

There is a fork in the PM career path road: one is becoming a people manager, the other becoming an expert in a deep thinking product area sans managing a team.  My recommendation is to figure out whi

This is a very interesting question and one that I keep touching upon on almost all career conversations with my teams & mentees. There is no one typical career path for PMs, which can be both lib

I have been a part of small teams, large teams, a PM consultant and an entrepreneur. I have yet to scale a PM team beyond the first PM but here are the things I would consider: Structure your team ba

The simple answer is to hire PMs :) .  That said, I'm assuming you are asking more of how to structure the team to scale to the needs of the organization as you hire Define the discipline: Hire PMs t

This is a situation that our team went through last year, scaling from 2 PMs to 10 over 12 months. Before hiring any additional PMs, we first took the time to survey the teams that existed in our curr

Building with intent is key. As a first PM or TPM, you are often running a one-person show. You wear multiple hats and you tend to be scrappy, flexing to what the business needs you to do. That approa

The first PM hired into a company, or in a division of a company, will usually be an individual who can wear different hats on any given day. (see one of my favorite product management graphics: https

I'm not sure it is the most effective because I've really only used one strategy, but it has been effective for me. Grow your own scope, take on more than you can handle, do a good job of pitching th

Contrary to popular belief, it's not about writing a job description as fast as possible and starting to hire! It's important to spend some time upfront thinking about the team you are trying to build

I’ll apply the framework outlined above to this question and talk about setting up a Technical PM function for the first time. 30 days of LEARNING: I’ll start with a listening tour, meeting with all c

Speaking to your cross-functional teams is the best way to gain a deeper understanding of your company’s goals, its processes and challenges. It’s also an excellent way to get to know your new coworke

The listening tour is what I love most while taking on a new role. I’m a social person and I love meeting people. What better than getting to know the people you are going to work closely with? I typi

I think it takes a thorough understanding of a product and its users to achieve success. For that reason, I am not a big believer in “quick wins”. Take the time to learn before executing and think of

“Rushing to prove value” is one of the common pitfalls of starting in a new role. Having said that, you want to make steady and incremental progress in delivering value. See my response to the questio

First off, take a deep breath and remember, crushing those OKRs is going to take time and effort. Next, set clear goals for each milestone and build a plan around it. Just like you would when defining

I worked at Microsoft for about a decade and then moved to Meta to take on a new role, a few years back. That was the most unsettling period of my professional life. I’ve gotten accustomed to a certai