How does product management differ when you are working to create a custom infrastructure platform?

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VP Product Management, Networking and Security, Cisco • February 22

"Custom infrastructure platform" is nearly an oxymoron. :-) Anyway, it doesn't sound like a product; products are offered for sale to a market.

A "custom infrastructure platform" is very likely an internal project. It will have organizational stakeholders, clearly defined objectives (be very cautious here!), and a budget based on a (likely inflated) forecasted operating outcome. A project or program manager will be responsible for delivery here, and they partner closely with a technical architect who designs the system to spec.

While there are certainly aspects of project management overlapping with product management, it is a distinct discipline worthy of its own AMA!

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Savita Kini

Director of Product Management, Speech and Video AI, Cisco

Key traits for AI PM is no different from other PM roles -- empathy for customer issues, ability craft / create / articulate problems and how we might approach the solution, industry and domain experience, and collaborative leadership to work with engineering. Willingness to learn or prior experience or understanding of AI/ML modeling challenges, and how they can be use in the context the industry / domain where it is applied is ofcourse a big plus.

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Sreenath Kizhakkedath

Uber Head of Growth Programs, Riders, Uber

Let me answer this more broadly. For any organization, it's important to have alignment across the different functions, including Product Management, Operations, Design, Engineering, and Data Science. You wanted to have a small leadership team that works very closely with shared KPI's and goals. Then the question is more around what projects to work upon to meet the KPIs. This is typically done through a lightweight prioritization framework. There are many industry standards for sprint management and prioritization. The key is to ensure there is the right leadership team with aligned priori...

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Veronica Hudson

Director of Product Management, ActiveCampaign

The biggest change is the importance product plays in customer acquisition via trials and retaining customers past the 90-day onboarding period. When a product is self-serve, a PM should be paying attention to how their features drive trial conversion and the role they play in the customer onboarding process. This is often determined by identifying the drivers of PQLs (product qualified leads). So, for example, if we know customers that convert always use some combination of X, Y, and Z features within a few days of signing up for a trial, we will not only work to ensure that feature experi...

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Vasanth Arunachalam

Director, Technical Program Management, Meta | Formerly Microsoft

This response also applies to one of the other questions asked here - "What qualities stand out in some of the best TPMs you know?" I strongly believe that you can be a successful technical product manager regardless of your background, as long as you have the passion and growth mindset. It is not rocket science (for that matter, look at Elon Musk for rocket science). So I’ll focus on some of the desirable soft skills that makes one a successful technical product manager - * Able to technically grok how things work, very fast * Balanced (between Strategic and Technical thinking) & Objec...

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Roshni Jain

VP of Product, Eventbrite

There is no right answer, but here are a few lenses I've used when providing counsel to others and in considering the companies I've worked with: * Is this a product that I'm personally excited about? I don't have to be the ideal customer, but is there something about the product that excites me - it could be that it's a problem I'm passionate about solving, an approach that is truly innovative or differentiated, a customer that's a lot of fun to work with, or a business model that creates strong competitiive advantage * Are the secular trends in its favor? Is the company lea...

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D Matthew Landry

VP Product Management, Networking and Security, Cisco

Taking for granted a baseline of solid product management fundamentals and team simpatico, I feel the following play an outsize role in determining success in the enterprise: * Skeptical curiosity * Strong opinions, weakly held * Speaking and presentation skills, in front of senior execs & audiences * Ability to simplify and explain technical concepts * Interest in customers' industries and their end customers * Empathy for the sales team and how they sell * Familiarity with routes to market and channel ecosystems * Awareness of how all teams contribute to product delivery * Finan...

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