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?

Answer

6 Answers

Product Management Skills

Narmada Jayasankar

Atlassian Head of Product Management • 1y

In my opinion, building influence with your engineering team boils down to these 3 things Understanding engineering complexity even if don't quite grasp all the details eg. do you understand the cost (experience implications, impact to future team velocity etc.) of having tech debt when you ask your engineering team take short cuts? Being able to represent the engineering considerations in forums where your engineering team is not present eg. discussions with the sales team where they ask for sp ...Read More

3,152 Views
Aindra Misra

BILL Director, Product Management (Data, AI, DevEx, Identity) | Formerly Twitter/X • 1y

Engineering counterparts are not easy to influence as they come with some kind of bias that PMs are not there to help them but to add processes, hierarchy and more meetings to their day to day, without knowing their pain points and/or technical stuff. Based on my experience, here are some of the qualities you can develop to influence and impress your eng counterparts Get hands on wherever you can - In the age of AI, there are a lot of nocode tools to build prototypes etc (Cursor being one). If t ...Read More

1,892 Views
Casey Flinn

OEConnection Head of Global Product Operations • 2y

I get the gist of the question, yet want to call out that "impressing" team mates is not the path I would take. Rather its all about how one can show up authentically and build a collaborative working relationship. It also set ups a paradigm where one party gets to define what is valued and the other just has to respond / adapt. So I would recommend something like this (note: this applies not just to your engineering partners but also everyone in your Trio+ sphere). Essentially I want to consist ...Read More

676 Views
Anton Kravchenko

Carta Sr. Director of Product Management | Formerly Salesforce, MuleSoft, Apple • 3y

Being a team player and sharing team responsibilities e.g. sharing scrum ceremonies with your EM, will help you be equal partners.

Don't forget that while you're doing customer calls, aligning stakeholders, or writing PRDs, your EM is directly managing the engineering team. This takes energy and time.

1,083 Views
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
Milena Krasteva

Walmart Sr Director II, Product Management - Marketing Technology • 3y

A CEO once told me that he would only hire a person if he thought that he would enjoy the time spent with that person despite being stuck at an airport with them waiting to board an indefinitely delayed flight. Despite the exaggeration, I've always imagined the equivalent scenario as whether engineers would want to spend hours with a PM in a war room or a bug bash. Be an engaged partner. Be in the trenches with them. Work hard or harder. Follow-up and follow-through on your stuff. Be transparent ...Read More

556 Views