What skills are the most important to develop when going from Sr. PMM to Director of Product Marketing?

First, here is how I'd define the scope and complexity of a Director level PMM role:

• At a director level, your work will be highly strategic in nature. For example, you should be identifying and devising strategies to solve company-wide issues with longer term implications (18-24 months out). Your proposed solutions will go beyond the boundaries of the product or marketing orgs and likely shape how other functions think about the problem space and influence VP+ leaders to help secure the right resources to make progress. Effective PMM directors do not only look at the scope of PMM resource needs but other functions required for a successful company-level GTM approach (e.g. customer operations, technical sales, technical writing, co-marketing budgets etc.).

Here are the skills required to move to this leadership level:

1. Product Expertise & Decision Quality - A Director-level PMM will be advising the executive team, using their deep product expertise on emerging industry trends or technologies and then advocate for how the company should respond. They may develop principles or frameworks to scale the future approach across the company, and/or share more broadly to set new industry standards.

2. Communication - A Director-level PMM will be required to effectively and regularly communicate with a company's most senior leaders. To do this well, you'll need to lead with succinct, structured insights or clear points to land, and know when and how to step into a conversation to get towards a desired outcome. Before speaking up, always ask yourself: what do I want the leadership team to take away, and will it help advance the conversation and/or goals of the meeting? Director-level PMMs also anticipate communication breakdowns in product, sales or GTM planning and proactively mitigate this by summarizing key issues and seek clarity in meetings or stakeholder forums.

3. Influence & Stakeholder Management - At a Director-level, PMMs should be advising the executive team and deciding on company priorities for the PMM organization, alongside PMM leadership. They may create cross-organizational teams to address company-wide gaps and lead trade-off decisions across company priorities. They will know when and how to effectively escalate the most sensitive business-impacting issues and align outcomes with leadership. For example, you may align different leaders across product, sales, and marketing on whether to focus on customer segment A vs. customer segment B during yearly planning. Your ability to influence leaders towards an aligned goal is critical.

Great question! Definitely not an easy leap to make, but while there may not always be an opening at your current company, taking a proactive approach will position you well for if/when something opens.

Here are some things I would recommend you keeping in mind:

Leadership and People Management:

• Building and Empowering: While you may not manage a team yet, you can demonstrate your leadership potential by collaborating effectively across functions, fostering a culture of ownership, and empowering colleagues to achieve their best work. Be a cheerleader for your team members, and support them in times of conflict (I like your idea because of xyz. Here's why I agree we should move forward with that plan.) And celebrate joint victories! Share shoutouts on Slack, both within the product marketing teams, but across other teams as well like product.

• Mentorship, Direct or "Implied": When you "formally" have direct reports or not, your ability to mentor other PMMs on the team and help guide their development For example, mentoring and supporting other PMMs to make help them do their best work and learn from you makes the entire team better. By showing you can proactively take on this role without it being a "formal" thing is incredibly powerful for making that jump to director.
  

Strategic Vision and Communication:

• Managing Upward: As a Director, you'll need to influence stakeholders, secure buy-in for product marketing initiatives, and manage expectations. Develop strong relationships with senior executives, communicate the strategic value of product marketing, and clearly articulate the impact of your work on the company's overall goals.

• Data-Driven Storytelling: Move beyond basic reporting. Become a master storyteller who can translate complex data insights into compelling narratives that resonate with executives and decision-makers. And if data isn't your strong suit, ask for help! It can be hard to get into the data as a PMM, but it is important when making big decisions such as prioritizing focus verticals.
  

Proactive & Business Acumen:

• Anticipate Market Trends: Think beyond your day-to-day tasks. Develop a strong understanding of industry trends and anticipate potential challenges or opportunities. Propose proactive product marketing strategies that align with the company's overall business goals. Many podcasts and newsletters can help you do this!

• Metrics & ROI Focus: Shift your focus from campaign-specific metrics to demonstrating the return on investment (ROI) of your product marketing efforts. Quantify the impact of your work on product adoption, revenue generation, and customer lifetime value. My PMM mantra is...If sales/CS isnt closing deals, I am doing something wrong. Understand how your work impacts revenue. This will also help you build rapport with your sales colleagues.

Transparency and Career Development:

• Open Communication with Manager: Be upfront about your aspiration to become a Director. Have regular conversations with your manager about your career goals and the specific skills you need to develop. Seek their guidance and mentorship on how to best position yourself for advancement within the company so that if/when something becomes available, you've already built trust and are top of mind.

• Track Your Achievements: Don't rely solely on memory. Document your accomplishments, track key metrics you've influenced, and quantify the impact of your work. This will be invaluable for showcasing your value when an opportunity arises.
  
  By honing these skills and demonstrating your leadership potential, you'll be a strong contender for Director roles, both internally and externally. Keep in mind, sometimes the best opportunities come by creating them yourself! But if corporate politics is still a thing, leave.

On your path from Sr. PMM to Director of Product Marketing, you may have a couple roles in between:

• Lead PMM (sometimes called Principle PMM) which is typically the highest PMM level for individual contributors

• Manager & Sr. Manager of Product Marketing, which would be your first people managing roles in the Product Marketing org

Here are the major competencies you'll want to develop on your path to Director level (summarized from the PMM career ladder we have at SurveyMonkey):

1) Leadership DNA:

• Influence: At a director level, you'd be expected to drive organizational alignment and influence cross-functional stakeholders at the SVP or higher level. It wouldn't be uncommon for you to present your strategy or approach to the executive team.

• People management & coaching: You'd be responsible to hiring, developing, and growing talent on your team, including owning org design. You likely have multiple direct reports (even direct reports who are managers themselves) to whom you provide coaching and clear guidance. You'd be responsible for meeting hiring targets and employee engagement goals in addition to business impact.

• Conflict resolution: Directors can independently and proactively address critical business issues, with scale in mind. Directors would be able to meet with peers in similar leadership positions to align on a resolution. A good example would be agreeing on roles & responsibilities across teams.

2) Vision & Strategy:

• Domain knowledge: As a director, you'd be expected to independently execute market assessment for a broad product area or for the evaluation of a new product. You'd need to clearly define your PMM team's roadmap and influence organizational alignment, including interfacing with PM leaders to define high-level product strategy and roadmaps

• Product & market strategy: At this point, you'll need to demonstrate mastery of Product Marketing by leading a team of product marketers and partners to develop sound product and GTM strategies that support your company goals. This includes understanding market white spaces, TAM, and actively suggesting how to address said white spaces (e.g. buy/build/partner strategy). You'd likely be going beyond just defining the strategy, but defining the process by which the strategy is created - examples being processes and frameworks for GTM launches or product EOL (end of life).

• Thought leadership: Directors demonstrate broad knowledge and expertise in their product domain, as well as Product Marketing best practices and PMM leadership; they are seen as a go-to for interviews, blog content, and webinars

3) Functional Expertise / Execution:

• Goal orientation & project management: As a director of product marketing, you would be co-accountable for key metrics including product adoption, pipeline/revenue targets, and win rates. You'll be expected to manage large teams + large & complex projects involving cross functional teams

• Content & deliverables: At this point, your presentations should be executive-ready. Both internal strategic presentations & external speaking opportunities at industry events.

• Analytics: As a director, you should be able to conduct and supervise efficient, accurate and meaningful hypotheses driven analyses to address highly complex areas. Examples could be doing cross-BU funnel analysis of how you're performing with specific persona targets.

My recommendation for measuring your progress against these core competencies would be to have open & direct conversations with your manager. If you don't have a documented career ladder or job framework, work with your leaders (usually with your HR business partner) to create one. It's great to have that as a reference as you prove your readiness.