Monil Shah

There are three common approaches that companies take to address product growth. These include: 1. Everyone does growth, meaning each Product Manager is responsible for building the core features and improving adoption and retention of these features. 2. Having a dedicated Growth PM as part the core team, who reports to the Head of Product and focuses on growth levers specifically for that product area. 3. Having a dedicated Growth Product Function that either focuses purely on acquisition or takes a Product-Led Growth (PLG) approach, where the team looks at Acquisition, Activation, Retention, and Monetization. In this case, the company may have a PM and a dedicated team per growth lever. The PM will report to VP/ Head of Growth. The role of a Growth PM differs from other Product Managers in several ways. 1. A goal for a Core PM would typically be focused on improving the core features of a product, enhancing the user experience, and ensuring that the product meets the needs and expectations of its users. In contrast, a goal for a Growth PM would be focused on expanding the user base and increasing revenue for the product. This may involve developing and executing growth strategies such as increasing user acquisition, improving user activation and retention, and optimizing monetization tactics. 2. Core PMs may have longer-term roadmaps and focus on building comprehensive solutions, while Growth PMs prioritize rapid experimentation and iteration to test and validate hypotheses. 3. Core PMs may work more closely with product designers and engineers, while Growth PMs may have to manage their time to collaborate and influence more with marketing, sales, finance and data analytics teams to drive growth. E.g Finance wants to increase revenue by increasing prices but that may impact self service conversions. 4. Growth PMs often rely on hypothesis driven experimentation, data analysis and iteration to identify the most effective growth levers and to continuously improve product performance. Overall, the role of a Growth PM requires a different mindset, skillset, and approach compared to that of a Core PM.