Zeeshan Qamruddin

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 understanding how things operate current state, finding out pain points as well as the more successful parts of a product, and leaning on those insights to form your next steps. In certain scenarios, what a team may need is for someone to roll up their sleeves and do the work to keep the lights on for a produc ...Read More

Roadmap communication is often just as critical as developing it in the first place. Our team has a number of internal stakeholders that are directly impacted by the decisions we make. When we consider the level of detail, we try to anchor Goals and Plays. Goals ensure that we are focused on the right thematic areas, and our goals are prioritized before the start of the year. We socialize our goals and their priority level to help teams understand where we will be focusing, and why. Plays are a ...Read More

Finding the right balance of leadership input to infuse in roadmap planning is always a challenging endeavor. What has been most effective in my career is coming to the table with a clear perspective and reasoning for prioritization. As a leader, staying in tune with the business should allow you to preempt those initiatives that are top of mind for your executive team. It is absolutely not an exact science, but building a bridge between 1. The company/executive priorities and 2. The areas that ...Read More

Today, our org structure follows the ethos of "Small, autonomous teams". In this structure, we generally have a PM paired with a Technical Lead (Eng), somewhere between 3 - 5 Engineers, and a Business Systems Analyst to focus on operational and analytical tasks. Some teams have a Design/UX representative as well, where applicable.  Hierarchically, we have these teams organized into Pillars, with a shared broader mission/remit. Pillars are led by a triad, with a Senior PM, Product Lead, or Group ...Read More

This is often the case for companies in a hyper-growth state, especially as they look to find a clear fit in the market. Where I've found success with leadership is by helping them understand the trade-offs in our teams focus. For example, when planning out our team's work, we lean heavily on research and a few key metrics to prioritize. When faced with requests from leadership that may not align, we try to create an apples to apples comparison (though not always perfect) to help bring clarity t ...Read More

These are prime scenarios for a Product Leader, as they can use their own research and perspectives to help C-Suite understand the most beneficial bets to place. With a new leadership group, teams have the opportunity to reset on the legacy items that plagued them in the past. For example, upon taking over our Product Area in my current role, the first step that I took was to present a clear perspective on where our team could go. Because there was no leadership team from which I was taking the ...Read More

At the company level, there are a few different methods of communications to keep everyone abreast of updates: Product Notification emails (Ad Hoc) - These emails have a set template and allow product teams from around the company to share updates to their areas in a digestable format as major features go out of the door.  Product Newsletter emails (Weekly) - The weekly newsletter summarized major product updates and initiatives to all product team members.  Quartery Business Review meetings (Qu ...Read More

Ultimately, communicating about your product should tie to the outcome that you hope to drive. When pivoting a product, I've found it's most helpful to be honest about the process the team is going through. Sharing less information with higher quality is far more valuable than any other course of action in these scenarios. For example, when our team was stuck in a rut due to poor Org Design and a mountain of tech debt, we went to our executive team with a clear message. We needed time to unravel ...Read More

This is a scenario that teams often find themselves in, especially in fast moving parts of a business. The question I would ask when looking across the existing products is "Where do I gain the most leverage from innovation?" There are certain products that simply need to work, and that have a built in runway so as to not detract from the companies success. If there is an opportunity to simplify an unnecessarily complex product, such as leaning on a 3rd party or making a capital investment to en ...Read More

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 current state. We reviewed the tools they owned, their missions, their place in the lifecyle of the motion that we support (Quote to Cash), and made our decisions from there. Certain teams needed to be consolidated, others needed to be created, and some simply needed more structure. With a plan in hand, ...Read More