What is Product Management?

Product Management is the development of something which delivers value to your organisation, by meeting the needs of your users.’ - James Gadsby Peet

A product manager is responsible for a product’s overall success. Product management has a role to play in the entire product life cycle. Product managers are involved in all areas of product development, to ensure that the product is achieving its goals and meeting the needs of users.

The role of product management

Product development is an experimental process. You are constantly testing ideas and hypotheses to see if you are correct. It is not until the product is in the hands of users, in the real world, that you will truly understand how it is going to be used. That often means 'failing' and iterating the world. Having the courage to embrace failure and take action is crucial.

Product management is about relationships. It is your job to make sure everyone is on the same page, has a common goal and communicating effectively. Don't discredit how important stakeholder engagement is to your work. This could involve holding regular review meetings or advisory boards, having regular 1-2-1 catch ups with key colleagues and regular communications, updates or training for new features.

Product management is a discipline about value. Product management is about; Understanding value to add; Building value; Communicating value; Measuring value delivered. - Srini Sekaran

Top tips to remember as a product manager

Conway's law: The products you produce will mirror the way your teams and departments are structured.

“Organizations which design systems…are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations… The larger an organization is, the less flexibility it has and the more pronounced the phenomenon.” - Dr Melvin Conway

A good product strategy is never bound to the current operational set up. The strategy aims to create a future, which usually different from the current reality. The strategy is derived from a vision of how things could be and not how things are currently.

Don't limit your aspirations based on the current ways of working.

Key phrases for product managers:

• 'Why? What is the value to users? What is value to the organisation?'

• 'No'

• 'Not yet' - explore the power of not yet as explained by Jason Evanish

Reading:

• The history of product management

• The 5 core capabilities of a good product manager

• Video covering 20 Years of Product Management in 25 Minutes by Dave Wascha

Welcome to the Progressing Product Manager!

The progressing product manager is an open, collaborative library of tools, courses and resources relating to human-centred design and product development.

How to use this handbook:

1. Browse the resources by clicking on the left-hand menu or the button at the bottom of the each page.

2. Share the handbook with others.

3. Share your ideas, resources and questions/comments by clicking this link.

Contents

Disclaimer ⚠️

The Handbook aims to help inform and connect people working in the tech 4 good sector, so you can upskill more easily. All views expressed in the handbook are those of the sector and do not necessarily reflect the official position of New Philanthropy Capital.

Information is not advice, and should not be treated as such. We bear no responsibility for any decisions or actions taken resulting from information found here, nor do we claim that any of it is complete, accurate, or up-to-date. Use it at your own risk.

Contributions ✍️

Please do share your ideas, resources and questions/comments. All you need to do is create a Gitbook account and you can add comments or edit the page by clicking this link or you can send over your ideas to kathryn.dingle@thinkNPC.org

We like short, simple language and we love the use of images, videos and emojis! If you are sharing someone else’s work, please make sure you attribute the work to whoever created it.

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Prioritisation

Prioritisation Feedback and data isn’t hard to get, but organising and prioritising feedback often is.

• Have a clear method for prioritisation. Having a clear prioritisation method can help you to defend the decisions you have made in your product roadmap. This is likely to change as your product develops (which is okay!) You should be able to use your prioritisation methods to explain why you have made the decisions you have.

• Don’t prioritise in isolation. Prioritisation should be a team exercise. Your colleagues/partners will have useful insights into your users, the market, feasibility and risk.

• Share your prioritisation. Make sure the team knows what you are prioritising and why.

Choosing the right technology

• Database of software with reviews from users. Search for the type of software you need, look for software with a high number of reviews (100+) and then explore the app thinking about the security, accessibility, hosting, reputation etc.

• How to choose the right development framework: Native, Cross-Platform or Hybrid?

• 11 examples of progressive web apps

Product vision

A basis for every good product is a convincing vision for the future you aim to create and the objectives for the organisation. This should not be limited by the current working practices and structures, but should strive to be what is needed to meet the goals of the user and the company.

The Product vision describes the long-term goal of a Product and what it aims to achieve for users. Think of it as the mission statement for your product.

How to write a good product vision:

• A good question to ask yourself is, if you looked back in 3 years time, what would you like the reviews to say about it

• Create your own product vision template.

Product strategy

Product vision and product strategy are similar, but they are separate things. Your vision should focus on what you want your product to achieve. Your product strategy explains how you will make that vision a reality.

Your product strategy should not be limited by the current structures and practices. If it requires radical change, then you should be working to make this happen.

Project management tools

• Create simple and collaborative online Kanban boards with Trello (Trello templates here)

• Online whiteboard collaboration tool called Figjam

• Online team whiteboard tool by Miro

• Online whiteboard collaboration tool by Mural

Roadmap

‘A product roadmap is a high-level visual summary that maps out the vision and direction of your product offering over time’ - product plan

A backlog

A backlog is essentially your to-do list. Online tools for managing your backlog include, trello and Jira.

Inclusive Design and accessibility

• A practical tool for inclusive design where you get two random cards, a person and a trait so you can work out how you can meet their needs. Idean x Cards for Humanity.

• Explore and take steps toward a more diverse and inclusive design culture. Dropbox Design Diversity & Inclusion Toolkit

• Over 1,000 carefully curated accessibility content from across the internet. Stark’s Public Library.

• Framework of the minimum standard for creating accessible content called the Sculpt framework

• This list of digital inclusion resources has been compiled by Catalyst during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Free accessibility software:

Product reuse

• The festival of learning: examples of how charities have run digital projects, with links to reusable content.

• The power of reuse webinar recording by Catalyst

Free design assets

Free tools

A list of free tools for charities that should save you $200,000 per year. This list was compiled by Miguel Angel García del Valle via Campaigning Forum (ECF).

1. Google Ad Grants

2. Salesforce

3. Microsoft Dynamics 365

4. Vertical Response

5. QuestionPro

6. Canva

7. Later

8. Launchnotes

9. Grammarly Business

10. Slack

11. Google Workspace

12. Microsoft 365

13. Workplace

14. Livechat

15. Chatfuel

16. ShortPixel

17. Microsoft Azure

18. Amazon Web Services

19. Dreamhost

20. Interserver

21. Github

22. New Relic

23. Okta

24. Algolia

25. Microsoft Power Apps

26. Organic Themes

27. Fastly

28. Google Maps

29. Heatmap.com

30. Hotjar

31. Tableau

32. Facebook Donations

33. Paypal Giving Fund

34. Give Lively

35. Gofundme

36. Airbnb

37. SCORE

38. Taproot

39. Crowdspring

40. Online Impacts

Goals, Metrics and Data

Data allows for more effective decision making, but data is only as useful as your ability to use it. Metrics allow you to step back from your ideas and time and ensure you are meeting the needs of users. Analytics focused on users' behaviour can be a good source for explaining why you made a decision.

Metrics are often not useful on their own. All metrics need to be situated in context and focused around outcomes (e.g. the number of users to the site isn’t useful, but if you know the size of your potential audience, then knowing how many people you are reaching vs. could be reaching is helpful.)

Try to stay away from vanity metrics. These are numbers that don’t tell you anything in isolation. (e.g. number of page views). They tell you nice/bad stuff but not what to do next or why it is happening.

Mix methods approach to evaluation can often help to fill in the gaps in your knowledge.

Product design and UX/UI tools

• 10 principles for interface design

• An interactive glossary of UX research terms

• UX case studies in a comic book format

• Good UX design examples library

• 33 Activity Ideas for Remote UX Workshops

• Prototype design input Kit: Use real inputs in all your designs to elevate profile pages, password fields, credit card details etc by Framer.

• Product screenshots that focus attention on key areas.

• Design good practice guidelines

• Review and comment on websites live

Getting Super Powers

Becoming a super hero is a fairly straight forward process:

https://www.thecatalyst.org.uk/resource-articles/how-to-get-your-staff-on-board-with-digital

Prototyping tools and ideas

Prototyping tools and ideas A prototype is a simple mock up of an idea used to test or validate ideas, design assumptions, so that the team involved can make learn quickly and adapt

Book Recommendations

• Inspired: How to Create Products Customers Love by Marty Cagan

• Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal

• Competing against luck: The Story Of Innovation And Customer Choice, by Clayton M Christensen

• Cracking the PM interview: How to Land a Product Manager Job in Technology by Gayle Laakmann McDowell and Jackie Bavaro

Podcasts Recommendations

• Design makes the world with Scott Berkun – UX Podcast: Scott also shares with us four simple questions that can help put projects and situations back on track and help us deliver good design.

• Product to Product: A product management podcast for / by product people

Newsletters

• The best UX links and resources each week by UX design weekly.

Courses

• Free online interactive workshop to help you redesign your service for remote services by CAST.

• Free online interactive Human-Centered Design Prototyping course, by Acumen.

• 6-month no code paid apprenticeship by SIDE

Interview resources

• How to give a great product design portfolio presentation: Tips and strategies for delivering a great product design portfolio presentation.

Interview tips

What is no code?

"No-Code refers to a collection of apps which allow you to develop digital services without having to write code. No-Code may lack some flexibility compared to writing code yourself, but it requires less knowledge. It's the Ikea flat pack way of building digital tools - simple, functional, easy, and often good enough." – from Perspectives on NoCode

No code tools

• No code website builder, called Webflow

• No code software builder called Stacker

• No code app builder, called Airtable

• No code app building from google sheets called Glide. Good for directories or resource builders.

• A no-code drag-and-drop webapp building tool called Knack

• No-code intergrations to automate processes using Zapier

The problem space

As I mentioned earlier, product managers work to add value to users and the business. The problem space is where your user needs are. This could be the challenges/pain-points they face, their goals or their desires.

'Customers don’t care about your solution. They care about their problems’ - Dave McClure

It is a product manager's role to ensure the product allows users to overcome their problem or achieve a goal. However, people don’t often communicate what their problem is in a clear way. We often think of solutions because as users we don’t know any better (e.g. asking for a feature because they think it will help, rather than being clear why they want that feature. Product Managers must read between lines to define the problem space.

Product / Market fit

Getting the balance between adding value to users and adding value to the business is known as product / market fit.

An image of the product market triangle. From Dan Olsen’s book. Resources section.

• Target Customer: Who are they?

• Underserved Needs: What are their needs?

• Value Proposition: How the customer benefits and how our product is better.

• Feature Set: The functionality that supports those benefits.

• User Experience (UX): What the customer interacts with to get the benefits

How to do user research

User research doesn't have to be loads of time, but you do have to know how to do it well. It is focused on understanding the problems users are facing. Something as simple as 15 minute calls with users/potential users can help you to gather data.

• Usability testing 101 by the Neilson Norman Group

How to ask the right questions

• Asking good user interview questions by NCVO and Neontribe

• 5 ways to ask the perfect question, by Jeff Haden

Remote user testing options

• Ways to involve users remotely by Joe Roberson

User research frameworks

How to Set Up a User Research Framework by Nikki Anderson