Skillset to Mindset: Realizing Your Potential as a Product Manager – Product at Heart 2024
Being a successful product manager isn’t just about your technical skills or knowhow. In fact, it’s your soft skills—things like communication, time management, and even curiosity—that will allow you to flourish in this challenging and unpredictable career. This is why we had a themed session on Skillset to Mindset: Realizing Your Potential as a Product Manager, in addition to other themed sessions on Product Operating Models, Blueprints for Collaborative Success, and Rethinking Value Creation.
This themed session featured three 20-minute talks. During Realizing Your Potential as a Product Manager, we heard from:
Jennifer Michelmann, Senior Product Manager, Schwarz Media
Axel Sooriah, Product Management Evangelist, Atlassian
Timoté Geimer, CEO at dualoop
In this post, we’ll share some highlights from each talk. If you’d like to explore any of the content in more detail, make sure you check out the recordings from each session.
Jennifer’s talk: How to Take Care of a Limited Resource and Become a Better PM
Axel’s talk: Beyond PM Craft Skills: Human Skills for Next-Level Growth
Jennifer Michelmann: How to Take Care of a Limited Resource and Become a Better PM
Not having enough time is one of the most common complaints and challenges among product people. And Jennifer Michelmann has firsthand experience with this: In her 12 years as a product manager, 6 of them have been as a part-timer. For her talk, Jennifer promised to share some of her learnings to help you better manage your time.
The tale of the crazy busy product manager
“Have you heard of the crazy busy product manager?” Jennifer asked. “It’s a scary story. Some of us work 60 hours a week. We don’t have time for lunch. We’re triple-booked with meetings. We’re so busy. And it’s a dangerous tale. Because if we keep telling it to ourselves and others, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Jennifer explained that this idea of the “crazy busy product manager” raises expectations that product managers need to be there all day every day, attend all the meetings, participate in all the discussions, and be responsible for everything.
But it’s a trap. As Parkinson’s law dictates, work has the tendency to expand to take up however much time we allocate to it. Plus, as product people, our work is never really done.
If we spread ourselves too thin, the quality of our work will decrease. We need proper breaks in order to perform well.
“We need to do less in order to do better,” said Jennifer. And as much as we might hope for someone to come look at our calendar and delete some meetings for us, that’s never going to happen. We have to take matters into our own hands.
Do the “stop dance”
You might be familiar with the party game “musical statues,” where everyone dances until the music stops playing and they have to freeze in place. Jennifer explained that the German name for this game is “Stopptanz” (stop dance) and she gave us an acronym to help us remember how to make more time in our schedules.
D - Define priorities: If you don’t know where you’re going, it’s a waste of time.
A - Allocate time: You need to come up with a plan.
N - Notice patterns around your own energy levels, workload, tasks, schedule. If you know what you spend your time on, it becomes easier to manage.
C - Consider coworkers: there might be people out there who can help you, but it’s up to you to identify who can help with what.
E - Establish boundaries: If you don’t value your own time and you don’t protect it, no one else will.
When it comes to priorities, many product managers find they’ve either got no direction at all or 15 competing ones. In these cases, the biggest struggle is not actually a lack of time, but a lack of clarity. Jennifer mentioned that Arne Kittler wrote a series of blog posts about clarity and recommended checking those out.
“Enabling and aligning your team is the biggest lever when you want to have more time as a PM,” said Jennifer. Your goal should be that your team knows the direction and context and can make decisions without you being involved. You need to delegate and facilitate in order to achieve that.
Building trust and managing up are also critical skills that take time to build. “You need to spend quality time with your colleagues, your stakeholders, and your management team,” said Jennifer. She shared that when she was returning from parental leave and working as a part-time product manager, she was trying to do everything in half the time. She skipped all the fun stuff—the coffee breaks, the lunch chats, the catch-ups in the kitchen. And it slowly eroded the connections she had within the company. “If you’re a product manager, these connections are crucial,” said Jennifer. “You have to actively nurture them, so having these coffee chats is basically part of your job.”
What’s important vs. what’s urgent
It’s also important to learn to make the distinction between what’s important and what’s urgent. The trick is to focus on what’s important while giving yourself some buffer time to attend to any urgent things that come up.
Know your triggers
Knowing your triggers—mental patterns and self-beliefs that can affect your sense of importance—will help you better distinguish between importance and urgency. For example, you might have a tendency toward perfectionism or people pleasing, so it’s important to be aware of this and try to avoid falling into these patterns. A useful tip is to ask yourself: Is this really important or does it just feel important now?
3 tips for staying focused
Even if you’ve defined your priorities and have a good sense of what’s important and what’s urgent, it’s all too easy to get distracted if you’re not careful. Here’s how Jennifer recommends staying focused.
Don’t go down every rabbit hole. “We’re not in the Matrix,” said Jennifer. “Don’t follow the rabbit.” In this case, Jennifer uses the term “rabbits” to mean notifications, because if you don’t actively manage them, they WILL multiply. Jennifer recommends switching off anything that makes a noise or visual interruption. This way, you can choose when you want to engage with tools like Slack rather than having them rule your day.
Always let some fires burn. “If you’re always focusing on fires every day, that means you’re only reacting and you can’t create any new value,” said Jennifer. Get comfortable with the idea of letting some fires burn so they can keep you warm in the night.
Go to your castle and take time to think. Referring to the Disney movie, Frozen, Jennifer said that when Elsa gets upset, she builds a castle to give herself time to think. This is an important step in deciding what you should focus on and what you can let go. Jennifer also recommended checking out Meghan Murphy’s talk from Product at Heart 2023 on carving space to think.
Make things visible
Next, Jennifer said that making your work visible is another way of better managing your time. She had a few specific suggestions to try out.
You can create clarity for yourself and others by writing down your top priorities. Regularly remind others by pinning this short list to your Slack or attaching it to your epics.
A to-do list is your friend. You can take a “getting things done” approach. If something takes under two minutes to complete, just do it right away. Revisit your list regularly and see what you’ve been working on through the week.
Your calendar is not your enemy. It helps you to focus and regularly reviewing it reminds you to put important, non-urgent tasks on there, like user research and coffee chats. If you end up having to spend the whole day fixing a bug, you can keep track of that on your calendar, too. If you notice this is becoming a regular occurrence, it’s a strong signal that you’re in firefighting mode and you have to adapt your approach.
Talk to your manager
Don’t forget that your manager is a resource for you. Talk to them and let them know that you’re getting overwhelmed. But be aware that they might not be willing or able to help. Start by sharing your struggles with them. If they aren’t able to help, you can make your own plan of what to delegate, delay, or drop. Just remember to let them know your plan so they have a chance to weigh in on it.
Know the difference between busy spikes and chronic stress
“There will always be times when we’re busy,” said Jennifer. “That’s okay, as long as it goes away again. But there’s also chronic stress that makes you sick. And it’s important to understand the difference between these two.”
Busy spikes occur when you have to power through for a short period of time. You know that it’s both short term and within your control.
Chronic stress, on the other hand, has no end in sight. And in this case, working harder won’t get you out of the situation. Jennifer warned that if you don’t take a break to refocus and evaluate, your body will force you to do so, whether it’s by coming down with a cold, back pain, or some other physical ailment.
Finally, Jennifer said to remember that workflow is like the tide: It can get quite high, but it should always go back to being low again.
Axel Sooriah: Beyond PM Craft Skills: Human Skills for Next-Level Growth
Axel Sooriah has experienced several highs—and several lows—in his career. And while there were times when he was so stressed out he was having nightmares about his work and barely sleeping, there were thankfully plenty of points when he felt a great sense of purpose and commitment to his work.
In his talk, he promised to share the three keys that have allowed him to find more meaningful connections with his family, his friends, and his work.
Key #1: Nonviolent communication
In June 2021, Axel was invited to run a ways of working workshop with a travel tech startup in Paris. He sensed there was something unique about this company. The staff were radiant, smiling, and looked like they regularly had eight hours of sleep. Everyone was using gestures so they wouldn’t interrupt others when they were speaking. Everyone was super respectful with how they explained ideas and they were non-judgmental with how they entertained others’ ideas.
“I had never seen an entire product and engineering team so happy to be working in their office during working hours,” said Axel.
When he asked the head of product the secret, she told him that everyone at the company was trained in nonviolent communication (or NVC for short).
Axel was surprised to learn that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella attributes his successful turnaround of the company to NVC. Learning to use NVC meant they were better colleagues and leaders, but it also meant they were better parents and partners. “Feeling better in all aspects of our lives means we can perform better in all aspects of our lives,” said Axel.
How does this work? NVC is based on the idea that we all have needs. If our needs are not met, we might feel anxious, helpless, and stressed. And when our needs are met, we feel confident, glad, and relaxed.
This is so important it’s worth repeating: When our needs are met, we’re happier. And as a result, we’re more efficient at work. The goal of NVC is to understand these needs, what happens when they are not met, and what to do so they are met.
Axel shared the following template that you can use for NVC-driven conversations: When [observations], I feel [emotions] because I need [needs]. Would you be able to [request]?
NVC offers the tools to change that so you can be happier, more self-aligned, and more connected with your emotions.
This is more challenging than it sounds, because most of us are not actually that good at recognizing our own emotions. To get better at this, Axel suggested you try out the following:
Find a feelings/needs cheat sheet online (like the one shown in the slide below).
Print it out or have a copy somewhere you can easily refer to.
After each Zoom call or meeting, take a look at it.
Recognize your feelings and needs.
Check that you have a path to resolution.
Check that you have a path toward feeling better.
“The more you practice self-empathy like this, the more it becomes part of you. The more you can use it for your benefit, the more you can use it to help others around you,” said Axel.
Key #2: Internal Family Systems
As Axel went through NVC training, he learned about another critical key: Internal Family Systems or IFC for short. His coach recommended the book Émotions: enquête et mode d’emploi (Emotions: Inquiry and users’ manual, volume 3).
Axel summed up the book (and the basic concepts of IFC) by explaining that we’re all made up of parts and a Self. Some parts of us are wounded, carrying the burden of childhood trauma. Some parts are protectors who are literally fighting for us so we can crack on with our lives. All the parts are trying to help. There are no bad parts.
If you’re familiar with the movie Inside Out, Axel said it’s a good analogy for IFS: It’s about understanding which parts of you are creating havoc and how you can better accept them, quiet them, etc.
Understanding your part means deeply understanding what’s going on internally. For example, imagine you’re in a product review.
There are a bunch of senior stakeholders in the room. They’re asking tough questions. You might sense that some of these questions are triggering emotional responses from you. In that moment, some parts reveal themselves. It might be the part that is judging you, saying things like, ‘You’re a loser. You don’t have the answers to their questions.’ Or it might be the perfectionist part that wants to come up with the answers.
“IFS teaches us to accept our parts and to show them love and compassion. When we do that, these parts go and fight for our survival,” explained Axel. And it becomes much easier to adapt to high-pressure environments like working in product.
If you’d like to learn more about IFS, Axel recommends finding a “name your parts” workshop online. Give it a go and see what happens. “This has been truly transformational for me and I cannot recommend it enough,” said Axel.
Key #3: Humility
The final key Axel described is humility. “It’s about understanding yourself, both the tools you have and the ones you don’t have yet,” he explained.
Product managers are expected to lead with no formal authority. But focusing on status or authority leads to the wrong priorities and hurts relationships with engineering and other teams.
“We often confuse being confident with projecting confidence,” said Axel. “A product manager can quickly lose credibility if they’re making decisions based on unearned confidence. This approach can lead to poor outcomes.”
So how do you find the balance between confidence and humility? Confidence is all about you—the belief that you can accomplish hard things. Humility is about the tools that are required. It means knowing that you might not yet have the right tools or knowledge to get the job done.
To practice cultivating humility, Axel recommended trying the following experiment:
If someone at work asks a question you don’t know the answer to, be honest and avoid the temptation to make something up. You might be surprised by what happens! “The more I’m honest about what I don’t know, the more I find colleagues and leaders really value what I bring to the table,” said Axel.
Timoté Geimer: The One-Hour-a-Week Challenge
“I think there’s one thing we can all agree on,” said Timoté as he began his talk. “Being a PM is tough.” He even had a diagram to illustrate the typical journey of a PM.
After spending some time at the peak of Mount Stupid, Timoté realized that he was the only person who could invest in himself—no one else was going to do it.
And since in his role as CEO of dualoop he’s spent a lot of time evaluating what makes product managers successful, Timoté has distilled his learning into three key characteristics that define great product managers: passion, learning, and humility.
For this talk, he chose to focus on learning. “The best product managers have developed a learning system and learning habits that help them to keep progressing,” said Timoté.
But first, he wanted to go through the usual objections PMs give to justify the lack of time they spend on learning.
Objection #1: I’m too busy
“We can all agree that this is BS,” said Timoté. “One thing we forget is that you don’t need 15 hours a week to learn—you just need 1 hour.”
If you don’t think you can find one hour in your schedule each week for learning, Timoté has a few hacks, including first identifying distractions and then removing them (by deleting social media apps from your phone, for example), making use of any free time you get when a meeting finishes early, or even taking advantage of the time you spend on the toilet. Hey, you know you’re going to be there for a few minutes each day—why not make the most of it?
Objection #2: One hour is too short
If you feel like an hour is too short, remember that a university course is only about 24 hours. Think of all the material you can cover in a university course!
And there’s actually quite a bit you can accomplish during a single hour, including: watching a keynote or two (may we humbly suggest starting out with the Product at Heart video archives?), organizing a lunch and learn session, or reading several short articles such as the ones on the SVPG website.
“The only limit to what you can learn in an hour is your creativity,” said Timoté.
Objection #3: I don’t know where to start
Learning opportunities are everywhere. This means that it doesn’t really matter where you start; it just matters that you get started. And you’ll find something magical: Once you get started, you’ll learn something that will guide you to the next thing you can learn, which will guide you to the next thing, and so on.
A learning roadmap and tips for success
Timoté shared a roadmap to help you plan your next steps: find your unknowns, set goals, prioritize, and put these concepts or skills in practice. The last step is incredibly important, so don’t forget that one!
“If you put the ideas into practice, you’ll get hooked on learning. And then you’ll find it much easier to put the time on your calendar for learning,” said Timoté.
Timoté also shared a few additional tips, which include varying the formats, sharing your learning with others, and to have fun!
To provide a more practical example, Timoté shared how he had divided up his hour of learning over the past week.
And as a final call to action, Timoté asked participants to answer a critical question: What will you learn this week?
In the context of the Product at Heart conference, Timoté asked participants to review the whole day and consider which talk surprised them or taught them something they didn’t know, or perhaps the idea that would have the most impact on their work in the next week. Once they’d narrowed in on a single idea, he asked them to picture what they needed. How would they measure the success of that new knowledge acquisition? Where could they find that information? How would they find an hour in their week to go through it?
And now it’s your turn! Consider how you’d answer Timoté’s questions and what steps you’ll need to take to learn more. And if you’re feeling stuck, maybe just start by exploring more of the Product at Heart resources which we’ve shared below.
Want to dive deeper into Realizing Your Potential as a Product Manager—or any of the topics from Product at Heart? Make sure you check out our blog and video archive!