lmckeogh's posterous

Can Anyone Really Rank Product Management Skills?

Last week I had proposed a session for ProductCamp Austin called the “Product of You.” Having been on the job hunt for the better part of a year I have learned a thing or two about the process. My goal was to tie these learnings back to product management where I was my own product and the companies I applied to as the customer that might purchase that product.

Good product management, as you know, is to understand your customers and their needs. With that in mind I created a quick survey and solicited other product managers to rank order 13 very broad product management skill sets. The breadth was purposeful in order to allow input from as many product managers possible without regard for product, market, company size, or seniority.

Ultimately I got 19 responses. I quickly realized I was in trouble. While the information was good it raised more questions in my mind. I am sure it would do so in my intended audience’s as well. At the last minute I decided to not give the session. I did however say I would publish the results.

So, keeping my word, here are the results and my thoughts on them:

Macro View
Below is a weighted summation of the responses for each trait. Either end of the spectrum is pretty clear. The number one trait desired for a product manager is Business Acumen. The least necessary trait is Project Estimation (13) followed closely by Product Support (12).
Pmsurveyrslts
The interesting part is in the middle (#2 – 11). Several participants commented on the difficulty of ranking these traits. My intention was to not try and split hairs but to create a picture of what a prospective hiring manager would value. You can really see the difficulty mentioned. A single vote change one way or other for several traits would result in a different ranking.

I think everyone would agree that all of the traits are necessary. However, the actual ranking was probably influenced by the daily or weekly activities. This was a snapshot. I fully expect that if the participants retook the survey next week there would be a different picture.

So while that was interesting, digging into the data revealed different trends within each category.

Micro View
Again, it is the clearer at the ends of the spectrum but within each category there is quite a spread of responses.The sparkline graphs next to each category below indicate the spectrum of responses (without going into the numbers).

Pmsurveyrslts3
First off, Business Acumen responses were all pushed to the left hand or higher scored side. It is easy to see why it came in the top spot. Conversely, Project Estimation responses were pushed to the right or lower scored side. Product Support had a similar grouping but was more dispersed causing it to edge out Project Estimation for the 12th position. Again, you will notice that the only consensus in the middle is that there is not consensus. I see this as a good indication why the philosophical debates on various topics keep coming around. The light blue bars indicate the top values within each catagory. Looking at Domain Knowledge this got identified as the #2 and #3 top item by the same number of people that voted for it at #11. Then there were a few that ranked it slightly lower in between. Any wonder why this debate arises every 6 weeks? Risk Identification and Management at #8 had almost the converse type of profile. This debate probably doesn't come up though because it is not a qualifier for many positions.

Summary
It would have been nice to use this information to finally put a stake in the ground. Unfortunately, I think these skills are going to be in flux for any organization and its hiring manager depending on the needs of the day. 

If you'd like the raw data, I have it available in spreadsheet format.  Let me know and I can make it available.