Pivot to Product like your life depends on it - because it does...
As a participant in the modern workforce, I NEED to get a job that can help me move up socioeconomically, so that I'm not left poor and desperate.
It’s Getting Ugly Out There
Conditions are getting scary in the job marketplace. I hate to break it to you - those in the ancillary roles at their company are at risk of getting fired.
I’ve been at companies where the purge goes down, and morale gets crushed - people start wondering if they’re next. Adding inflation into the mix, even if you keep your job - I can almost guarantee this year’s raise won’t keep pace with inflation.
These are events you have to consider as you plan your career.
You need to protect yourself from getting fired.
You need to protect yourself from inflation
You need to protect yourself from being a tool in someone else’s machine.
I faced this earlier in my career as an account manager. I remember waiting an extra 4 months to have the meeting just to get my “Promised” promotion and a $3k raise. I remember being told to be “Happy I had a job” when I dared asked for 1 day remote a week.
I remember what it felt like to be treated as an afterthought - required to have a boss/nanny looking over my cube shoulder day in and day out.
This pain of being someone else’s underling hurt like hell. I couldn’t take it, and I quickly realized I had to get out of where I was in the workforce. It was in this negative space I discovered a career that would change my life. Out at a happy hour as I aired my grievances about everything wrong with how my companies software worked, I had a fateful friend lean over and ask with a half-smile:
“You know there’s a role where making those decisions is literally your job?”
We spent the next two hours talking about his career where you got paid like a software engineer, but instead of coding, you called the shots. Better yet, unlike banking - where they had worked before - there was a true meritocracy. Prove you could deliver and you’d get more money, resources, and responsibility. Hell, they showed me a $100,000 bonus check after a particularly good quarter...
It’s the job that brought you to this blog in the first, and a job that has been very… VERY good to me in my career.
Enter Product Management
My friend I shared a drink with that night, referenced in articles past as purple belt, was my man on the inside. They helped me scheme and execute my way through the modern workforce until one day I talked a company into giving me a shot as a product manager.
I was not an engineer.
I didn’t get an MBA.
But I was hungry, and very strategically put myself in the position to succeed. Now in Product for the better part of a decade, the perks of the role have kicked in.
I make hundreds of thousands of dollars base salary
I typically see multiple five-figure bonuses a year - and I’ve got performance incentives where if I had a home run, that becomes 6
If/when my current company sells, I stand to have a damn good day
I work fully remote. It says it in my contract. I’m never going back into an office
I average at least 3 recruiters trying to entice me to a different company every week
I get to come up with new ideas, turn them into product POC, and see if they actually sell in the marketplace
Due to big wins, have twice skipped the expected “Wait” time to be promoted.
I quite literally ignore emails and people every day - and I’m encouraged to do this more! My time is considered more valuable than others, and I’m treated as such by my co-workers.
I’m quite serious when I say the perks are great but truth is, theres one aspect of role I like more than anything else.
Trust, and Respect.
My current company hired me to OWN the part of the business I’m responsible for (I’ve built the team from scratch). The beauty of product work is that it is all-encompassing. I’m involved in every business aspect of my product. If it suceeds, I win and get a cut of its profits. Of course, that means it fails I’m helf accountable - some great motivation.
My employer wants to see results, and all that matters is I deliver.
They don’t care if I decide to stop working at noon on Friday
They don’t care if I’m calling into a meeting from the backseat of an Uber.
They care about the Profit and Loss statement. If that goes up, I get the luxuries above befitting of a rainmaker.
Unlike earlier in my career, its not even possible to micro-manage me day in and day out. Why? I am the expert who knows how things actually work. Product managers get hired by executive teams to be in the weeds so they don’t have to.
Why to not be a Product Manager
I want to help you break into a career that has given me so much.
But I must warn you, Product Management is not for everyone.
If your “product curious” you really need to think deep if the career is for you. It’s not for the weak - success in the career means more power and control over the company and its resources. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.
You should not work in Product if you cannot get a read for people (Low EQ) . A product manager has to interface with every team in the business - you have to be able to understand their needs - stated and unstated - along with managing their expectations. This is more art than science.
You should not work in product if you can’t multitask. You will have multiple priorities, and multiple features in development in parallel You need to be able to track these disparate activities either in your head or well-developed system.
You should not work in product if you can’t think like a builder. You do not need to code, but your most important collaborators are software developers. Devs operate on a level of respect - they have to believe you're leading them in the right direction to have their support. Many a product manager have failed because they could not grasp basic engineering principles and limitations. A major part of the job is to be able to understand and communicate engineering truths to a mass audience.
A product manager is a man in the middle of the engineers and salespeople. If any of the above give you pause, look into becoming a developer of account executive.
Pivot to Product - where the next Generation of CEOs come from
There is no job better prep you to run a business than product management.
In fact, many of the modern tech CEO were product managers at some point on their way to the top.
Do you want to make the Pivot to Product and get paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, working remote, building the future?
If the answer is yes, today’s the day to start taking it seriously.
Take the first step. Join my paid substack to get the best, insider info on how you can break into a career as a product manager, no matter where you are today.
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