Comments on: Product Managers Play Tug-of-War http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/ Software product success. Tue, 22 May 2012 20:46:27 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.4 By: Speaker City » links for 2006-08-02 http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/comment-page-1/#comment-54555 Speaker City » links for 2006-08-02 Thu, 03 Aug 2006 02:24:14 +0000 http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/#comment-54555 [...] Product Managers Play Tug-of-War -Tyner Blain As SVPG points out, product managers will tend to evolve into the activities most valued in their organizations. Combine this with Cooper’s take on the needs of the everyman, and we end up having to devote energy to overcoming organizational bias in ord (tags: productmanagement) [...] [...] Product Managers Play Tug-of-War -Tyner Blain As SVPG points out, product managers will tend to evolve into the activities most valued in their organizations. Combine this with Cooper’s take on the needs of the everyman, and we end up having to devote energy to overcoming organizational bias in ord (tags: productmanagement) [...]

]]> By: Bikram Kumar Gupta http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/comment-page-1/#comment-54391 Bikram Kumar Gupta Fri, 14 Jul 2006 04:34:52 +0000 http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/#comment-54391 Scott, Yes I am pretty clear about it now. Thanks! Scott, Yes I am pretty clear about it now. Thanks!

]]> By: Scott Sehlhorst http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/comment-page-1/#comment-54389 Scott Sehlhorst Fri, 14 Jul 2006 02:33:08 +0000 http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/#comment-54389 Bikram, Thanks for reading and commenting! Best practice is a tough phrase to use when it comes to organizational design. Ultimately, the people running the marketing and product management groups (or group) will have more influence on the success of the company's products than anything else. A single organization with a VP who can manage two distinct sets of objectives (marketing vs. product management) will be just as effective as two separate groups. There is a risk in rolling product management into marketing, that the product manager will become a sales-support role, which is very tactical. For example, product managers shouldn't be focusing on giving demos - they should be consumers of market research, to determine the proper features to include in the product. A collaboration between sales and product management should determine which features to stress in a particular demo. But the demo is a presales function, not product management. Presellers are often customer-savvy technologists reporting into (or cycling through) the engineering department. If I were designing an org, I would absolutely have product management and marketing as separate departments with unique objectives. If I did not have a large enough staff to have two VPs or directors, I would have one person with dual titles, like VP of product marketing / <i>acting</i> VP of product management. This is how I would help to maintain a focus at the top of the org. If at all possible, I would avoid having any of the people who actually "do stuff" from doing both marketing and product management work. Both jobs are so large that doing both would be impractical. Hope that helps, Scott Bikram,

Thanks for reading and commenting!

Best practice is a tough phrase to use when it comes to organizational design. Ultimately, the people running the marketing and product management groups (or group) will have more influence on the success of the company’s products than anything else. A single organization with a VP who can manage two distinct sets of objectives (marketing vs. product management) will be just as effective as two separate groups.

There is a risk in rolling product management into marketing, that the product manager will become a sales-support role, which is very tactical. For example, product managers shouldn’t be focusing on giving demos – they should be consumers of market research, to determine the proper features to include in the product.

A collaboration between sales and product management should determine which features to stress in a particular demo. But the demo is a presales function, not product management. Presellers are often customer-savvy technologists reporting into (or cycling through) the engineering department.

If I were designing an org, I would absolutely have product management and marketing as separate departments with unique objectives. If I did not have a large enough staff to have two VPs or directors, I would have one person with dual titles, like VP of product marketing / acting VP of product management. This is how I would help to maintain a focus at the top of the org. If at all possible, I would avoid having any of the people who actually “do stuff” from doing both marketing and product management work. Both jobs are so large that doing both would be impractical.

Hope that helps,
Scott

]]> By: Bikram Kumar Gupta http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/comment-page-1/#comment-54388 Bikram Kumar Gupta Thu, 13 Jul 2006 17:29:08 +0000 http://tynerblain.com/blog/2006/07/07/product-mgrs-play-tug-of-war/#comment-54388 Scott, this is a very useful piece of writing. For best results, product managers are to be represented in their own Organization. I have an specific query in this context. We know that the sales group in a Company is represented in its own organization, with the Sales head reporting to CEO. What is the best practice w.r.t. Product management and Marketing? Should they be in different organization (like sales), with respective heads reporting to CEO? Or, should they just be in separate organization in the product domain (and not in the Company), reporting to Product/BU head? Which is more effective? Scott, this is a very useful piece of writing. For best results, product managers are to be represented in their own Organization.

I have an specific query in this context. We know that the sales group in a Company is represented in its own organization, with the Sales head reporting to CEO. What is the best practice w.r.t. Product management and Marketing? Should they be in different organization (like sales), with respective heads reporting to CEO? Or, should they just be in separate organization in the product domain (and not in the Company), reporting to Product/BU head? Which is more effective?

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