Once you get right into a senior product supervisor position, one among your key duties is to mentor and handle your junior product managers. Not solely does this assist them develop their expertise and experience, but it surely additionally ensures that your staff is continually bettering and rising.
I do know this — I imagine every individual has a singular persona, and we must always method mentoring and managing based mostly on the understanding that there’s no common reality on easy methods to do it. Having stated so, on this article I‘d prefer to share my experiences and classes realized. I used to be additionally requested just lately about this — so I made a decision to write down down my solutions.
I need to admit — I don’t have the “proper” or “full” reply to the query within the headline. It’s as a result of I’m on a continuing journey and nonetheless studying easy methods to mentor and handle junior product managers.
Among the recommendation you’re about to learn may appear trivial at first, and also you could be inquisitive about easy methods to implement my recommendation in your day by day routines. With this in thoughts, I shall clarify and supply examples, and I might love your suggestions and questions.
With out ready any longer, listed here are some factors I realized:
A lot of the product work and effectivity relies on belief that the product supervisor (PM) creates with inner stakeholders and, in a while, the purchasers. Set your PMs up for fulfillment by mapping the group — roles, duties, strengths, and weak factors of every division alongside the extra “standard” studying supplies relating to the product, and so on.
Create a 4-week onboarding schedule. What materials he ought to learn, who your PM ought to discuss to, and the goals of those duties. Encourage your PM to be extremely partaking and work to grasp the ache factors of the folks he’ll encounter.
I recommend assembly with every junior product supervisor, and go over their potential scripts for his or her introductions. Additionally ask your junior PMs to write down down their impressions and takeaways from every of the introductions.
The plain factor to do is to set clear expectations and targets in your PMs. This consists of outlining their duties, defining what success seems to be like, and offering them with a roadmap for attaining their targets.
There’s a delicate steadiness between micromanaging and setting clear expectations. You shouldn’t micromanage every activity, since you need to domesticate PMs with a way of independence and a mindset for progress.
Don’t neglect that you could be clear with the junior PMs in regard to your expectations.
Lately, managing has change into a mentor’s sport. It’s a really optimistic shift, for suggestions is important for progress and improvement.
Present to your junior product managers constructive suggestions frequently, in regard to their efficiency, highlighting areas the place they excel and others the place they should enhance.
Be certain to additionally present them with particular examples and actionable steps they will take to enhance. It’s important to offer suggestions on the great and the dangerous, and be very straight concerning the studying curve and the place you assume the PM is at present at.
Product administration is a always evolving area, and it’s important to encourage your junior product managers to remain up-to-date with the newest developments and greatest practices.
Please allow them to attend trade occasions, learn trade publications, and experiment with new strategies and techniques.
Collaboration is important for product administration success, and fostering a tradition of collaboration inside your staff is significant.
Encourage your junior product managers to work intently with different staff members and supply alternatives for them to collaborate with different departments inside the firm.
As a senior product supervisor, you’re a job mannequin in your junior product managers. Lead by instance, and show the abilities and behaviors that you just need to see in your staff members. This consists of being proactive, speaking successfully, and being open to suggestions and criticism.
Present your junior product managers with alternatives for progress and improvement. This might embrace attending conferences or coaching applications, taking up new duties, or main tasks.
Please encourage them to stretch themselves, tackle new challenges, and provides them the help they should succeed.
When you’re not an impartial contractor (IC), you’re measured in your staff’s work, so it is best to credit score the staff for his or her dedication.
I’ve usually witnessed impartial contractors flip into staff leaders. Different instances, I’ve witnessed newly appointed staff managers wrestle to undertake the “credit score the staff” idea. In the event you can keep away from it, don’t let this example occur to you. As an alternative, remember the fact that crediting your junior product managers can construct belief and credibility amongst your staff.
Mentoring and managing junior product managers is a vital duty for senior product managers. Whereas there’s no common reality on easy methods to do it — making a ‘tailor-made for belief’ onboarding, setting clear expectations and targets, offering common suggestions, encouraging studying and experimentation, fostering a tradition of collaboration, main by instance, and offering alternatives for progress and improvement are all important parts.
It’s vital to keep in mind that as a senior product supervisor, you’re a job mannequin in your staff members, and giving them credit score for his or her work and dedication goes a good distance in direction of constructing a thriving staff. Bear in mind to be affected person, adaptable, and all the time attempt for steady enchancment.
