I’m a product manager of backend/platform/microservices - how do I make myself useful?
I’m a product manager on a scrum team of a component in a microservices architecture. I created a poll last night which seems to have proven I may be useless. Link: https://us.teamblind.com/s/ERyJDapF
I want to change that. How can I be useful as a microservice/backend/platform product manager?
I have 2 years experience as a softeware engineer and a degree in computer science. Though other product managers on the platform don’t even have technical backgrounds sometimes. They just run aorund creating stories for the tech lead.
I’ve read Inspired and Lean Product Playbook but not sure if the advice applies here. Marty Cagan did say in a talk though that platform product management is the hardest form of product management and you’re there to help the engineers.
I’m on two scrum teams. One is the legacy system and one is the new modernization platform. On the legacy system I feel more confident. I get to make a lot of decisions on testing strategy, not hard coding values, not making the legacy system more complex, etc. But on the new modernizaition platform, I’m lost. My day to day consistents of scrum ceremonies (refinement sprint planning sprint demos retrospective), going around all day with the tech lead to alignment and unblocking meetings and creating a story if needed.
I’m thinking I create customer surveys for other components on the microservices on how to improve our components APIs, make it easy to use, etc.
What do you all think?
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You also should ultimately define what success looks like for your platform -- this will provide clarity to your eng team. Think about two categories of metrics: business success metrics (usually a lagging indicator), and user experience metrics (usually a leading or predictive indicator of business success).
If I were you I'd start by conducting face-to-face (or Zoom these days) interviews with my users -- in-person interviews might not be scalable but they help you read the non-verbal emotions and frustrations (or joys!) of your users. Prep for the interview with a couple of well-formed questions beforehand. In the next two weeks plan to talk to at least 5-10 different users. Then to augment that, put together surveys to send to a larger group of users periodically.
You don't want to be a program manager masquerading as a product manager.
What is their vision for where the platform should be? How does the platform fit into your company's overall business goals? How are they defining business success?
Ultimately you need to make sure your business stakeholders are aligned on vision and expectations -- and if not, you want to be the one to help create that alignment. Building this alignment will also provide a channel for helping to advocate for your engineering team's needs.
I’m thinking of conducting consumer surveys and capturing metrics and using that to pivot to a user facing role
I see your point, but I have a different opinion. I'm an infra PM and I love it.
I would agree with you that infra PMs face the high risk of having no visibility in addition to facing the risk of being pigeon-holed into a technical PgM role.
Yet, a good infra PM should be able to clearly tell the story of how his/her infra maps to the external-facing business/product. A strong infra PM can & should have a massive multiplier effect across several products, and as a result should be able to contribute as much (if not much much more) to the business than an app user facing PM.
For me, I make sure I build strong relationships with the PMs of the external facing GUI products that consume my infra so that I can understand how I am helping their product succeed.
I am then able to communicate my infra's impact to the business by being clear about what user-facing product & business metrics we have driven across multiple products.
2. Talk to the engineers, prioritize pain points, find ways to make their lives easier so they will do #1.