Successful Product Manager find a way to get shit done.

More times than not, Product Managers operate in uncharted waters as we search for new and innovative solutions that add value to the users and business.

Sure this sounds cool (it is) but it can also be very hard.

Your products are rarely built in a vacuum with just your team. Oftentimes you have cross-functional dependencies that must be worked through on fly to avoid development delays.

This is where Product Managers who get shit done shine.

We bring people together, talk about problems then identify and execute solutions on a moments notice. This is not “the happy path” of product development, but it is “the path” that PM’s must be prepared (and capable) of traveling on.

Don’t take my word for it, read the snippet from a job description for a Product Manager at Facebook.

“Product Managers work with cross-functional teams of engineers, designers, data scientists and researchers to build products. We are looking for extremely entrepreneurial Product Managers who value moving quickly.”

Two things stand out, you build products and move quickly. I would call this getting shit done.

In a future post I will talk about the relationship between trust and product management (hint: it’s critical). Here I will say that competence is a core component of trust and as a PM your competence is based largely upon the products that you build and the speed at which you move. In other words your ability to get shit done.