Given the current uncertainties with COVID-19 or Coronavirus, product management becomes difficult. How do you continue to be an effective Product Manager?
Most of us are working from home.
In fact, many new age tech companies have announced permanent work from home for most of their employees.
If you are looking to enter product management during these times, it is best to understand the various aspects of this changed environment.
You may also like to go over 10 easy steps to become a Product Manager.
Coronavirus Management – Work From Home
Work from home may be a common practice in startups, but it is practically unheard of in large, traditional corporates.
But broadly, the challenges that you face will be similar to the ones that everyone else is facing.
As with any situation, it is a Product Manager’s job to take control of the situation and bring clarity.
This is exactly what makes Elon Musk such a good Product Manager.
This is also a good time to get familiar with the OKR Framework.
Learn how to grab opportunities like Warren Buffett!
Pandemic Management – History
The world has faced both pandemics and epidemics every few decades. Be it SARS, MERS, Ebola (recently) or the Spanish Flu (historically).
However, barring the Spanish Flu, none of the recent events spiralled into a global crisis, forcing a majority of companies to mandate work from home for their employees.
Product management becomes especially complicated. In the majority of the companies, people are accustomed to working face-to-face. But what happens when face-to-face is not an option? There is no “Tutorial”, “Guidebook”, etc. available on the internet on what to do during such a crisis.
However, now more than ever, it is necessary to fully understand Agile Methodology.
I have prepared a small list of steps that every Product Manager must follow to remain effective.
Coronavirus Product Manager
To stay on the top of your game, you must keep in mind the following –
- Don’t Forget the Basics
- Set a Schedule
- Follow Your Schedule
- Video Call Your Stakeholders
- Over Communicate
- Use Your Tools
- Set Up Demos/Presentations
- Visualise Delivery Schedule
- Up Skill Yourself
- Remain Product Agnostic
Most of these skills will not only help you remain an effective Product Manager, but they will also help you maintain a healthy work life balance!
Coronavirus Management – Detailed
Let us go over each aspect in detail.
Don’t Forget the Basics
Critical product management skills will always remain necessary.
You already know these skills, but there is no harm in brushing up on them.
Set a Schedule
Fix your routine, step away from your laptop when you need to, have fixed meal timings, and most importantly, fix a time to close out your work day.
Maintaining a healthy work life balance is important because for all you overall well being.
More importantly, a healthy work life balance is the hallmark of an efficient Product Manager who can easily manage his or her time.
Follow Your Schedule
Easier said than done.
You may feel distracted or disoriented. That’s ok.
Don’t be too hard on yourself, take it one day at a time (check out the top 15 benefits of Scrum).
Video Call Your Stakeholders
Video calls significantly enhance user attention.
Maintaining the continuous feedback loop with all stakeholders is very important in product management and project management.
Now, it is more important than ever to learn to influence without authority.
Over Communicate
There is no substitute to good old, crystal clear communication.
You are a PM, communicate like one.
And it is important to err on the side of caution.
Sometimes, things get lost over phone calls. There is no harm in sending an email with whatever was discussed.
When in doubt, simply over communicate.
Communication should be an integral part of every phase of the software development life cycle (SDLC).
Use Your Tools
Maximise use of tools like Jira. As far as possible, eliminate the use of emails and Excels to track progress and monitor things.
There are great tools available out there that do a much better job than emails or spreadsheets.
Check out the full list of top 10 product management tools.
The tools should be an enabler in product management or project management.
The tool should never become a process in itself.
Trello is a great tool that can be used by very small startups. Here are the top differences between Asana vs Trello.
Set Up Demos/Presentations
Your leadership expects frequent updates, don’t forget the KISS principle.
Easy to understand and visually appealing presentations are now more important.
With reduced face to face interactions, it is important for Product Managers to succinctly communicate their ideas through well crafted presentations.
Visualise Delivery Schedule
I cannot emphasise enough the significant benefits of Kanban here.
An easy to understand and visual representation of the deliverables is important to keep distributed teams on the same page.
A Kanban board is a great tool here.
Up Skill Yourself
There will be a new normal when this over.
Check out the list of the top 9 product management courses.
Don’t be left behind. Here is a helpful article.
Remain Product Agnostic
Product management intuition is the need of the hour.
No matter what the product, a Product Manager generally has a great idea of where it is in the product life cycle.
If you feel something is not right based on your experience on another product, then call it out.
Crisis Management – Conclusion
The world is in a confused place. But remember, we are all in it together. Everyone is trying their best. Your scrum team or stakeholders will have more questions. And that’s ok. It is a Product Manager’s job to clear out the confusion and bring clarity. During these times of Coronavirus, product management becomes more important, not less.
Finally, don’t forget your specific job function. In your mind, you should be clear of the differences between a Product Manager and Product Owner, and those between a Product Manager and a Project Manager. If you are clear, it means your stakeholders are clear.
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