How do I move from programmer to Product Manager (transfer from everyone to Product manager)

It was a long article, and it took me almost 30 minutes to finish it, and I've seen the longest and most complete article on programmer transformation Product manager ever. Since everyone is a product manager, every day there are many people ask me how to transition to do product manager, transformation Product Manager will encounter what problems, in fact, I have not been able to answer this question, because I am the transition from the operation of the product manager process is too smooth, and the process of transformation has not done much thinking and summary. Until you see this post ... The author has completely recorded his way from product cognition to contact product to transformation product the whole process, as well as product understanding, change of consciousness, mentality change, very complete, heartily admire the author.

Today, we recommend this article to everyone, especially the preparation of transformation and small partners in the transition, I hope to help you, the article is longer, but it is worth a look.

Put down, is a practice

Pick up, is a kind of experience

Write in front

Over the past year, I have completed the role and identity of the transformation, from the most familiar development across to unfamiliar products, from the initial curiosity to the middle of the confusion to the recent a little enlightenment, all the way through, growing up, carrying pen record of my this year mentality, consciousness, thinking of the change, is a summary of the past, a future expectation, I started with technology and went out because of the product.

I understand the product

Speaking of products, or Internet products, I know for the first time that the meaning of this concept should be in 2011, the year the smartphone began to rise, very impressive, That year's Android system was still in the 1.x to 2.x upgrade, that year's iphone is still a distant luxury for me. Also in that year, I began to learn Android development to later learn iOS development, embarked on the road of mobile development, that is, at that time, I started to do mobile app project, at that time, I took the project as a product. At that time, the understanding of the product is shallow, more is to see the interface, with the function, I believe many of the first-entry products will have this stage, the design of a beautiful interface and cool features are thought to be a successful product. That is, from that time, I developed projects, and found themselves on the so-called project design has its own views, and often to the project leader, that is, the product manager to make their own suggestions, I think that is my earliest product feeling, from now on, found themselves on the creation, design a good thing is full of interest in the process, Buried foreshadowing, in the process of development, I began to consciously understand the process, in good development, I began to "do nothing" to learn, to understand what is the design, what is the product. I began to learn from the Web, some industry meetings to learn about the content, and from then on, I began to become more interested in the process, from now on, I know that this process is called product design, the role of the process is called the Product manager, that is, PM (Products manager).

Product manager, sounds a very high-end word, but this manager is not the manager, the product manager has no executive power, no power to dominate the business strategy, the product manager is responsible for the implementation of the business strategy, responsible for defining products, design products, Coordinate all the resources under certain conditions to complete product development and on-line and after-line operation and maintenance. If a product is likened to a child, the product manager is the child's mother. In reality, the product manager's work is far from the high-end itself, product managers need to deal with each product-related issues, product managers need to communicate with the parties to obtain a consensus, need to go to the scene to solve the problem, need to deal with large and small chores, busy with the product related to every scene, so, in the Internet, Great product managers laugh at themselves for products such as Wang or product dogs. In my opinion, the product dog is a commendatory term, it is loyal, loyal to their products, it is diligent, every problem of the product to solve, it is optimistic, every little progress can make it happy, each one of the shortcomings is the impetus for its progress.

The world's best product managers, the brightest stars, jobs is the ultimate spokesperson, his definition and design of the Apple products have changed an era, leading the trend. His harsh, extreme, world-changing beginner's mind has influenced product managers in all areas of the Internet as a classic. Zhang Xiaolong, the father, is familiar with human nature, understand the trend, can be a product to people's lives, hundreds of millions of people pay for it, it is the realm. believe that every product manager has a dream to change the world, but also in this path on the road stumble, after all, change the world is a minority, can change only their own, in the product of the road to cultivate themselves, improve their own, inadvertently may find that they have done a great thing, down-to-earth, looking at the sky, there is a universe At the same time also must have ants diligently.

I switch to do products to now exactly a year, I am located in a start-up company, from the technical product is also a coincidence, this year, from the product point of view, my product road total experience of three stages, is a completely different three stages, this way, my mentality, consciousness, thinking are undergoing change, or transformation, Along with the hardships and the way not to give up toughness, in general, in the sense of thinking I experienced engineering thinking, functional thinking, product thinking three stages. Thinking determines mentality and action, documenting my transformation.

Phase One: Engineering thinking

Since October 2014, I began to formally make products, from the beginning of that period of about three months, I do product thinking is more technical and systematic perspective, I define this stage for the engineering thinking stage. Why do you say that, because when I design the product, the first starting point is the technical implementation level, through the ease of implementation and system perspective to define products and design products. One of the biggest drawbacks of doing this is to get out of the "real", which I'm talking about is not the actual "reality" of technology implementation, but the need and the actual scenario. Easy to become designed to design, I believe that the students do technology will have a feeling, when received a demand, the first is from the existing engineering structure and expand the angle to consider, a requirement or a function of the implementation of the first factor is the compatibility of existing systems and the extent of ease of extension. This is a very normal thinking, because I am the same. But from another perspective, the value of a demand is not in its own technology is difficult, but whether it solves the problem of product users, if a requirement is defined as a technical product, then we are doing a scientific task, on the contrary, the product is a business task. So, when I first switched from technical mode to product mode, for quite some time I was thinking through technology definition and design products, this time the product out of the real scene, away from the user needs, I began to rethink.

Product output under engineering thinking is more like an industrial production than an output that can solve real problems from a human perspective. It is a technical product or scientific research, away from the actual needs and scenarios, and finally found that such products into the market is almost unusable, this is a very serious problem. Engineering thinking mode, the lack of user awareness, of course, not to mention the user experience. The problem is not bad, terrible is not found the problem, found the problem after I began to solve the problem, so I gradually into the second phase.

Stage Two: Functional thinking

I found that the product work under the engineering thinking is not satisfactory, so I began to think consciously, how to analyze and understand the requirements, how to transform a requirement into a function for the user by means of technology. This is my second phase, functional thinking, which lasted nearly half a year, when I began to realize that the product was ultimately delivered to the user, and all the design process was to translate a business requirement into a specific feature under a specific scenario. Each feature has a complete business logic and functional experience.

Fortunately, at this time I began to stand on the user's point of view to design products, a business needs into a technology can realize the function, so I began to think around the function, every need or optimization I start from a functional perspective, how to make users better use, What information should be displayed and so on, I focus on the functional experience and visual experience, began to learn a variety of excellent product design in the market, so I in the premise of the product availability to fall into a functional design circle. Will begin to consider the possibilities of the feature experience in order to complete a requirement, focusing on the product functionality itself, ignoring its business objectives and business value. And, at this time I found that a product from the business strategy to the final landing products on-line, during not only a technical product, but also business definition, the whole business process design and so on, the product has always been in parallel with the business development, the real good product should achieve product-driven business, in the product design process I neglected the interaction with the business This includes product operations and business operations on-line, which form a holistic set of products to support the operation of a product. And do products are aware that the communication and agreement with the parties actually accounted for a large part of the work of the product. Once again, my mind was opened to focus on the business, about the product strategy and definition, about the business goals that the product needed to achieve, to think more about the business goal of the function under the premise of ensuring a correct function, and not to marry for the purpose of bullying, Product designs that do not aim at achieving business goals are all nonsense.

Functional thinking of product output with a certain degree of feasibility, because of its actual needs, in the functional thinking I have the entire mobile app product functional design has a deep understanding, from information architecture to product interaction design and part of the visual design have formed their own thinking mode. At the same time, I began to stand in the business of thinking about the product, the product exactly what the business objectives, and product-related aspects of how to define and design to ensure that the final product output is available, so, I gradually entered the third stage.

Stage Three: Product thinking

Product thinking is also my current stage, at this stage I focus more on business value and business objectives, to fully understand the premise of business strategy to complete the product definition and product design, through a full understanding of the product around the business scene to improve product usability and ease of use, Improve the business experience and product experience to improve the overall user experience. Return to the essence of the product. In product thinking, I understand that the process of the product beyond engineering and function, but also covers the project and function, it is because of the first two stages, so I have the whole process of the product and every detail have a further understanding and understanding. Driven by product awareness and product thinking, I define the product stage in the early stages to fully understand the business and clearly define the business objectives to measure how quickly it is implemented under the current product environment and available resources. A great deal of communication is required during the period, with the business, operations, design, technology and other relevant functions of the company and so on. On the basis of consensus and feasibility, we will start to further detailed design work.

Product thinking can actually greatly simplify the product work, in the idea of carding and division of labor in collaboration compared to the efficiency of the great improvement. The whole product system is divided into strategic layer, scope layer, structure layer, frame layer and presentation layer from bottom to top. The bottom level of the strategy determines what the business and product need to achieve, why people and what the scene service, the scope layer needs to define clearly on the basis of the existing strategy to achieve the strategic objectives, the structural layer needs to complete the basic information architecture and interaction design based on the content of the scope layer, the framework layer to complete the interface design we can see , the presentation layer is a visual representation designed to make the product look more friendly. A complete product definition and design process need to go through each stage from bottom to top, missing a certain stage will lead to incomplete products, focus on a certain stage will also lead to product imbalance, so the product manager needs to find the balance of the point. But in terms of importance, the farther down, the greater the importance.

Product thinking is also a very important part of the design of business processes, product managers for the final product quality and user experience is responsible for the design before the need to consider the product from design to development to the end of the need to go through the use of the process, and who need to cooperate with. For example, the product needs data preparation, in the product design phase need to agree with the data provider, to ensure that the product on-line data preparation is OK, such as the need for operational intervention product design, need to invite operators to participate in the early stage of communication, to ensure that the overall business process and product links are clear enough and understanding of the consistent, In order to make the final product on-line when everyone's collective force to ensure that the product can operate efficiently, rather than the product unilaterally think and define and then deliver to downstream partners, which will lead to product and business disconnect. Therefore, product thinking needs to consider the integrity of the details at the same time, the mind to install business, operation, design, research and development, the process is very tired, but also enough to let people grow. Good products at the same time, but also do their own.

My Product methodology

Throughout the Internet product industry, I belong to the new product, need to learn and master the things there are many, in this dare not talk, only their own understanding of the record down. During this year's cultivation process, I slowly formed my own set of products to do the method, to share, is to accept critical suggestions and discuss with you. Products and technology, need to through continuous learning and accumulation coupled with continuous thinking to break the bureau, so for me, this is a re-learning and breakthrough journey, like the original learning technology, learning, understanding, mastery, collation, thinking, breakthrough. The following five points are five key steps in the process of making a product:

Define Product Strategy

Defining a product strategy needs to be based on business strategy, I understand the business strategy and product strategy is slightly different, the goal of the business strategy is to maximize the interests of the Organization, and the goal of the product strategy is to maximize the interests of users, in order to ensure that the business strategy around the premise of the implementation of the product strategy. Therefore, the definition of a product strategy needs to be based on a full understanding of the business strategy. This needs to be from the top of the organization, that is, the organization of business strategy-makers to obtain the information, in the most complete state of business strategy to fully understand the definition. The next step is to develop a product strategy based on a complete definition of business strategy.

An organization or company may have multiple product lines, there will be a product strategy, but there is only one business strategy, all product strategies are designed to achieve this business strategy. Define the product strategy needs to analyze clearly the target user who is the product, where the use of the scene, the key resources is what, of course, the most important thing is the product to solve the user what problem, if you want to use a word to answer what is the product strategy, I summed up is: "We use what method for who solves a problem." The "we" here is the organization, is the team, "what method" refers to our core business, is the service, "who" refers to our target user, is the customer, "what problem" refers to the core demand, is the scene. This process does not need to use any tools or special methods, only to achieve organizational and team understanding of the consensus, through the text can be recorded, the key is to think clearly. By defining the key issues, the answer is clear and you can go to the next step and complete the business process.

Grooming Business Processes

Grooming business processes requires a clear definition of the product strategy. Business processes are designed around product strategic objectives, requiring clear business objectives and the most streamlined design of the process around the target. In this process, the key is to define business objectives, clear business objectives to achieve what purpose, and then further process design. The process of grooming a business process involves taking into account what key roles are involved throughout the business process, what are the key actions of those roles, what key information is included in the business process, and how the flow of information between roles is defined. Once you have defined your business goals, key roles and actions, and key information, you can use a flowchart to express the design of your business processes graphically. Flowchart of the drawing will not be described, there are many methods, the key is to identify the business process design of the three key links.

In the process of combing the business process, it is necessary to define clearly what needs to be involved and handled, and what needs to be handled by the technology, so that a complete business process is clearly defined, where the boundaries of the technical product are, and the resources outside the boundaries need to be coordinated. At the same time, the entire process needs to be fully communicated with the parties to ensure that the design of the business process in the existing resource environment is feasible, but also with the research and development team on the technical products in the business process of the role and definition of the full communication, to ensure that the existing technology is feasible. In general, the process of combing the business process is a feasible business operation process designed by the product manager to achieve the product strategic goal under the existing resources.

Product prototype design

After the business process is clear, you can begin the design of the product prototype. Product prototyping includes information architecture design, functional design, interactive design and visual design. The product manager first needs to define the product information architecture, produce a complete product information structure, and then start the functional design based on the understanding of the business process, the purpose of which is to meet the design of the business process, so there is a functional design after the business process design. Product function design to ensure the adoption of the minimum principle, we are using the principle of minimization of the feasibility, that is, the MVP (Minimum viable Product) principle, which is a concept of lean entrepreneurship, about what is the MVP what is lean entrepreneurship everyone can go to understand, I think it's a very good set of business and product design practices.

After the definition of function is interactive design and visual design, in large companies may have a dedicated interaction designers and visual designers, but I think, product managers need to have a relatively strong interaction design ability and visual aesthetic ability, said that need to have interactive design capabilities, Because the pre-defined business process definition and functional definition are directly involved in the product manager, and the most understandable and direct into a technical product of the non-product manager is the most appropriate, but this is what I think is a more efficient way, of course, depending on the actual situation of the organization, such as large companies are more than a small number of workers, But the disadvantage is inefficient. As a start-up company, I strongly advocate that product managers need to perform functional and interactive design, and finally produce functional interaction diagrams, which is called low-fidelity design. Of course, this process can be communicated with the designers, to draw professional advice. The reason that product managers need visual aesthetic ability, is finally by the visual designer to improve the high-fidelity design, but a good product manager I think is able to distinguish what is good design and bad design, and the user's first sense is from the presentation layer, that is, see the interface and use of the function.

Product prototyping process can be used in a lot of tools, I used to have Apple keynote, use it to make product interface prototype fast and beautiful, interactive design logic with simple text plus line markers to mark jump relationship can, of course, there are a lot of tools to choose and use, do not repeat. This step should be able to produce a so-called PRD, the reason is that the so-called PRD is because I think the start-up companies do not have to get a large set of documents to explain, PRD the purpose is to record the entire design output, as well as the business parties and research and development team input material, to describe clear, facilitate business and technical understanding. This is also the core of lean entrepreneurship, do not do unnecessary things, simple and direct, to achieve the goal.

Communication and coordination resources

After completion of product strategy definition, business process carding, product prototyping design, entered the design implementation of the landing phase, this phase is mainly communication and resource coordination work. At the same time, the design output needs to be fine-tuned and prioritized. This stage is a test of the product manager's priority and communication and coordination skills. Everyone in the team's way of thinking and perspective, how to make everyone in the understanding of the agreement is a vast project, communication skills in the middle of play a very crucial role. Communication with the business can not completely use the product technology thinking, and technical communication can not be fully used business thinking, so, product managers play a connecting link for information transmission of the key role. Ensure that technical products can be completed within limited resources and time, while ensuring business objectives.

Communication is about finding the right person and paying attention to the order of communication. Clarify the purpose of communication and then find the most critical role that can solve the problem, if the wrong person pays the time and energy and then does not have the result. After finding the right people, you have to determine the order of communication, to ensure that things go smoothly and the problem is resolved quickly, it is important to define a sequence of communication, in general, I follow the problem phase to determine the order of communication, such as in the problem definition phase, need and problem-makers and related decision-making definition person to complete the problem definition, After the problem is clearly defined, the specific solution is fully communicated to the resource parties that match the solution, and then the implementation of the solution is consistent with the understanding of the parties. Ensure the direct and efficient communication, avoid duplication of communication and communication is not in place.

In the communication and coordination of this link, the product manager must not be afraid of trouble, important things to say three times, communication, communication, communication, is very important!

Validate Product Improvements

After the above four steps, the product can be on-line, this time need to monitor the operation and the actual operation of the product, in-depth on-site understanding of the problem, back to the timely summary and formulate improvement programs. This is the verification link in Lean entrepreneurship, the previous design to some extent can be said to be a priori design, on-line after the actual operation of the need to reverse the verification of business and products, which is why before the MVP design reasons, because the earlier design more simple later verification of the cost of improvement is less, Good products are polished in the process of continuous verification and improvement, without a one-time complete design.

In the process of validating and improving the product, I think the most important part is to go to the scene, go to the place where the business takes place, go to the user, experience the product in the actual scene, discover the problem and develop the solution. Avoid receiving second-hand information, which can mislead product managers into making judgments. To improve the product, it can be combined with each node in the business process, it is important to find the site, go to the scene, define the problem in the field, come back to develop solutions, quick verification, quick trial and error, rapid improvement.

Written in the last

In the past year, I completed a transformation, from a professional technical personnel to product personnel, technology let me get started, see the details of the industry, products let me go out, let me see a broader space. This process did not go through detours, experienced the beginning of curiosity, longing, to the halfway of the confusion, self-denial, excessive to the present slowly enlightened and truly understand the product. Human growth is a process, spring sowing autumn can harvest, recall this process feel more is harvest and growth. My product career has just begun, the road is very long, I will insist on this road go down, walk well, walk beautiful! These are some of my personal summary, does not represent any point of view. Put down, is a kind of practice, cherish and farewell to the past, pick up, is a kind of experience, is the confidence and anticipation of the future.

That's what I'm talking about, not necessarily all right!

How do I move from programmer to Product Manager (transfer from everyone to Product manager)