(2022-04-26) Are You Doing Product Management Or Bullshit Management

David Pereira: Are You Doing Product Management or Bullshit Management? Product professionals become powerless because they are not the ones calling the shots. Top management believes in knowing best what to do and expecting product people to follow their orders. In reality, you start doing bullshit management instead of product management. At some point it becomes a Bullshit Job.

Be careful! What companies say and do often go in opposite directions.

I’m shocked by how opinions and hierarchy drive business. I wonder if leaders hire Product Managers to do product management or bullshit management

As companies grow, it gets more political and less Agile. Sometimes instead of figuring out which end-users problems are worth solving, it matters most to please critical stakeholders. That’s the moment you may descend from a Product Manager to a Backlog Owner or Story Writer. In such scenarios, pleasing stakeholders is more advantageous to your career than improving end-users lives.

I look at job advertisements

It’s sad to see many misconceptions already in the job ads.

Good product management is about having a vision and testing many small ideas with little funds and gradually increasing them as you get objective evidence. The goal is to reach your vision but embrace experiments to uncover hidden opportunities.

When I read Product Managers’ job descriptions with requirements like these, I know we have a lot of opportunities. It may be challenging to help companies implement sound product management practices but rewarding

Bullshit Management

I call bullshit management when you spend your time doing things unrelated to product management

what makes great Product Managers: Leading teams to create value for end-users and businesses by identifying significant problems to solve and uncovering unexplored potential.... She is not a boss but a leader the team follows.

if you’re doing something unrelated, you are potentially doing bullshit management. Here are some common signs:

• Gathering requirements from stakeholders
• Keeping an extensive Product Backlog
• Preparing frequent performance reports
• Striving for consensus
• Attending several meetings just to avoid pissing off critical stakeholders.
• Fear of saying no to pointless requests because your boss may get an e-mail.
• Prioritizing features based on opinions instead of learning from end-users.

Escaping from Bullshit Management

Stakeholders will push you to implement the features they want. Before making any decision, you can ask some questions, for example:

• Could you help me understand how this feature relates to our goal?
• Which evidence would you have this feature solves our users’ problems?

If they insist without evidence, it’s your role to insist on objective evidence. Opinions shouldn’t drive product teams.

Everyone loves security, and nothing better than having a step-by-step plan for everything ahead of you. Stakeholders will push for prescriptive plans and commitment to deadlines. Don’t fall into this trap

Solid product management has little to do with plans. Don’t focus on plans; put your energy into defining where to land and your first step towards it.

See also (2024-03-10) Lenny Interviews Cagan On Product Management Theater.