Aspiring product managers often ask, “What are some great ways to get product manager relevant experience to prepare for a position?”
Since Product Management stands at the intersection of business, technology and user experience and is often a generalist role that varies per organization the best way to get experience is to do the job before you get the job.
This means proactively learning as many product management skills in your current position.
I worked as a software developer in startups before becoming a product manager. Often we’d only have sales and engineering on the initial team so it was easy to learn PM skills such as creating mockups, wireframes, use case documents, specification, roadmaps, project schedules, and taking the time to communicate these across departments from customers, executives, sales, engineering, QA, and Ops. As I gained trust across the departments I was given more product management responsibilities and after proving that I could do the job before getting the job it made for a seamless transition to Product Management.
If you are at a larger company where roles are more defined and you can’t just do the job before you get the job, then align yourself with a Product Manager by conducting an informational interview and asking how you can help them. Yes, sometimes this means you’re doing more than one job but it’s one of the easiest ways to get experience, gain confidence in your skills, network and fake it until you make it.
