Joseph Cherian
Career Milestones
Organization and You
Core Competencies
Go to food for thought
Favorite Products
What accomplishment in your product management career has brought you the highest level of satisfaction and joy? Can you narrate why?
Solving problems with multiple teams such as Sales, Operations etc at HappyLocate while the company is going through a crucial funding round.
What aspect of product management did you struggle the most with? How did you overcome it?
Balancing requirements from stakeholders. The way I overcame it was to take a data driven approach, calculating ROI of everything in the backlog.
What's one common myth about product management that you find common among aspiring PMs.
One common myth is that you need to be technical to become a PM. While it is beneficial to have an understanding of technology, you can overcome it by having the sufficient skills in business, UI / UX etc.
What are some common pitfalls that product managers must be aware of?
A HiPPO, or “highest-paid person in the room’s opinion” can skew a logical prioritisation of products or features
If not product management, what career would you have picked? Are there any complimentary skillsets that you see between being a PM and your alternate choice?
Software Sales. As a PM in a SaaS company there have been times when I have had to go on Sales calls. Some of the skills I built as a PM help relate to customers needs and identify (and sell) features that can be beneficial to them and connect the same to their business model.
What is something about product management that you wish you knew when you started out?
How valuable Digital Marketing and analytics skills are to a PM. I would have spent more time learning about SEO, SEM, Google Analytics etc.
What accomplishment in your product management career has brought you the highest level of satisfaction and joy? Can you narrate why?
Solving problems with multiple teams such as Sales, Operations etc at HappyLocate while the company is going through a crucial funding round.
What aspect of product management did you struggle the most with? How did you overcome it?
Balancing requirements from stakeholders. The way I overcame it was to take a data driven approach, calculating ROI of everything in the backlog.
What's one common myth about product management that you find common among aspiring PMs.
One common myth is that you need to be technical to become a PM. While it is beneficial to have an understanding of technology, you can overcome it by having the sufficient skills in business, UI / UX etc.
What are some common pitfalls that product managers must be aware of?
A HiPPO, or “highest-paid person in the room’s opinion” can skew a logical prioritisation of products or features
If not product management, what career would you have picked? Are there any complimentary skillsets that you see between being a PM and your alternate choice?
Software Sales. As a PM in a SaaS company there have been times when I have had to go on Sales calls. Some of the skills I built as a PM help relate to customers needs and identify (and sell) features that can be beneficial to them and connect the same to their business model.
What is something about product management that you wish you knew when you started out?
How valuable Digital Marketing and analytics skills are to a PM. I would have spent more time learning about SEO, SEM, Google Analytics etc.