The Product Owner role, as often implemented in Agile frameworks, is focused on delivery and backlog management. It typically lacks the core business ownership, customer interaction, and go-to-market responsibilities that define true product management.
Despite the industry's obsession with AI, product executives are primarily concerned with connecting product initiatives to revenue, margin, and profit. They are being held accountable for financial results, a significant shift from the previous era of growth-at-all-costs.
As leaders face pressure to justify investments, PMs must be able to calculate and articulate the business return on their team's cost. This involves a back-of-the-envelope understanding of team salaries and development expenses versus the financial impact of their work.
Product Management's core responsibility is to drive the business growth of a product by delivering profitable customer value. Technical skills and building are means to an end, not the end itself. This business focus remains constant even as tools like AI change.
Product initiatives often seem disconnected from company goals because teams struggle to articulate their work in terms of business impact. This forces executives to pay a 'translation tax' to justify product investments to the board and C-suite, undermining the product team's credibility.
Product leaders believe their teams lack the fundamental skills and knowledge to connect product plans to business outcomes. It's not just about how they present information, but about whether they've done the core thinking to make the connection in the first place.
Top-performing senior PMs often fail as directors because they try to be 'super PMs.' The director role is not about making all the decisions, but about creating the operating system—the processes, talent, and leverage—that enables the team to consistently deliver results.
Career advancement isn't about waiting for a new title to start taking on more responsibility. To move from Director to VP, for instance, you need to already be operating at a VP level. The title and compensation often follow the demonstrated capability.