Beyond speaking the same language as developers, an engineering background provides three critical PM skills: understanding architectural trade-offs to build trust, applying systems thinking to break down complex problems into achievable parts, and using root-cause analysis to look beyond user symptoms.
For Walmart PM Sanjita Raj, mentorship is a commitment born from not seeing many women in product leadership early in her career. Her goal is not just to offer advice but to actively "make the ladder more visible" for others, showing them a clear and attainable path forward.
A compliance tool flagged for decommissioning was transformed into a strategic asset. The key was modularizing it for different personas and repositioning it from a burdensome tracker to the central hub for portfolio data, which drastically cut duplicate reporting and improved cycle times.
The Goddess Project, which combats period poverty, was launched by applying core product management principles to a real-world problem. Identifying an unmet need, building partnerships, and creating a sustainable distribution model are PM skills that can be powerfully leveraged to drive social change.
For internal tools, don't rely solely on product-led growth. A hybrid approach combines a frictionless product experience with a proactive "sales" strategy of advocating for the tool's potential, constantly proving its value to leadership, and removing friction for users.
A former manager urged Walmart PM Sanjita Raj to leave a role where she knew the products "too well" and was doing "bare minimum innovations." This pivotal moment taught her that comfort is a sign of stagnating learning, a dangerous state for any ambitious product professional.
To overcome leadership resistance to an internal tool, Walmart's PM built prototypes populated with actual production data. This tangible "what if" scenario demonstrated exactly what executives would see and the value they would get, proving far more effective than standard mockups for securing buy-in.