How to Advance Your Career As a Product Manager

What was your Job Hunting Experience prior to Joining Product Gym?

I started searching on my own on how to get into product management, and I was looking at different ways to augment my knowledge and get credentials essentially to understand. I did apply to several roles, but I didn’t really know the official processes. I learned a lot of things by reading articles, but it was pretty fragmented for me in my head. The articles were pretty good, but I was like “how does this relate to that?” I was doing a bit of homework, but Product Gym consolidated the knowledge and put it in my head.

What was the Biggest Challenge you had to Overcome during your Job Hunt?

The most difficult things were accepting that I’m not as technical as I thought. As an industrial engineer, I saw myself as technical, but for a software firm, that does not have much value. The coding that I did know was not enough for me to be a technical program manager, so I decided to stop applying to some of those roles because I’m way in over my head for those. While I can answer questions that are very core to product management, such as: frameworks, prioritization, product marketing, and working with UX designers and engineers, I can confidently handle all that because that’s what I did. But, I needed to change my tactic and cast a wider net, not be picky and just apply wherever and learn from those interviews.

What are Some Words of Encouragement you have for Other PM Job Hunters?

I think what is truly important is you need to have a system and discipline because when you’re applying for roles, it’s a seasonal job; you don’t do it all the time, so you tend to forget it. It’s not like brushing your teeth, it’s more like doing something that you would do once in many years. You think there should be no system and it’s just something that you get over with as soon as possible at your own pace, but that’s not how you will get what you want. You will need to develop a system. People are in PM-ish work and want to be a PM, there’s no difference between you and me. You just don’t know the talk and you don’t yet have a system. Otherwise, we are the same and you can make it.