Duties include, but are not limited to of the Director of Product Management:
Supervision:
First and foremost, the position is a position of leadership and in this capacity the Director of Product Management oversees and is often answerable to the Chief Product Officer and stakeholders for all activities of the product management department. The Director of Product Management oversees and ensures that the functions of the Junior Product Manager, Product Manager, Senior Product Manager, and Head of Product Management are efficiently and effectively executed.
Collaboration:
The role of Director of Product Management is also one of a cross-functional nature and as such, the Director is expected to liaise with other Product Line Directors. These are Directors of the engineering, marketing, sales, and design departments. The reason for this collaboration is to place the executive management in a position to translate the product needs into requirements and to drive consensus within the product departments, which ultimately promotes the achievement of the product goals. Collaboration leads to clear and efficient product road mapping, product planning, prioritisation, and an overall agile product development process.
Product Proposals:
The Junior Product Managers are tasked with the analysis of information and formulations of product solutions and strategies that are presented and refined further up the line. The Director receives numerous Product Proposals from his junior managers through the Head of Product Management. He is then expected to evaluate these proposals prior to authorising the effect of any solutions and strategies for the business’s product.
Stakeholders:
The Director is answerable not only directly to the Chief Product Officer but to the stakeholders of the business. The Director is tasked with keeping the stakeholders up to date on product process and progress.
Vision Creation:
As the leader of the product department, it is the Director’s responsibility to build an understanding and cultivate in the departments’ members the product’s vision, the business case, as well as compiling the product planning material necessary for driving product initiatives further with clarity and consensus.
Product Line lifecycle:
The Director of Product Management, alongside other product Directors, is also responsible for developing, defining, and overseeing the product’s road-map and managing it as required for the purpose of meeting deliverables for the business. At this capacity, the Director of Product Management also incorporates the existing development backlog and makes priorities as determined by the business, consumer, and market needs.
Consumer Relations:
The Director of Product Management does not simply rely on the input and feedback of the junior product managers when it comes to consumer relations. A Director of Product Management is also responsible for engaging extensively with consumers in order to gain first hand insight on the consumers’ and market feedback on the business’s product. This first hand information coupled with consumer and market information relayed to him by the junior product managers breeds a clearer understanding of the current and future market direction, needs, and potential receptivity.
Product/Market Strategy:
The Director of Product Management also works intimately with the marketing department to develop marketing strategies, lead generation strategies, and sales strategies. The Director also partners up with the sales department to build on product unit sales implementation as well as support strategies.
Research and Analysis:
The Director of Product Management is also tasked with conducting relevant product research; establishing competitive intelligence and various market analyses that supplement and compliments analyses already conducted by junior product managers. The Director of Product Management in this capacity is responsible conducting consumer and market research that further aids the business in understanding current and future product needs.
Product Evangelism:
Like the Head of Product Management, the Director is tasked with representing the business and promoting the product by advocating for its value and benefits at executive briefings, marketing events, online consumer platforms, and so forth.
