Product Manager

Purpose of the Role

The Product Manager is the strategic owner of a product workstream, responsible for defining its long-term vision, strategy, and roadmap. They act as the voice of the customer and the market, ensuring the organization is focused on solving the right problems and building products that deliver significant business value. They own the "why" and the strategic "what," empowering the Program Manager and the entire delivery organization to execute with clarity and purpose.

2. Key Responsibilities

Strategy, Vision & Market Analysis

• Define Product Vision:

  Define and champion the long-term vision and strategy for the product workstream, ensuring it is aligned with overall business goals and customer.

• Conduct Market Research:

  Conduct continuous market and competitive analysis to understand industry trends, customer pain points, and sources of competitive differentiation.

• Develop Product Positioning:

  Own the product workstream value proposition, using market research and customer insights to define its unique position in the market.

Roadmap & Feature Definition

• Own the Product Roadmap:

  Create and maintain a multi-horizon product roadmap for the workstream, that communicates the long-term direction and outlines the features, priorities, and timelines for the next 12+ months.

• Define Strategic Requirements:

  Translate business needs and market opportunities into high-level product requirements, defining and prioritizing the epics and features that form the product backlog. Leverage the Aha Ideas Portal, RFP requests. Internal and external product stakeholders for requirements and priority.

• Provide Strategic Direction:

  Hand off prioritized epics and features to the Program Manager and Business Analysts, providing the strategic context and "why" behind them to guide detailed requirement creation.

Go-to-Market & Lifecycle Management

• Lead Go-to-Market Strategy:

  Collaborate with Marketing and Sales to ensure successful product launches for assigned workstream and aligned to the overall product launch and strategies. Create content and participate in activities (webinars, etc.) that support GTM efforts for workstream.

• Own the Business Release Process:

  Own the business readiness and sign-off for releases, aligning with the technical release manager Business Analyst and Program Manager on timing and scope.

• Monitor Product Performance:

  Continuously monitor and evaluate product performance using usage analytics, customer feedback, and financial metrics to inform future iterations, feature enhancements, or end-of-life decisions.

Stakeholder Alignment & Customer Advocacy

• Act as the Product Evangelist:

  Serve as the primary point of contact and subject matter expert for the product workstream for all internal and external stakeholders.

• Represent the Voice of the Customer:

  Champion the needs of the customer in all forums, ensuring the product solves real-world problems. Actively participate in user research programs to gather direct feedback.

• Align Cross-Functional Teams:

  Work closely with other Product Managers to ensure roadmap alignment and manage dependencies. Partner with Customer Success and Support to ensure customer satisfaction and gather product improvement ideas.

3. Authority & Decision Making

• Product Roadmap Authority:

  Holds final authority on the content and prioritization of the product roadmap for their workstream.

• Feature Prioritization Authority:

  Authority to prioritize features and epics at the strategic level based on business value, customer feedback, and technical feasibility.

• Product Positioning Authority:

  Authority to define the product's value proposition, target market, and go-to-market strategy for assigned workstream and aligned to the overall product strategy.

• Limits of Authority:

  Does not have direct people management authority, but does dotted-line manage the assigned Business Analyst. Does not own the delivery schedule or cross-team orchestration (owned by the Program Manager). Does not approve the final enterprise-level budget (owned by senior leadership).

4. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Business & Market Impact:

  Achievement of product-specific business goals (e.g., revenue, market share, adoption).

• Product Success Metrics:

  High scores for customer satisfaction (CSAT/NPS), positive user feedback, and strong usage analytics for new features.

• Strategic Clarity:

  High confidence scores from stakeholders and delivery teams on the clarity and stability of the product roadmap and vision.

• Go-to-Market Effectiveness:

  Successful product launches measured by adoption rates and the achievement of sales/marketing goals.

5. Stakeholder Relationships

• Program Manager (Strategic Peer):

  A critical partnership. The Product Manager defines the "why" and strategic "what"; the Program Manager owns the cross-functional execution plan to deliver that vision.

• Business Analysts (Strategic Direction):

  The primary source of vision, context, and high-level requirements. The Product Manager empowers the BA to define the details by providing a clear "why."

• Senior Product Leadership (Head of Product):

  Their direct reporting manager. Aligns on strategy, reports on business outcomes, and seeks approval for major investments.

• Engineering Leadership (Director, Architects):

  A key partnership to understand technical feasibility, manage technical debt as a strategic concern, and align the product roadmap with the technology roadmap.

• Go-to-Market Teams (Sales, Marketing, Customer Success):

  The core partners for launching products, gathering feedback, and driving business results.

• Customers & Users:

  The most important stakeholder. Engages with them directly and frequently to ensure the product is always delivering value.