The role of group product manager (GPM) is new in product management. Businesses are becoming more aware of the value of cross-functional cooperation. That’s why it’s gaining a reputation.
The GPM is in charge of uniting the product team under a unified product vision. They ensure they are all working toward the same goal.
Knowing the technical, business, and product functions that must work collaboratively to deliver a product to market is a must for this role.
Let’s dissect this critical role to see what a group product manager is and how they vary.
Who Is a Group Product Manager?
Group product manager (GPM) has become popular in recent years.
A team leader overseeing several products’ development is a group product manager. Product development and team management abilities must exist for the group product manager position.
Effective GPMs demonstrate the capacity to mentor. They inspire their team members while involved in the job.
The group product manager is in charge of developing and maintaining roadmaps. They establish the vision and strategy for the product (s).
They collaborate with other teams inside the business to guarantee that the products follow the broader business plan.
Responsibilities Of a Group Product Manager
1. Uniting the Team
The group product manager must ensure that engineers, administration, advertising, and customer service cooperate as a team to accomplish the objectives of the business case and the clients.
There are numerous people involved in the product management cycle.
A group product manager must understand how to ensure teams work effectively in cross-alignment.
This calls for clear communication rules to ensure everyone understands the overarching product vision.
2. Be a Keeper
The duty to deliver thorough reporting and documentation is a key portion of a group product manager’s job description.
This comprises, to highlight a few, product roadmaps, case studies, and market needs documents.
Others may also be required, including competition analyses, case studies, and product comparisons.
The product management function will also include significant documentation for presentations and data sharing.
A product manager must be a good presenter and support their arguments with facts and metrics to successfully communicate consumer needs.
3. Testing Is a Must
Product managers are in charge of managing the beta and pilot programs as the project nears completion.
Additionally, they will continuously analyze completed work to ensure that it meets client requirements and supervise any necessary product modifications.
A group product manager must be aware of the agile approach to obtain quick feedback and make improvements.
A group product manager will want to learn about the pilot program’s successes and how to strengthen the product in subsequent iterations by analyzing consumer input.
4. Listen to Customers
Finding, compiling, managing, and prioritizing client needs and wants is one of a group product manager’s duties.
A profitable product depends on knowing what the market needs. They must comprehend both the motivations behind consumer purchases and the strategies used by rival businesses.
Group Product managers must participate in client service interviews to gather user insights and analyze needs by taking what customers say at face value and drawing conclusions about needs from their feedback.
This is necessary to create an experience that will fulfill consumers’ needs. A group product manager will work with the customer service staff to identify the main problems that the existing product isn’t solving and how to develop solutions to take into account this customer input.
5. Innovation
The main duties of product management include creating new business cases for new goods, enhancing those that have already been delivered, and searching for new business opportunities.
As was previously said, a group product manager ought to consider oneself the product’s CEO.
A group product manager can decide whether consumer wants can be fulfilled by looping on the existing offering or whether a new model would be a better concept through an ongoing research process.
6. Advocate
A group product manager’s job profile calls for them to represent clients’ interests and demands. The group product manager should speak out for the client’s needs if problems are, ensuring that the product targets the market appropriately.
It might be too simple for the technical team to assume that the consumers would understand the answer they create without additional explanation.
A good group product manager should be able to reference client input to assess whether the optimal user experience reaches the consumer.
A product manager plays a crucial part in the decision-making process while always keeping the enterprise objectives in mind to ensure that the product satisfies a customer’s needs.
7. Vision and Roadmap
This entails creating a product roadmap and an integrated production strategy based on the organization’s purpose and the intended results of a product to carry out the vision and goals.
The product’s future direction must be determined by gathering and analyzing user feedback and collaborating with cross-aligned teams.
This will entail going through the product backlog to decide which additional innovations will be included in the product and ranking them in order of importance.
Skills of a Group Product Manager
1. Product Knowledge
A group product manager has to have in-depth knowledge of the product they are in charge of. This involves familiarity with the product’s attributes, functionality, materials, manufacturing process, and features.
Additionally, a product manager has to be familiar with the product’s market and intended audience. Making judgments regarding the product requires having this information.
2. Leadership Skills
Since they frequently serve as the team’s and the product’s spokesperson, leadership abilities might be crucial for a product manager to possess.
A group product manager may inspire their team to collaborate to develop a successful product using their leadership abilities.
They may motivate their team to produce novel things clients want using their leadership abilities.
3. Analytical Skills
The capacity to evaluate data and derive conclusions from it is known as analytical skill. To develop the greatest choices for your product, you must be able to assess data and knowledge as a product manager.
For instance, if you see a fall in sales, you must be able to evaluate the data to identify the root issue and decide what to do about it.
4. Communication Skills
You engage with many different individuals in your role as a product manager, including other product managers, engineers, salespeople, marketing teams, and customers.
Your effectiveness in this profession depends on your ability to communicate successfully. You must be able to explain complex concepts in a way everybody can grasp.
To comprehend the demands and preferences of your consumers, you must also be able to interact with them.
5. Business Acumen
The visions and strategies of a firm link to its level of financial performance. A product manager must comprehend how their product affects the business’s bottom line.
This necessitates having a solid grasp of the business’s financials and how the product may impact them.
For instance, a product manager would need to understand the potential impact of a new product on sales, profitability, and client acquisition expenses.
