Good Product Managers, Great Product Managers

In my experience, echoed by a few people I’ve chatted with, there is a general rule of thumb vis-a-vis the categories of work above:

A “Great PM” is

excellent in one area,

good in at least one other,

and doesn’t have time for more than two.

Using “Great PM” language, you should strive to be “Great,” as superlative as possible, in one of those four are

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Good product managers know the market, the product, the product line, and the competition extremely well and operate from a strong basis of knowledge and confidence. A good product manager is the CEO of the product. Good product managers take full responsibility and measure themselves in terms of the success of the product. They are responsible for

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Good product managers think in terms of delivering superior value to the market place during inbound planning and achieving market share and revenue goals during outbound. Bad product managers get very confused about the differences amongst delivering value, matching competitive features, pricing, and ubiquity.

Being good at strategy is also one of the defining characteristics of a senior Product Manager. For good reason — a well-crafted strategy can change the trajectory of a business, while a bad strategy is a huge waste of time and money.

There are very few PMs who are Great (and I am not one of them. At least yet.) Because the difference between Good and Great is HUUUUGE. It's not that Good PMs don't do the right things. It is just that the Great PMs do the right things consistently.

Good product managers know the market, the product, the product line and the competition extremely well and operate from a strong basis of knowledge and confidence. Bad product managers have lots of excuses. Once bad product managers fail, they point out that they predicted they would fail.