Here’s a story for anybody who’s desirous about just a few pointers for their very own product supervisor job-hunting journey.
By sharing my story, I’d like to offer an in depth narrative will show you how to understand that each one components play into the method: endurance, rigorously thought-out tasks, and networking — all of them matter.
And simply to be clear, luck and timing additionally play small but vital roles within the means of leaping into the hell-fire position that’s product administration. I’m not an exception; there are various levels of luck that performed into my very own story, however they weren’t “make or break” influences. Don’t fear — more often than not, they shouldn’t be “make or break” components for you both.
Wanting again, it’s simple to conclude that the “heavy lifting” a part of my journey was much more salient, and thus extra rewarding. The boring steps of working step-by-step; making small wins; using the powerful studying curve; all of them performed a lot bigger roles.
I’m going to derive all I can from my very own expertise to offer again to the group of aspiring PMs in order that anybody who reads this may acquire one thing out of it for their very own story. This doesn’t matter for those who’re nonetheless a scholar or 10 years into your present working life.
Here’s a high-level breakdown of my journey, from 1st yr undergrad till now, which is just a few months into my graduated working life. Keep in mind — the weather of worth from my story can nonetheless apply to anybody, whether or not for those who’re a scholar or not.
2017
This was a loopy turbulent time. I wasn’t certain but what I wished to do after I graduated, however one factor was for sure: I knew I needed to discover with hands-on expertise. My subject of focus wouldn’t matter as a lot throughout this time, as a result of with none working expertise in any respect, what was there to leverage or lean again on as soon as I did determine what I wished to do?
Thus, I took a small sacrifice and landed a full-time volunteer place at a biotech startup in Waterloo, Canada. This position allowed me to discover your complete spectrum of potential work I might discover myself immersed in later in life. I might work within the lab on at some point so as to add biotech expertise, or I might assist carry out investor outreach and different enterprise growth-related actions.
However what in the end mattered was that this expertise gave me my first actual internship at Blackberry in early 2018 — triggering the snowball impact to hop from one internship to a different till product administration was inside attain.
2018
This yr was by far essentially the most pivotal out of all years I’ve spent throughout my product management-hunting journey.
At Blackberry, I used to be a basic enterprise admin intern — nothing too extravagant, albeit nonetheless basically rewarding. This was the place I actually found what PM was by watching the product group from afar: a robust and extremely coveted position inside tech that labored with a number of stakeholders to resolve product issues. By definition alone, this already sounded attention-grabbing to yours actually, so after my internship ended, I sought to community more durable with full-time PMs or different aspiring PMs to at some point attain my very own sense of belonging inside this profession path.
After Blackberry, I did some pro-bono consulting with a college membership, after which accomplished an internship in consulting within the fall of 2018. Throughout this time, nonetheless, I started diving head-first into hackathons regardless of barely figuring out code. Conquering this concern of missing data for the sake of expertise made all of the distinction — the tasks, individuals, and alternatives hackathons had opened up for me was loopy. I made certain to benefit from these alternatives by networking with each hackathon sponsor and supporting my group in constructing our venture in any approach I might. Lastly, I performed the position of a “sponge” — soaking in each piece of information or ability round me as a lot as I might. Our group even gained a prize at Hack Harvard 2018!
2019
I lastly obtained my first ever product internship at SAP in the summertime of 2019. Throughout this time, I additionally dived into podcasts to diversify my hobbies a bit, and took part in my college’s product administration membership by internet hosting numerous completed product people on our membership’s podcast to talk about their expertise for all to listen to.
Within the fall, I continued my job seek for different product alternatives with out letting go of that drive for hackathons.
On the facet, whereas I utilized to varied product job openings, I made certain to be relentless when it got here to the functions and their homework and canopy letter necessities. This particularly stayed true for jobs I actually, actually, actually wished. Product openings at Reddit, Fb, Mozilla, Microsoft, RocketBook, ClickTime, PagerDuty, Apple, Splunk — I keep in mind sitting for five–6 hours each week grinding out product assignments or detailed over letters for all of them. Even merely bettering my very own product/design portfolio was properly well worth the time. Even when an organization rejected me, I might take that homework task and use it in my very own portfolio. With that mindset because the spine for my motivation, I sat down and did each single one meticulously regardless of my tight college and extra-curricular schedule. I even wrote out some tailor-made cowl letters alongside these homework assignments; the rationale was: “I’ve already executed this a lot, including a canopy letter isn’t that rather more…might as properly go all in.”
2020
A COVID-infested yr didn’t cease my digital presence; I labored for 3 totally different corporations as a digital PM intern throughout my faculty coursework. I by no means stopped making use of — I keep in mind writing out just a few extra homework assignments, sprucing up my portfolio much more, and even trying to begin a few facet tasks on my own. One factor to notice is that even for jobs you don’t really feel enthusiastic about, apply for that interview expertise. You may even nearly deal with them as mock interviews.
For others who noticed COVID as a time to cover away and excuse themselves away from productive work, I noticed it as a chance to do no matter I wished: brainstorm facet venture concepts, enhance my coding, Figma designing, and even on-line volunteering for a startup.
It’s vital to name out right here (and for all earlier years) that I undoubtedly had my downtimes and dips in each productiveness and psychological well being. In spite of everything, my journey wasn’t quick — this climb to changing into a full-time tech product supervisor took me over 4 years.
2021
This was the yr I used to be graduating, which meant a full-time job looking season. Instances have been definitely anxious — particularly that interval spanning from November till March. I’m a stressed and impatient particular person in relation to jobs, however I used to be capable of calm myself sometimes throughout this time by sprucing up on my design portfolio and searching for mentorship (it’s best to do that too! I joined WealthSimple’s product & design mentorship program). Mentorship was an absolute game-changer that not solely lightened my temper throughout occasions of stress and pessimism, but in addition allowed me to achieve invaluable product recommendation from an trade veteran. I’d prefer to name out my mentor, Saksham, Director of Product at WealthSimple, for the easy but extremely invaluable assist that he offered each month throughout this system.
As one can see, my journey was lengthy and tedious, to not point out the numerous, and I imply numerous (we’re speaking maybe within the 1000s right here — I’m not exaggerating, I wrote perhaps 100+ cowl letters that haven’t even gotten a response, nonetheless interview) rejections, each earlier than and after interview levels. Preserve your head down, maintain your product/venture portfolio and resume up-to-date, write out some tailor-made cowl letters for jobs you really need, polish up your expertise (SQL, system design, UI/UX, something {that a} product job would need) if you really feel they could possibly be refreshed, and don’t cease. Be relentless, but in addition be affected person; stopping to choose up some volunteer work to spice up that resume by no means hurts.
Better of luck on the market! Comply with me on Medium and join with me on LinkedIn for those who’d like some extra offline recommendation!
