It seems that virtually everyone tuned into what’s happening in product management senses that big changes are imminent. There are lots of discussions about the death of PM. Others describe a bright future in which PM will become even more important and valued.
As is typically the case, small minds migrate to the ends of the catastrophe/renaissance continuum without much critical thought, adding to the general confusion. That being said, in the interest of transparency, you should know that I’m far more toward the catastrophe/disruption end of this spectrum.
You are probably wondering where PM is headed. In this post, I’ll share my predictions in the hopes that if you agree with my rationale, you’ll be in a better place to prepare yourself. Predictions are typically wrong and I hope mine are because they don’t paint a particularly rosy picture.
What’s causing the change?
As I said, many folks perceive that something is changing and we hear about various contributing factors independently, but perhaps the convergence of big changes isn’t getting the press it deserves.
Key Assumptions
I’m basing this post on the following assumptions:
The PM job market is horrible right now (I have tons of anecdotal evidence for this)
There has been more anti-PM sentiment in the last year than in the history of the profession (some very public)
Gen AI is going to be more impactful than the internet because its disruption will happen much, much faster.
Since assumptions are assertions we make without evidence, I won’t provide any. If these don’t resonate with you, you should probably stop reading (although I welcome evidence to the contrary). I only have so much energy and I want to invest it topics I find more interesting (which I’ll get to in a moment).
The convergence of these factors will disrupt product management in a way that is unprecedented in both its speed and profundity.
So what now?
My Hypotheses
Here are my hypotheses regarding the key factors precipitating change. Since there are people out there actively trying to confuse this basic vocabulary, a hypothesis is an assertion made with implicit uncertainty — it is stated so that evidence can be gathered to support it (or not).
GenAI is going to disrupt every traditional product discipline/role profoundly (although some more than others)
A significant number of organizations will radically modify their approach to and investment in PM in the next couple of years
The PM job market will never recover to past heights (the golden age is over)
Changes in the PM job market will happen relatively quickly (2-4 years) and fundamentally disrupt many people’s lives (they will have to change careers and maybe lifestyles)
Many of the significantly lower number of PMs will practice PM in a different way
On the GenAI front, this technology is going to massively augment, essentially commoditize, many aspects of product discovery and delivery. Traditional product discovery, for example, will be completed with better quality in a couple of orders of magnitude less time, e.g., hours instead of weeks. That sounds like an outlandish claim to those who have dabbled with tools like ChatGPT; much less so for those of us who have invested months figuring out how they can make us more effective.
What will happen to PMs? My Predictions
In the next 3-5 years, the number of PMs will almost certainly shrink. I believe within 10 years, there will be 25-30% fewer people practicing these variants of product management (and the discipline will radically evolve in many respects).
Here are the broad categories of PMs in this new reality:
Traditional: A minority of orgs won’t change much. They’re getting value from the discipline and won’t fix what “ain’t broke”. Most of the orgs will have former PMs in influential leadership roles.
General Managers (GMs): Some orgs will give PMs profile and loss (P&L) responsibility. These professionals will be much more commercially oriented and will be the clear bridge between product development and GTM. Managing the strategy and roadmap of products that have reached product/market fit (PMF) will take a very small percentage of their time.
Growth PMs/professionals: Some PMs will continue to use the GTM knowledge and growth techniques to help orgs focus on growth. Growth will continue to evolve into its own discipline, “poaching” PMs and some marketing types as it becomes more mainstream.
Discovery & Assembly: Some PMs will become experts in rapid discovery and use low/no-code environments to get a product from idea to PMF (or not) at lightning speed. They will work with a tiny engineering team to help them with heavy lifting. After PMF, they will move on to the next idea, turning steady-state delivery over to a traditional PM or a GM.
Traditional product owners who engage operationally with engineering during implementation will continue to play an important role, ensuring strategic, commercial objectives are not overlooked or forgotten during development. More and more, these professionals will report to engineering and be seen as part of that function.
So what can you do?
I guess this is the big question on the minds of people who see significant disruption rapidly approaching. Here's the safest advice I can give as it is probably a smart move regardless of what happens.
Sharpen your business chops and start thinking about how you can communicate your value to management in business terms. Start by getting over the obsession with delivery -- that's the easy part.
Study growth in particular and GTM more broadly. Understand the roles, the activities, the KPIs etc.
Start exploring rapid prototyping with low/no-code environments
Set some career goals and create a roadmap to evaluate your chances of staying relevant.
I won't give a lot of direction on how to do these things. Self-starters will figure it out. You can start by having a GenAI chatbot create a professional development plan for you.
I know the last point is heavy, but I don't believe the market will support the number of PMs we see today. Some folks are going to have to make a radical change -- the more they prepare now, the better off they will be. If you're new to PM and aren't enamored of it, for example, start thinking seriously about changing careers.
This is not a cheery message to hear or write. I hope I'm wrong.
What are your predictions?
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