6. How to build confidence as a PM
And become a trusted steward of your product along the way
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Welcome! I’m Vincent and this is a Product Manager’s Notebook, a series of notes for people who are interested in sharing and learning the art of product management and career development. You can read my archive here.
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When you imagine a product manager, you may be tempted to think of someone power standing in a meeting. Head up high and brimming with confidence, they would say to the rest of the room:
“This is not how it should be done. It should be done in this particular way, and I would know because I am the manager of this product."
The rest of the people in the room then murmur (“hmm, oh yes, right of course he/she’s correct..”) and nod in agreement, as if in awe of the PM taking the lead.
That kind of attitude was also implied to me when I first became a PM, when well-meaning people said:
“Congratulations! You’re now the CEO of your product.” (Deeply untrue by the way)
“This means that you’re much more visible now than before.” (This is True)
“You can listen to others’ opinions, but you have to remember - you’re the boss.” (What did this actually mean?)
I used to struggle with this need to exude confidence, because I can be quite reserved and reluctant to be the loudest voice in the room. Perhaps, this is due to Asian culture, where I was taught to be respectful of others’ opinions, and deferential to those more senior than you. Or perhaps it's due to British politeness, where there is always room left for disagreement. Whatever the reason, I was very reluctant to impose my opinion on others. After all, “My way or the highway” sounds great in a song but I’ve seen it burn bridges in real life. 🔥
For a long time I wondered: how do I show confidence as a PM without it coming across as not authentic? Did “confidence takes time” mean that confidence would just one day magically happens to me? ✨
Spoiler alert: You do not become a PM and suddenly become more knowledgeable, capable, and confident overnight because your title has changed.
Here’s the action plan of what I’ve learned to do instead:
Become your product’s expert
Create your own mental model for confidence
Accept imperfect information
Learn to value your own opinions
Let’s break this down. But before we do…
Why is confidence important for PMs?
Confidence is an important trait for PMs to have. You are likely to be much more visible than before your product role, because your responsibilities have now grown.
People look to the PM to set the pace and direction of your product, and trust that you're making the right decisions going forward. The way that you conduct yourself gets reflected in others’ attitude and opinion towards your product.
Trust: It’s all about trust.
You want your executive management team, sales people, engineers and your customers to trust you to prioritise the right initiatives to maximise impact. If you lack confidence, others will question if resources are being dedicated to the areas that really matter. Your confidence in your decisions or views is reflected in their confidence in you.
Research also shows that confidence is the top trait people want to see in their leaders, and what is considered when we look for gravitas and executive presence.
Let’s dive into the art of building confidence.
1. Become your product’s expert
Your priority as a new PM should be to learn as much about your product as possible. That is because the key behind confidence is the ability to have qualified opinions about your product.
So talk to customers. Talk to internal teams like your customer support, implementation teams, and spend time with Sales. Sit down with your engineers, grab a piece of paper, and ask questions to understand the technical areas you don’t really get.
You will soon realise that everyone you speak to comes with their own biases, such as their most recent experiences with customers or their baggage of working with your predecessor(s). Your job as the PM is to make sense of it all. Learn the what, the how, and most importantly, the why it has come to be the way it is.
Over time, you will be able to get to a place where you’re able to stand behind your product five questions deep, and use evidence to explain your thought process to others. Confidence and arrogance are not the same thing: one comes from knowledge and experience, and the other comes from ego. This will make sure you don’t across as the latter.
Takeaway:
Confidence comes from a place of in-depth understanding about your product and its customers. You should prioritise this above all else.2. Create your own mental model for confidence
As you start to learn more and more about your product, it is helpful to create a mental model of three things that you need to know, in order to feel confident about any given topic.
For me, it looks like this:
Evidence: Do I have quantitative data eg product metrics that support my view? Do I have qualitative feedback eg customer anecdotes that say the same?
Impact: Do I have any idea of what the impact of this decision will be, whether on customers’ user experience, workflows or the business?
Alignment with product principles/vision: Is this in line with our core principles for the product, and consistent with how we make other decisions for this product and others in our department?
Having a mental model gives you a baseline to be able to speak about your product with conviction. When you are able to back up your thoughts with clear and concise explanations, this gives you and others the confidence that you know what you’re talking about and that the product is in good hands.
Takeaway:
What are the 3 key things that you feel like you need to know to feel confident about something? Out of these, which one is most important?3. Accept imperfect information
“But what if I’m wrong?”
In an ideal world, we have perfect information about all three. In reality, we won’t. It’s for us to figure out what level of information we’re comfortable with, and where reasonable assumptions can be made. The truth is that everyone is making decisions with the most information that’s available to them at the time.
Most product decisions can be reversed once the data is out. It’s okay to be wrong and adjust course based on feedback and data.
Takeaway:
The PM's job is to mitigate risks as best as we can, but there will always be unknowns. Reasonable assumptions must be made.4. Learn to value your own opinions
We need to learn to give yourself the credit you afford to others.
Yes, your partners are to be valued for their expertise, but there’s no need to put them on a pedestal, valuing their opinion above your own. Your responsibility is to listen and understand their views, not blindly accept them as your own.
It’s important to recognise that, while each of them has expertise in their respective field, it is the PM’s responsibility to bring it all together. Your Regional Head of Sales may understand your customers, but they won’t understand your tech stack. Similarly, your Head of Engineering will be intimately familiar with your architecture, but have little understanding your customer needs or your competitive landscape.
As the PM, you’ve done the research. Remember that you’ve been entrusted with this responsibility for a reason, and that is because your management believes you to be a smart, capable, and responsible steward of your product. You should believe that too.
Takeaway:
You need to believe in yourself: that you have done your homework and that your voice and opinion have value.What’s next?
The great news is that being confident isn’t just a personality trait or something that “happens” to you over time. Instead, it is something you have agency over; to learn and improve on over time.
To recap, you should
Become your product’s expert
Create your own mental model for confidence
Accept imperfect information
Learn to value your own opinions
I’m still learning and confidence is still a work in progress - what are your thoughts on the topic? I’d love to hear from you and feel free to share it with someone who might find it useful.