Project Manager vs Product Manager

Good day...

I met some people who are confused regarding what is the different role between a product manager and project manager. Unfortunately I have been both, so I can give some brief introduction on both roles.

Picture credit: geralt

As a product manager, you will be responsible for end-to-end life cycle of the product. Starting from business case, product design, proposal, seeking approvals by management (normally through product committee), obtaining regulatory approval, product development, product launching, marketing, campaign and promotion, further development, and so on until the product is matured and finally decided to be put off the market.

Although in some cases the product manager is responsible as a business project manager during product development, it is not always the case. In my organization we have a dedicated team for project management, who will take the ownership as the overall project manager. In this case, the product manager is positioned as a product owner or primary user, and in some cases as the sponsor of the project.

While as a project manager, your main responsibility is to lead the end-to-end project life cycle. In product development case, the scope of the project could be the same as product life cycle described above, or, focusing only in a fraction of the life cycle, such as product development, product campaign or product launching only. In other words, the product life cycle could be divided into more than one project, with each project has its own project manager. The person running the project manager role could be overlapping between one project to another, however, they are treated as separate projects.

It is interesting that in my experience, a good product manager is very potential into a strong project manager and vice versa. To become a good project manager, the product manager should equip herself with project management discipline. On the other hand, to becoming a good product manager, the project manager should strengthen her business acumen.

I met some colleagues who are coming from product management and end up into very strong project managers, and even a leader of project services team. On the flip side, I also know some colleagues who successfully moved from project management into star product managers once she is passionate about the business.

Edwin