Product Manager Vs Project Manager

Many professionals often confuse the roles of product managers and project managers. It is a common misconception, and many people use these terms interchangeably, as they are quite similar. Though they often work together on the same initiatives, they have distinct roles and responsibilities.

In today’s blog post, we will discuss these two roles and how they differ.

Product Manager Vs Project Manager

Let us first understand the terms product and project.

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A product can be a tangible good, service, or system that solves customers’ problems and satisfies their needs. 

A project is a process of creating a product or service. It is a collection of tasks with a timeline and a defined outcome. Projects revolve around a product, it is temporary, and its purpose is to develop and deliver a product. 

On the other hand, a product is not temporary and evolves to meet customers’ needs. A product can involve several projects for its improvement and maintenance.

Product Manager

A product manager is responsible for the vision, strategy, and product goal. They look after the “what” and “why” part of the product. For example, what will the end-product look like? What problem will it solve?

Project Manager

Project managers are in charge of projects and are responsible for managing projects. They are focused on “how” and “when.” For example, how will the product be delivered? When will it be delivered? 

Product Manager Vs Project Manager

Both roles require communication, organization skills, and profound market knowledge. While these two leaders are concerned with managing team members, producing the best end product, and ensuring customer satisfaction, they have many differences in their roles and responsibilities. 

“A product manager concentrates on product development and releases, while a project manager coordinates, supervises, and oversees projects.”

Some of these differences are:

Question 

The product manager and project manager answer different questions. The product manager deals with the “what” and “why” of the product. The project manager deals with the “how,” “when,” “where,” and “who.”

Responsibility

The product manager is responsible for the product’s creation, strategy, and development. In contrast, the project manager is concerned with the project plan execution and completion.

Timeline 

The product manager does not have a fixed timeline. They have an ongoing lifecycle to see to the end-product and keep it up-to-date, so it continues to satisfy customer needs. 

The project manager has a fixed schedule to complete the project and deliver the product. Once the product is delivered, the project is closed.

Focus 

The product manager focuses on market research, customer needs, and target end-users. The project manager is focused on schedule, budget, project progress, and solving problems or obstacles that may arise along the way.

Product Manager – Roles, Responsibilities

Develops the Product Vision

The vision includes target customers, the problem it solves, key product success metrics, and other important things.

Creates a Product Roadmap and Strategy

This plan describes what needs to be done to meet the vision. This roadmap involves a lot of planning with varying opinions. 

Does Market Research

The product manager must understand the market, conduct risk assessments, and forecast product needs, market trends, competition, etc.

Gathers Customer Satisfaction Data

The product manager is responsible for understanding customer needs and measuring customer satisfaction using surveys, reviews, etc.

Organizes Product Launches

The product manager must know the product launch time, whether to launch it fully or start small with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP).

Controls Development Process

The product manager has to improve the product to ensure product continuity. They constantly have to update products with new features to ensure the product is not outdated.

The product manager helps in ideation, strategy, delivery, growth, sales, improvements, pricing, and monetization. 

Challenges Faced by Product Managers

The product manager has a huge role, but it is not smooth. Carrying out responsibilities comes with challenges. 

Some challenges a product manager may face include:

Meeting Deadlines

Deadlines can make or break the product’s success. Meeting deadlines can be difficult, especially sticking to a tight product launch deadline. Launching a new product is complex, so the product manager must stay on schedule to avoid delays.

Identifying and Rectifying Product Failures

If products are not performing well, the product manager must find the cause and solve it. They have to decide to change the product or discontinue it. This is a tough decision, as the outcome may be good or bad.

Sourcing Materials for Production

The product manager sources materials for products. This is a critical job. The product manager must find quality materials from credible vendors to ensure high-quality products. This is tough as they have to stick to the budget while dealing with vendors.

Managing Cross-Departmental Communication

Being a product manager means working with different departments like marketing, engineering, etc. This is necessary for production and to keep the product lifecycle continual.

Project Manager – Roles, Responsibilities

Throughout the project life cycle, project managers have many responsibilities. They are responsible for gathering the product vision, creating a timeline, and coordinating with the project team to meet deadlines and achieve project objectives. 

Develops a Project Management Plan

A project manager develops a plan to achieve the product manager’s vision. This project plan includes the scope of work, defined milestones, tasks, other subsidiary project management plans, etc.

Delegates Tasks

After establishing the milestones, timeline, and budget, the project manager assigns tasks to the team members and follows up until they are completed. The project manager tracks progress and ensures it is as per the planned progress.

Communicates with the Team

Communication is an important aspect of project management, as the project manager has to coordinate with different stakeholders throughout the project life cycle to complete the project. 

Challenges Faced by Project Managers

Project management can be complex due to the many responsibilities involved. Project managers tend to face challenges as they carry out their responsibilities. 

Some of these challenges are:

Maintaining Project Timelines

Project managers track project timelines, as project delays are costly. They must maintain the project timeline to ensure the project is on schedule.

Implementing Change Requests

Projects usually don’t progress according to plan, so many change requests arise. The project manager is responsible for influencing factors causing the changes, reviewing change requests, and forwarding for approval.

Identifying and Tracking Risks

The project manager is responsible for identifying and tracking potential risks and managing them.

Keeping Up with Market Trends

Project managers have to be aware of market trends, tools, and resources. Following the right market trend will favor the project and the product.

Which Role is Suitable for the Team?

The most suitable role for the team depends on the objective. A project manager helps build the product and deliver it to the product manager.

On the other hand, a product manager strategizes new launches, coordinates with production and development teams, and innovates the product portfolio. 

The scenarios below highlight some situations requiring product and project managers for the team.

Scenario 1: 

A team struggling to release new products and keep the production process efficient.

Solution 1: 

A product manager strategizes new product ideas and coordinates with the production team for further development. 

Scenario 2: 

The team struggles to keep projects on schedule and manage project changes.

Solution 2: 

A project manager can oversee deliverables and allocate resources, keeping the team updated about the project schedule and managing changes.

Product Manager and Project Manager Career Paths

The process of becoming either is quite similar, especially when it comes to having technical knowledge and soft skills. However, there are different pathways to becoming a product manager or project manager.

Skills

Soft skills are essential for both product and project managers. 

Product Manager Skills

1. Data analysis

2. Market review

3. Price modeling

4. Essential UX knowledge

5. Primary business knowledge

Project Manager Skills

1. Understanding of project management approaches like Scrum, Agile, and Waterfall

2. Risk management

3. Project management tools

4. Planning

5. Basic budgeting

Certifications

Certifications aren’t required to become a project manager or product manager. However, having one can provide an edge in job applications. 

Project management certifications are more common than product management certifications. 

Project management certifications include:

1. Project Management Professional (PMP)

2. Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)

3. Certified ScrumMaster (CSM)

4. Professional Scrum Master (PSM I)

Product management certifications include:

1. Product School – Product Manager Certificate

2. Pragmatic Institute – Certified Product Manager 

3. AIPMM Certified Product Manager Credential

Product Manager or Project Manager: Who Earns More?

Product Managers earn more than project managers in the US. The average product manager’s salary in the US is 111,755 USD per year, while a project manager in the US earns an average salary of 87,637 USD per year, according to August 2021 data from Glassdoor.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Project Manager or Product Manager: Which is Better?

Generally, product managers tend to have a higher rank in an organizational hierarchy. They are in charge of making more advanced decisions than project managers.

Project managers are more versatile as they handle different projects. They are more versatile and dynamic.

Can a Product Manager be a Project Manager?

Product managers and project managers share many skills. Product managers can be project managers as well. Both roles are demanding, and dealing with both roles simultaneously can be exhausting and challenging, which will affect the progress and quality.

Product managers can handle project management tasks. This practice is common in smaller companies with a lesser workload.

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Product Owner Vs Product Manager

A product is a service or system that businesses develop to meet users’ requirements. These days, consumers are cautious and demanding, and fulfilling their requirements is not easy. 

Over time, products evolve with increasing complexity, and managing the dynamic requirements entails specialization and better management in the product life cycle. 

Organizations need someone to define their high-level vision of the service and maximize the product value. Thus, they need a product owner and product manager. 

The product owner and product manager are distinct roles, and in today’s blog post, we will learn these two roles and the difference between them.

Product Owner Vs Product Manager

Product owners’ responsibilities are often confused with product managers’ responsibilities, as they sometimes share common tasks. However, the product manager has a wider role, and the product owner is mostly a subset of the product manager. 

In many organizations, the roles and responsibilities of product owners and product managers are often interchanged, depending on the nature of the product development team and the size of the company.   

The product owner focuses on maximizing the product value. The product manager’s focus is balancing the user experience, building a feasible product, solving customers’ problems, and fulfilling the organization’s business needs.

So, a product manager has more responsibilities than a product owner.

Product Owner

Many professionals assume product owners to be service owners because the names are similar, but this is wrong. The product owner is concerned with getting customer satisfaction by delivering quality work through proper guidance to the team towards achieving the customers’ needs. 

Here, we are talking about a scrum team developing the product with client collaboration through the product owner. The product manager is responsible for creating day-to-day tasks for team members and evaluating the deliverable based on the customers’ needs.

The role of the product owner includes:

1. Efficient product backlog management.

2. Identifying customers’ needs and guiding the team to achieve them.

3. Analyzing product risk.

4. Defining product requirements and communicating the goals and requirements to the team.

5. Developing and sharing product backlog items with the team.

6. Prioritizing product backlog items.

7. Ensuring backlog item transparency and clarity.

8. Ensures the previous feed is factored into the deliverable before moving further.

9. Communicates internally with the team and externally with the customers.

The product owner works with the stakeholders to get the correct requirements. They help improve relationships, build trust with customers, and help the delivery/development team to understand the vision and needs. Hence, this role is comparable to a bridge between the two sides that allows smooth communication.

The product owner manages the manager of the Agile team. If the product development is not following Agile methodologies, the product owner’s role will probably not be required. 

A product manager can serve as the product owner in small organizations but cannot always be accessible if they manage a handful of large, complex products, each with a dedicated team of developers. 

Other agile frameworks do not involve frequent requirement modification, so product managers can easily fulfill the role of the product owner.

Habits of Highly Successful Product Owners

Product owners are responsible for maximizing the product value. They focus on two aspects of the product: building the “right thing” and building the thing “right.”

The seven habits of successful product owners are categorized according to those two aspects.

Source: Scrum Crazy

Product owners communicate on both sides (customer facing and team facing).

With the team, they discuss backlog items and develop the deliverable. With customers, they collect the feedback and explain it to the team members so they can solve the customers’ problems.

Building the “Right Thing”

The product owner understands the customers’ needs and adds the right value to the product.

Successful habits that the product owner exercises to build the “Right Thing” include:

1. Product Value Maximizer: Works to maximize the value of the product

2. Product Visionary: Communicates with the customer to understand their needs and clarify them to the team to fulfill customer requirements.

3. Product Backlog Management Leader: Translates the high-level vision of the product into manageable and executable backlog items.

4. Product Marketplace Expert: Understands the features of the product to be launched in the market.

Product Release Decision Maker: Knows the customers’ needs and the product; they decide the right time to release the product in agreement with the client.

5. Lead Facilitator of Key Stakeholder Involvement: Leads and represents the development team when communicating with the key stakeholders.

Building the Thing “Right”

Using the right strategies, product managers can build the product the right way. The following habit helps them build the thing “right.”

1. Product Backlog Management Leader

2. Lead Facilitator of Key Stakeholder Involvement

3. Effective and Active Scrum Team Collaborator

Product Manager

The product manager has more responsibilities as compared to the product owner. Their responsibilities include defining high-level visions and missions, while the product owner’s concern is translating high-level missions into day-to-day activities.

Other responsibilities of product managers are:

1. Defining high-level problems and the product success

2. Recognizing market needs

3. Achieving defined objectives that prioritize product features

4. Ensuring the company generates profit

5. Guiding and leading different teams within the organization focusing on the product, including the product owner

6. Managing the entire product lifecycle and roadmaps and setting the strategic direction of the product

7. Translating the product strategy into planned work

8. Trading-off to ensure the delivered product is right

The above figure shows product managers’ responsibilities distributed among three disciplines: User Experience (UX), Technology, and Business.

Product managers must be experienced and have the required skills in the above-mentioned disciplines and should be able to balance them using tough decisions and trade-offs.

Product managers balance the need for user experience, ensure the product is feasible, and solve customers’ problems.

Salaries of Product Owner and Product Manager

Product owners are responsible for maximizing the product’s value; their role is often a subset of the product manager’s role. Product managers are responsible for the entire product’s lifecycle, and their domain is broader than the product owner. 

The average salaries of these roles are often not the same because of the following reasons:

1. As product managers with less experience might be given the role of product owner, their salary might be the same as the product owner.

2. Smaller companies might hire a person responsible for the product. Since there are fewer responsibilities, they don’t hire product managers and entrust the responsibilities to the product owner. This drives the salary of product managers downward.

3. Large companies need to share product responsibilities between different parties for increased quality and better management. So, the need for product owners in larger enterprises drives their salary upward.

As of June 2021, Glassdoor.com reported the average salary for a product owner is 100,000 USD with a range of 70,000 – 142,000 USD in the United States. The salary of a product manager is 112,000 USD with a range of 73,000 – 173,000 USD. 

Product managers have higher salaries. 

Do Organizations Need Both Roles?

Organizations consider many factors in deciding whether they need both positions or one of them. 

These factors are given below.

#1. Organization Size

Large organizations have more responsibilities with different teams to deal with different aspects of products. It will be hard for one person to deal with both roles in this case. 

Smaller organizations have fewer responsibilities, so they can have a product owner with some additional responsibilities or a product manager.

#2. Framework

The Agile framework facilitates collaboration and teamwork by dividing the tasks among the team members. If the organization follows the Agile framework, it must assign a product owner.

Projects following waterfall methodologies do not require product owners. Here, product requirements are defined at the beginning of the project and delivered to the project management team at one time.

Here requirements are fixed, and at the end, the product is verified to ensure it meets the stated requirements.

When other frameworks are used for product development, a product manager can deal with the overall product lifecycle and the task of the product owner. In other frameworks, product owners have little or no role.

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