The Product Management Triad

Another excellent article from Pragmatic Marketing...this one from Steve Johnson with one of the most complete descriptions I've ever seen for the key Product Management roles:

"How many product managers do you need? What are their roles in the company? Is product management a support role for sales or marketing communications or development? I'm often asked to contrast product management, product marketing, program management and other titles in a high-tech company. All are poorly understood and are defined differently everywhere I go. An ideal solution for many companies is the 'product management triad'."

"Some product managers have a natural affinity for working with development, others for sales and marketing communications, and others prefer to work on business issues. Finding these three orientations in one person is an almost impossible task. Instead, perhaps we should find three different people with these skills and have them work as a team."

"Start with a business-oriented senior product manager for product strategy. Make this person a Product Line Manager (PLM) or director. Now add a development-oriented Technical Product Manager (TPM) and a sales-oriented Product Marketing Manager (PMM)...."

Thanks to my friend Brian Massey for sending this link to me (and Steve Johnson for teaching me about the "Blog this" tool).