Advice for moving to a product role as a Senior Software Engineer
Posted by posiedon77@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 23 comments
Hi everyone! I have \~9 years of experience and I'm currently a Senior Software Engineer. I have a Bachelors as well as Masters in Computer Science, so my entire background is in tech.
I do not wish to continue down the tech path of progressing on the IC/Management track. I'm quite interested in the product side of the business.
Few other thoughts:
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I'm very flexible on salary and okay with a significant pay cut short term. I do understand that I won't get paid as much in the beginning as this is a career switch
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My understanding is that I'll be more suitable for a technical product, probably an internal platform team or a tech heavy product like developer tools.
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Would some random MBA help? I do not wish to do a full time MBA due to the huge costs associated with it. Just something that I can put on my resume to get more opportunities.
How can I use my tech background as a strength to move to such a role? Please let me know your thoughts and general advice. Thank you!
KosherBakon@reddit
I have 26 yoe in tech including 9 yrs as TPM, 7+ yrs as SWE, and 4+ yrs as EM so I feel qualified to answer.
If you're going into it for the right reasons then it can be very fulfilling. I pivoted myself from SWE to TPM and was much happier, as it aligned with my strengths. I loved not having to learn new tech stack minutae every year just to stay "current".
You don't need an MBA. The best option would be to start doing part time TPM work in a SWE role.
Feel free to DM / msg me if you want some help with this transition as a service. I am a tech career coach (even more fulfilling for me than TPM).
Equivalent-End-938@reddit
Can I dm you
KosherBakon@reddit
Of courseÂ
idiotsandwichbybirth@reddit
I'm late but can I dm you? I desperately need some advice
KosherBakon@reddit
Yeah DMa are open
cliffy979@reddit
Sounds great! đź‘Ś
Remarkable_Amoeba_87@reddit
DM'ed :)
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Thank you! DM'ed.
Aggressive_Ad_5454@reddit
Go take a class from PragmaticInstitute.com . They offer really good stuff to would-be product people.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Hmm. I'm curious. Have you tried it yourself? Did you find it helpful?
Aggressive_Ad_5454@reddit
Yes, the class I took from Pragmatic was career-defining helpful. Seriously good stuff.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Thanks!
Exciting-Bit-5260@reddit
Salary bands at my company are lower at the same levels in the PM side. You might want to make sure you can eventually get back to your target level salary.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Thanks, but yes, I'm okay with that.
dystopiadattopia@reddit
Aren't you afraid of all the meetings? My PO is usually in meetings morning till evening.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Not really. I'm an ambivert so actually I feel depressed if I don't talk to anyone. Sure a whole 8 hours of meetings might be too much sometimes, but in general, I don't mind them.
jkingsbery@reddit
As a Senior Software Engineer, there are often opportunities to get experience doing Product Manager tasks. For example, you can help do customer interviews, perform an analysis on the usability of your system, write a business case for prioritizing a particular feature, or offer to provide more detailed requirements for a part of the system. Even if you're not doing those things full-time, doing some of these things a bit first, seeing if you like them and getting feedback on them from a more experienced PM is probably a better first step than upending your job. Over time, if it's the right thing for you and your company, you can transition to a PM role having demonstrated you can do the job, rather than trying out a role you've never done before.
"Interested" can mean lots of things. I would expect questions on how that interest has manifested.
There certainly are advantages to working a domain you already know, but technical products come with some challenges. Because your a software engineer, you probably understand the technical needs of projects you've been on, but a product manager needs to anticipate the needs of lots of different kinds of use cases, which you might not have seen before. You'll have to get used to thinking more broadly.
Probably not. I've known PMs that have MBAs, but I've also known lots of PMs that don't have MBAs. For the most part in PM roles, people don't care about the MBA, they care that you can deliver what you need to, and that you have examples of having done that in the past to back it up.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Maybe my company was different, but what I saw was that our company hired people for specialised roles. So I was expected to spend 100% of my time on eng. PMs were super busy too and we did not have a culture of people transitioning roles as our company did not provide support for that. Every role in my company pretty much only hired people with 5+ years experience so changing careers was not an option for me.
Good to know that I don't need an MBA since I really wasn't keen on doing that.
PragmaticBoredom@reddit
What do you mean by this? Product Management is a role that requires management-type skills, but you’ll be doing much of that management without the authority of being a manager. It can be even more challenging to exert influence as a non-manager when the people doing the work don’t report to you.
Product Management is a challenging role when done right. If you’re viewing it as an easy way to stop coding, get out of the details, and become an “idea person” then you could be in for disappointment. (On the other hand, some companies have garbage product manager roles where that’s basically the expectation).
Proper product management is a lot of work. You will get away from coding, but you will also be plunged into a world where your life is dominated by meetings, conflicting demands, accountability for things you don’t have direct control over, and working with teams who have their own priorities that conflict with yours.
In tech? No. Going from developer to MBA to product manager is a confusing path through one’s career. A resume like that would have me question what you wanted to do. A lot of people want to get into Product Management because they think it’s an easy way to hide out inside a tech company with high compensation and low accountability. You need your resume to show that you’ve already been staying involved with product decisions and direction, not that you’ve been trying to game the system to get a sweet product job.
Build a resume that shows how your current experience qualifies you for a product role. Don’t try to collect credentials as a crutch.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
I recently worked on staring my own company with another co-founder. I was responsible for product and engineering, and my business partner was responsible for marketing, sales and operations. Since it was just the beginning, there wasn't a lot of tech involved, but it was a lot of finding product market fit, talking to customers and figuring out requirements and building something that customers really want. I really enjoyed the product role responsibilities there. Unfortunately it only lasted a few months, and it'd be better for me to have some paycheck coming in as well, which is why I wanted to move to product management.
Most of this applies to being a SWE too. Sure the number of meetings are less, but that's hardly an issue. Conflicting demands is a challenge as a SWE too. An eng manager also has to deal with these problems. As a senior engineer, I'm too expected to run my own prioritization to balance the work load. I could write the most beautiful code as a SWE but if there's no business impact, which is a result of PMs prioritization, the SWEs are not getting any promo, or worse, actually getting layed off. In a job, all of us depend on each other so every role involves accountability for at least some things they don't have direct control over.
rewddit@reddit
Your reasons here seem pretty sound. You were doing product-oriented work and found you enjoyed it. Cool.
I guess reading this, I'm asking myself why you don't already consider yourself a Product Manager. You have a few months of experience; great. I'd put that on your resume and give yourself the title of "Technical Product Manager." If anyone asks during the course of an interview why you pivoted, your story is solid. You were a dev, you wore a lot of hats when spinning up a company, found that you really enjoyed the upstream challenges of product management, and have found a niche that you love.
I'd just apply for more product management roles and not worry about getting an MBA or whatever (I have one, I don't think it'll give you any sort of edge). In the meantime, read up on more product management books, e.g. "Inspired" by Marty Cagan.
posiedon77@reddit (OP)
Thank you so much! That's very solid advice!
El_Gato_Gigante@reddit
Any candidate that pitches product management as their "true passion" is throwing up a red flag. A candidate needs to sell themselves, but this is coming off as disingenuous at best. Maybe some people are actually passionate about this, but the vast majority are not. Sell your interest, sell your ideas, sell your hustle, don't act like you're in love with this job. The term "passion" is used by recruiters in job postings.