Do this instead of studying product management
Instead of studying product management, kick-start your small side-hustle and create a product end-to-end. Don't worry about doing it well - not everything you make has to be perfect. Just do it.
This is a piece of advice I give all aspiring Product Managers when they ask me what they can do to transition to product management from other roles.
There are many reasons behind why I prioritise working on a project before any other transition strategy:
✅ It gives you maximum flexibility - it's up to you what idea to take, how much time to invest into it, and when to stop.
✅ It's an enriching experience - to see how you help other people by solving something they've been struggling with before.
✅ It shows you what it takes to become a Product Manager and helps you make an informed career decision.
✅ It teaches you relevant skills (for real).
✅ It helps you to get the first job in Product.
So how do you decide on the type of project that gets you the most learning on what Product Managers do?
You have the following options:
⭐️ Option 1: Create a software product like a web or mobile app using no-code software development tools.
Yes, that's not a joke - you can build at least a first functional version of a tech product without coding.
Have you used Lego plastic bricks at least once? Using the no-code tools will be pretty similar to your experience with Lego.
These tools have pre-built drag-and-drop building blocks that have been coded to perform specific tasks. You use these building blocks like Lego parts to design new web or mobile apps.
What product idea to choose is probably the next question that comes to your mind.
I recommend you to explore these two groups of ideas:
Group one of ideas: problems that bother you and you face daily - either at work or home.
Group two of ideas: problems that belong to the space where you need to connect demand and supply to solve them.
For example, the first project I worked on to gain product skills came from these two groups of ideas. Back then, I've been trying to solve a problem of people like me - busy consultants who traveled for business every week and couldn't maintain their fitness routine consistently.
I've built an app prototype to do live workouts with fitness instructors to address this problem.
⭐️ Option 2: Create a non-tech product, for example, launch a podcast or a newsletter, or a video course.
Yes, that's right - to master core product skills, you don't necessarily have to work on technology-enabled products.
First of all, a product is about the value that it can provide to customers and businesses, and technology helps deliver this value.
There are plenty of other ways of how you can bring value to customers and solve their burning problems.
Launching a podcast is one such example. You have to solve multiple challenges to build it:
selecting content that will fit with an audience,
getting things done to produce and deliver each episode in time,
retaining and growing podcast audience, and
making the content better.
You'll get the fundamental product skills you need to create successful products by following these steps.
Working on these types of non-tech products will be the most beneficial if you want to become part of today's booming creators economy.
For instance, if you want to join companies like Udemy or Skillshare (popular marketplaces for selling online video courses) or companies like Teachable or NasAcademy that develop platforms to empower individual creators to create and sell digital products.
And finally, you are probably thinking now - are there any projects to avoid?
Yes, certainly. Please avoid selecting an idea in the deep tech space - when you need to research and develop a sophisticated technology or algorithm to validate a problem or solution.
For example, in my previous role as the director of product, I worked on a technology to extract information from complex business documents that only humans could read.
Our solution implied the development of a complicated mechanism in the natural-language processing space that could accurately read and understand the information from the documents.
Creating that kind of product is not supported by no-code platforms. So if one of your ideas belongs to the deep tech space, put it on hold and continue brainstorming.