Fall into Winter: December 2016

Saturday, the 17th of December was supposed to mark the start of a happy holiday week. Having buried myself in work for many months, I was eagerly awaiting some time with friends and family. My boyfriend and I had made a plan: We would celebrate my birthday early (which is on Christmas Eve), fly to spend the Christmas week with our respective families, and reconnect in San Francisco to ring in the new year together.

My boyfriend Ted (not his real name) had mentioned his office’s winter clothing drive, so I had planned to spend the afternoon Kondo’ing before my early birthday dinner. Unexpected, Ted texted me:

Ted: What are you up to? I’m nearby.

Me: Hey! I’m cleaning out my closet.

Ted: Can I come join you?

Me: Aww, of course you can.

In my mind, I saw Ted staring at me lovingly while I struggled to part with old clothes. I’d hold another shirt up to the light, explain memories tied to it nostalgically, and he’d jokingly ask me whether it gives me joy or not. I’d end up tossing it into the growing pile, laughing.

But then Ted stepped into my apartment. With teary eyes, he seemed a bit anxious.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, worried.

“Let’s sit down” he said.

After a painful pause, he continued, “Koun, I don’t think we’re on the same wavelength.”

Oh. God.

We climbed aboard a roller-coaster. First it was him saying we should break up, then it was me in shock, then it was us both crying, then me rambling, then us both crying more, and finally me in a puddle. When we couldn’t find anything else to say, we talked more. Over two hours later, I was so emotionally drained that I barely noticed when he walked out the door.

Was this really the end? Could this really be happening?

Amidst discarded clothes, I curled up in a ball. As someone who prides herself upon being rational and in control, I was completely out of my element. Not only heartbroken, I was shocked. I couldn’t begin to imagine what came next. All I could do was hurt.

Our breakup came as an utter surprise. He’d been so sweet throughout our time together. A week earlier he’d asked me to join him on a weekend trip with his friends because he “didn’t want to be without me.” A month earlier, he’d told me he loved me for the first time, given me keys to his apartment, and taken me house-hunting. He’d been my best boyfriend. I recalled zero negative memories of him. Now, my world was upside-down, inside-out, and twisted beyond recognition.

There’s never a good time for a breakup, but this seemed downright cruel. The worst birthday, Christmas and New Year of my thirty-five years. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. I could barely remember who I was. The person I had learned to trust the most had broken my heart with no warning. My mind wandered aimlessly, seeking answers.

What was wrong with me? What was wrong with him? What was wrong with the world?

Spring 2017: Sadness into Self-Awareness

By March, the clouds outside had begun to clear and the sun was shining more often after an unusually rainy winter in San Francisco. But in my mind, there was still mostly darkness.

My sadness felt all-encompassing and at times I was inconsolable. Well-intentioned friends reminded me that the passing of time would help, and I knew they were right. But adding insult to injury, time was passing SOOOO slowly. Could the world be less humane? I scraped up what motivation I could muster, and tried to avoid spending too much time idle or by myself. I journaled. I spent time with friends. I read dozens of books.

One book that resonated in particular was Sheryl Sandberg’s Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy — chronicling her path forward after her husband’s unexpected 2015 death. To be sure, I wasn’t mourning anyone’s death, but the loss of my future life with Ted had left me feeling empty, and what’s worse, I hadn’t given myself permission to grieve. But I learned that however small or big one’s loss, grieving requires time and honest reflection, and also empathy for oneself. For months, my life had been way out of balance, and it wasn’t balancing itself back out. For the first time, I realized that I needed professional help, so I started weekly counseling with a therapist.

At work, I tried to keep myself together but I found myself crying in many 1-on-1 meetings. Although I’m a proponent of bringing one’s whole self to work, this was too much. My seasoned can-do attitude was nowhere to be found. My supportive manager and colleagues suggested that I take a few weeks off to take care of myself. They offered to pick up the slack.

It bothered me immensely that I didn’t know when I’d be better. A few years prior, I’d recovered from a ruptured appendix (with the doctor’s prescribed 6 weeks of rest), and though I’d been anxious about slowing down for so long, I’d done fine with a timeline to give me context. Grief was a different animal; I had no prescription to follow. Slowing down at work didn’t sit right with me, especially as the product manager on an impending product launch. It had been three months since the breakup, and still I lacked the mental capacity to handle otherwise normal work stresses. I realized that I needed to take more drastic actions.

I embarked on week-long trip to clear my mind. I spent the time mostly disconnected, on a boat — mostly reading, reflecting, and journaling. Just after I set foot on land again, I submitted my notice at Square and set about transitioning my responsibilities over the next two months.

Quitting work to focus on myself was very hard for me. But along with seeking professional therapy, it was my first honest admission that I needed and deserved more. Foreign as the concept of being unemployed was, I made the commitment to do it in hopes of turning myself around. Perhaps I could return stronger, wiser, and more resilient. My colleagues were sad to see me leave but they universally called my decision brave. I remain incredibly grateful for their support and encouragement.

Summer 2017

Planning for No Plan

Transitioning my responsibilities would take several weeks, but the process was relatively straightforward. Rather than enjoy the absence of chaos and look forward to my impending time off, the idea started to give me anxiety. To quiet my inner critic, which didn’t know how to process the concept of unstructured life, I started to plan my time off. My first urge was to set an end date and an end state for my break. In my mind, the clearest way to do that was to lock in the future start date…of my next job.

After speaking with a dozen companies, I was fortunate to receive several offers. My internal critic urged me to make a decision quickly and objectively. But as I went about my normal planning routine, a less familiar, kinder and more subtle voice spoke to me in my quiet moments. And that voice kept getting louder as I was trying to make a decision. It took a while, but through honest introspection and encouragement from friends who were worried about me, I finally admitted that I wasn’t ready to consider a new job.

My old playbook had told me that first, I should check all the professional boxes. Then and only then, I could devote time and energy to myself. In hindsight, what I needed was the opposite. I needed to actually close the current chapter of my life and open a new one. This wasn’t just a pit stop to get back on track. I needed to live with the discomfort of not having a job to define me. I needed to wrestle with the possibility that when I was ready to go back to work, I might not be able to step right into a job I’d love.

So in June, with no specified end date, I began my break. My goal was simple: to take care of myself. I felt excited and nervous — nervous because it was unfamiliar territory, and excited because I could feel deep down that this was right for me.

When I talked to people about taking a break, they’d often ask if I would spend the time traveling the world. I love traveling. I once took a sabbatical from Facebook and traveled adventurously for nearly three months. This time, rather than travel to new lands, I wanted to explore the hills and valleys of my own life. I basically wanted to learn to date myself.

How did I adjust to having no responsibilities and no plan? Terribly at first. For a few weeks I sat and milled around restlessly in San Francisco, worried that I wasn’t maximizing each day. Work had provided me with social interaction, camaraderie and a sense of belonging. Absent those default interactions, sometimes I unintentionally spent days without talking to a soul.

Yearning for a semblance of structure and human connection, I wrote a list of things I wanted to do and roughly how often I wanted to do them. Thankfully I fought off the urge to set quarterly goals.

• Daily: exercise; meditate; write down 3 things I’m grateful for and 1 thing I’d learned about myself; have 1 meaningful social interaction
• Weekly: try something I’d never done before
• Monthly: volunteer; host a happy hour/dinner party
• General: take art classes, cook, research and learn about topics of interest, binge-watch TV shows without guilt, spend some quality time with mom, get certified as a Pilates instructor

Mindfulness and Self-compassion

In case it’s not obvious: I am a “do-er.” It’s generally a positive trait that’s served me well professionally. An ex-colleague told me that she coaches her team to “channel your inner-Koun” when something seems too hard. Historically, you could find me either doing something, figuring out how to do something, or planning something to do.

Early in therapy, I asked impatient questions: “How do I get out of this grief? How I do I shake this off? What can I do to speed this up?” I was assuming that emotional and mental issues could be “solved” like a product could be built. Turns out, you can’t solve life just by doing or planning — sometimes you just need to let things be. It sounds so simple, but it wasn’t easy.

Being fiercely independent has been a central tenet of my life. Through therapy, I learned how I’d come to be this way. When I was fourteen, I’d emigrated to the US from Korea without my parents. By reflecting on this experience, I came to understand that it had cemented in me an uncompromising self-reliance: If I wanted something to happen, I must do it myself. As a teenager in a new world — without familiar friends, without parents to help me, fumbling with a new language, struggling to assimilate to a new culture — I’d had no one to lean on. Over time, I’d come to believe that I never should.

As a strident and solo teenager, I’d set my ambition to eleven and never looked back. Twenty years later, I came to realize that while climbing hill after hill, like so many of us, I’d failed to smell the roses and enjoy the view.

Per my therapist’s suggestion, I enrolled in a Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program at UCSF’s Osher Center. Over eight weeks, the intensive program taught me how to practice mindfulness: How to be, how to stop all the doing, and how to relax into the present, without trying to fill your days up with anything in particular. It wasn’t easy to make meditation a habit, but with their help, I was able to take small, noticeable steps. Even unremarkable actions like brushing my teeth, enjoying a morning coffee, cooking a meal, listening to others, or working out, became an opportunity to notice my thoughts and feelings. My definition of “doing” became more generous. Even “non-doing” became a practice.

Something else I learned in therapy was that I‘ve been very hard on myself. Not only had I been struggling with the emotions from a breakup, I’d been scolding myself for not shrugging it off and I’d felt embarrassed about being so distraught. My inner critic was ruthless:

Do you deserve to feel this badly? So selfish to let your team down. How can you feel so sorry for yourself when your life is so full of great things, when you’ve never gone hungry or without a roof over your head?

Though I’d achieved many things, I’d never taken care of my emotional self. I’d been busy learning English, adapting to life in a new country, getting into a good college, getting a good job, launching products, supporting my parents. The list never got shorter, so dealing with feelings was a nuisance and a luxury I couldn’t afford. Finally, emotional negligence had caught up with me.

I am slowly learning self-compassion. It is ok for me to feel sad and to grieve the end of a relationship. It is ok for me to give my 14yr-old self a pat on the back and to acknowledge that it must have been hard for her. It is ok to be angry at my ex for the way he broke up with me. It’s ok to devote time to getting my life back in order, even if it inconveniences others. It’s ok not to accept the weight of the world all the time — It’s ok not to take myself so seriously.

Relationships

It took me six long months to muster the strength to face Ted. It took a while for me to truly come to terms with the fact that no matter how deeply I wanted a relationship to work, it wasn’t something I could do by myself. And though it saddens me a bit to admit it, romantic love isn’t enough to make a relationship last.

I also learned a lot about myself in the process. In relationships, I had been ignoring my own needs in order to support my partner. In fact, long-lasting relationships require mutual vulnerability. Each person must trust the other to honor their most authentic self. Though I’ve tended to be the “giver” in relationships until now, being more self-aware will help me to find a better balance. Although I did love many qualities about Ted, I have a new respect for emotional maturity and seek a partner with whom I can communicate more openly and consistently.

This past year has made me think a lot about other relationships in my life as well — colleagues, friends, and family. Something that surprised me was that the people who are most empathetic when you’re struggling aren’t always those who are closest to you when you’re succeeding. Nonetheless, gratitude was the most dominant feeling by far.

The night of the break up, some friends immediately drove an hour to keep me company. Another friend called from Berlin to console me. One friend who was visiting family in India sent a DoorDash delivery of flan! Other friends admitted not being able to relate personally but offered whatever they could. My younger cousins took care of me during the holidays that terrible winter. Colleagues at work cried with me when I told them I planned to quit and take care of myself, and many of them supported me knowing that my quitting would make their lives harder in the short term. I was only ever able to heal because of their kind words, understanding and support.

All the people who supported me inspired me to be more authentic, so that I too could be a better friend, colleague and human, and to support people when they needed me most.

Finding Work: Round 1

Although I had made peace with not treating my time off like another job, I found it rewarding to use my new flexibility to explore different areas of opportunity with an open mind. I referenced a list of criteria I’d used to find a new opportunity after leaving Facebook:

• Great people and culture
• Mission driven; Solves a real human problem
• Builds products I can relate to and love
• Early → growth stage: opportunity to make impact, learn, and grow with the company

Initially I narrowed in on early-stage, hardware<>software integrated companies only. Quickly I realized that it was too limiting, so I decided to include software-only companies as well. I also considered tech non-profits, to see if I could find a way to more directly do something good for the world.

I reached out to an ex-Facebook employees group and asked for recommendations and insights, explaining my thoughts on the search for my next meaningful job. It must have resonated with many of them; the post received dozens of comments. I met privately with about a dozen people and explored various ideas. These explorations helped me learn a bit more about myself and refine my criteria:

• I preferred the opportunity to work as a PM at a for-profit company
• Mission-orientation was not enough for me. I wanted to work on a product that I could personally get excited about.
• I should be open to smaller companies within larger parent companies, where a promising new technology had been germinated.
• Very early stage was probably not for me. Given that I enjoy working cross-functionally, working within a very small, homogenous group might feel stifling.

Finding Work: Round 2

As I continued to hone my preferences and self-knowledge, self-driving car companies kept popping up on my radar. Outside of Tesla, there were many whose size and stage seemed perfect: Waymo (Alphabet), Cruise (GM), Level 5 (Lyft), ATG (Uber) and others. The more I researched the industry, the more energy I gained. I knew I was onto something.

Getting self-driving car companies to consider me for a lead PM role was challenging. I literally had no colleagues in the industry, and generally they were seeking someone with more relevant or more technical expertise than me. At Square I’d been entrusted with flagship hardware products without prior hardware experience, because I’d had the good fortune of proving myself capable in other arenas. Self-driving car companies generally couldn’t take that chance on me, a noob and an unknown.

As I began to lose hope, a former Square executive, who knew nothing about my search for a role in the self-driving car industry, reached out and asked me if I would consider a PM job at a rather stealthy self-driving car startup. Through several chats and interviews, I grew increasingly impressed with the team and their vision. The company culture and role also seemed like strong fits for me. I’m so pleased to say that I’ll be joining Zoox in December. I am thrilled to be a part of the self-driving car revolution with an amazing team who I can learn from and grow with.

What did I learn from this search? Again, when you let life be, the right opportunity might just find you.

Autumn 2017: A Year Later

Autumn is harvest season, and a time of thanksgiving. Thankful is exactly how I feel. Although this year began with what felt like unbearable sadness, I’m now as ready for the world as I’ve ever been. Although my time-off was triggered by an unpleasant event, I am thankful that I had the opportunity to get to know myself a bit better. Armed with many lessons, recharged with a full heart, gratitude, and love — I am stronger than I was a year ago.

By no means am I the first person to have gone through a hard breakup, and who knows — perhaps this won’t even be my hardest emotional trial. But what is most personal to each of us has the strongest potential to resonate with others, so I am sharing my deeply personal story with the hope that someone else might gain strength from it.

I am very aware that taking an extended break was my privilege. Not everyone can afford to take a few months off, enroll in classes and therapy, or to be picky about employment. Not everyone has a wealth of supporters to call on. I certainly don’t take this for granted. But I too would probably have said that I couldn’t afford the time or money but now that I’ve done it, I know it’s an investment well made.

As my time off comes to an end, I’m pleased to have kept generally to my commitments. I’ve journaled regularly, kept to my physical routines, started watercoloring, and have been diving deep into interesting new areas. I am sure it will be much harder once I start working full-time, especially learning the ropes and getting acclimated to a new industry. No doubt the learning curve will be steep. But I hope to bring both a renewed enthusiasm and the benefit of a beginner’s mind to my new professional challenges.

For my friends who are reading this, please help me maintain my balance. I’m sure I will falter and I will continue to need your support. I still want to excel and achieve professionally, but I also want to be there for myself. And I want to be there for you.

Now finally, I can see that even in my darkest hours, I was blessed. I offer one of my favorite blessings to you:

May you be safe and protected.

May you be happy the way you are.

May you be healthy in body and mind.

May you live with peace and well-being.

May your heart be open and free.

“How big’s your company now? How big’s your team?”

Often, professional success is weighed by the size of the team one manages.Thankfully, in the tech industry, it’s increasingly common for companies to define two separate career tracks: Individual Contributor (IC) & Manager/Leadership (e.g. Google, Facebook, Square, etc.). These distinct paths are most commonly seen in the context of engineering levels, where engineers have the option to choose a track based on their interests and skills. Keeping separate/parallel tracks helps to dispel the perception of people-management as the only path to success. The two track system formally acknowledges that one need not manage a team of people or build an empire in order to advance in one’s career. As an IC, or Individual Contributor, one can climb the same number of rungs…but on a parallel and no less important ladder.

As a Product Manager, I’ve worked closely with many well-respected, senior IC engineers who led by influence, through their technical expertise and who worked on challenging projects with significant scopes and immense complexity. I have seen some senior IC engineers report to junior Engineering Managers (EMs) with far fewer years of work experience. Because the Engineering IC track is well established, people understand that IC and EM are different types of roles, neither one inherently better. Reporting relationships are largely independent of the seniority of IC engineers or engineering managers.

I love the two-track system because it expects that managers deliberately choose to manage. How many of you have colleagues and friends who’ve suffered from bad managers? Have you suffered from a bad manager? Maybe you’ve even been a bad manager. And yes, the adage is often true: people leave managers, not companies. When a manager is assigned exclusively because the person has performed well as an IC or worse, because the person has been at the company for a long time, the team is going to have a bad time.

Many take the responsibility of people management for granted, not fully realizing the necessary skills and commitment required of such a role. Sometimes, even when that gravity is recognized, some are simply not (yet?) cut out to lead even if they wish to be. Finally, some may not desire to be managers even if they have natural talent for it.

By making the decision deliberate, only those who choose to be managers are granted the responsibility. Engineers are expected to perform research to decide which path they want to take — they seek to understand the roles deeply, ensuring that they’re seeking challenges that are aligned to their capabilities and aspirations. Ideally, if they decide to pursue management, they are similarly expected to develop skills necessary to be thoughtful and effective people managers. Managers should be evaluated with criteria that measures and optimizes for behaviors that build and maintain successful teams.

Does the two track system work for Product Managers?

Theoretically, this two-track system can also apply to product management. My understanding is that some larger companies do indeed have very senior IC Product Managers (PMs). However, the path to becoming a senior level “IC” Product Manager seems not to be as well established for the PM discipline. I have not personally witnessed a case where a senior PM maintained his/her IC status without hitting the proverbial glass ceiling. In almost all cases of which I’m aware, senior PMs were eventually made to manage a team of Product Managers — sometimes by choice though more often, by not-so-subtle coaxing.

Up until recently I was the most senior IC Product manager at Square. To get there, I fought a long and arduous battle. Every year, leadership would ask me if I would manage others. People often assumed that the more junior PMs that I worked with and mentored were my direct reports. When I would dispel that assumption, people would look at me sideways and ask, “How are you so senior and have no direct reports?” Even when I interviewed for new PM roles, the interviewers would ask me why I hadn’t yet managed a team of Product Managers. “Grrr..” I would think, “No senior IC engineer would be asked to defend being an IC!”

So….really, why don’t you want to manage a team?

I have never been a 100% dedicated people manager, but for several years I did manage a team of four. I split my time between being a manager and being an IC, which required significant cognitive switching costs. I found that when I worked on products that required my full attention, it was tough to give my best to the products and to simultaneously take good care of my people. I didn’t like choosing between apples and oranges or sacrificing my personal life and sleep in order to do a good job. I told myself that I would only manage a team if the conditions allowed me to be an accessible and available manager who could dedicate ample time to my direct reports (btw this view is corroborated by Google’s Project Oxygen results). And to be honest, even that idealistic scenario never sounded especially appealing compared to the type of products I was product managing at the time, an observation which felt to me like a sound reason NOT to aspire to management at the same time.

What was clear was that I really enjoyed being at the grassroots and in the weeds of projects, working directly with engineers, designers, and cross-functional partners. I thrived when working on new, complex, and increasingly broadly-scoped products that challenged me and allowed me to develop into a stronger product manager. For me, management was not the clearest path to achieving these things.

While not managing (formally), one of my favorite experiences was mentoring several PMs and aspiring PMs when they sought my guidance. I believe that this relationship allowed me to be more genuine and honest, without the complexity of reporting lines. Ironically perhaps, I was in those situations, better positioned than most of the managers to share relevant experiences, best practices, guides/templates, and general career advice with other PMs. Not only having been in their shoes before, but being currently in their shoes seemed to lend my perspective significant credibility.

As a PM, I’ve especially enjoyed working on purpose-organized product teams, where several PMs would come together for a specified duration to work on a large and complex product. Not only did I have a meaty set of goals to run towards, I could also tap into my nurturing side. I wanted to ensure that people could grow and learn while achieving objective success. Being a team player without undue hierarchy allowed me to connect with others on a personal level, and to avoid the politics of career advancement.

Another benefit of being a strategic IC and product owner is that I have the luxury of a bird’s-eye view of what is or is not working on a project. Also, I can exploit a clear vantage into the organizational requirements that when improved, will gain efficiency and allow us to build better products in the future. Having both a macro and micro vantage has allowed me to recommend specific objective improvements — for instance — after a recent project, successful in many rights, I proposed to management that we create two brand-new roles and to add more definition and clarity to the existing roles on the team. These needs hadn’t been obvious to my manager — who though talented, wasn’t privy to the idiosyncrasies of the project.

As a senior IC PM, I’ve enjoyed many aspects of management but without the pressure of having it on my job description. Through self-awareness and self-reflection, I’ve realized that I am gaining more joy doing IC work than by being a manager. My long term career aspiration is to do my part as a leader, in a group of smart and passionate people, and to build something meaningful. This notion of leader doesn’t require having direct reports, and might be complicated or even distracted by it.

Is it possible to remain an IC Product Manager and to have a successful career?

I wish this were more clear. Some aspects of the Product Manager role itself could render it inherently more rare that senior IC PM roles exist in a company. There might not be a project / product area that is big enough in scope, complexity or that requires significant strategic planning, all things that might justify staffing a senior IC PM. But if there are big, complex, and less well-defined projects at companies, here are a few scenarios wherein a senior IC PM might be a good fit:

Often, complex products require more than one PM. You might divide the product into a few areas of ownership, staff multiple PMs, and give the the most challenging area to the senior IC PM. Depending on the circumstances, it may make sense to break the flat structure to make the senior IC PM the “lead PM.” In the lead PM role, the senior PM might be responsible for consistency and cohesiveness but not have people management responsibilities. On the other hand, the lead PM could be the people manager of other PMs on that product. Critically, this should be a an option, not a default. In my view, people management responsibilities can be independent of a ensuring a product’s consistency and cohesiveness. Successful products can be achieved through fluid communication, collaboration, and mentorship.

Although this may sound straightforward, the truth is that currently, the two-track career path is not yet well established for PMs in many tech companies. More likely, your competency as a senior PM may questioned if you don’t have or particularly desire management experience. Risks notwithstanding, I plan to continue pursuing roles as senior IC PM, until and unless I make a deliberate decision to be a PM manager. I honestly don’t know if this plan will stifle my career advancement in the near term, but it’s something that I’m compelled to try, because I’m confident that it can work for the me and others like me, and that it can facilitate the most success for our respective products and companies.

In order for the two-track PM model to work broadly, I implore those of you who are PMs, work with PMs or manage PMs to fight to make sure your individual contributors are not only doing what they do best and want to do, but that they are also advancing in their careers with incrementally meaty and impactful products, compensation and opportunities for leadership.

It’s my sincere hope that before long, it will be far more common for Product Managers and other non-engineering staff to have the same career advancement opportunities that senior engineer individual contributors enjoy today.

I want to hear your thoughts and comments. Do these concepts resonate with you? Do you know of a tech company that has a well-established IC PM track? Are there ways to make this more common?

Heads up, we’ve moved! If you’d like to continue keeping up with the latest technical content from Square please visit us at our new home https://developer.squareup.com/blog

I am a lead Hardware Product Manager at Square, where I’ve worked most recently on our contactless and chip reader. But when I started at Square 3 years ago, I worked on pure software products (as I had also done for 6 years previously at Facebook). I’ve always loved that Square provides an integrated solution to small businesses with both hardware and software. But to be honest, the only thing I knew about the hardware team’s area of the office was that it was off-limits to visitors.

It wasn’t until I actually switched to working on hardware that I realized the complex inner workings of making a hardware product — especially software-integrated, mass-produced hardware.

PMing integrated hardware is not as common in Silicon Valley tech companies. While my experience is limited to Square, I’ve noticed a few key differences in making the transition from software to hardware.

Scope and Complexity

I switched to hardware because I wanted to learn about something exciting and completely new. I should be careful what I wish for — the first few months felt like information overload!

Of course, there are plenty of complicated software systems, and just as many simple hardware products — but the fact that there are so many Engineering teams involved in building hardware makes the PM’s scope quite sizeable.

A typical software PM might work with two or three different Eng teams. For hardware at Square, I can count at least nine different teams — Client (Android, iOS), Server, Embedded Software (Firmware), Hardware Security, Platform Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Manufacturing Test Engineering, QA Engineering — and that’s just for Eng. Even for design, I work with both industrial design and software product design.

Launch and Iteration Cadence

Iterating on a software feature or product is mostly within your team’s control, but hardware manufacturing, of course, involves numerous external parties in addition to careful coordination among many teams within Square. Hardware development also brings a natural timeline that means once you cross certain milestones, you hit points of no return, where changing course can mean major delays in your roadmap — not to mention major additional costs!

For example, Square’s contactless and chip reader has red and green LED lights. What if, in the middle of development, the PM had decided to add blue LEDs? Between the board design team redesigning and prototyping; the manufacturer ensuring it can produce the new design; actual production; sourcing new components (that will be delivered on time and at cost); additional testing; and updates to firmware — this process can take weeks.

Compare that to a UI color change on a software product that usually takes minutes.

It’s normal for a brand-new hardware product to take more than a year to ship. Even iterations on software updates for already-launched hardware products can require a combination of server, client, firmware, and OS changes, all of which make for a much more time-intensive process.

Physicality of a Product

Hardware is, by nature, a tangible product that ships to customers, meaning hardware PMs have another separate issue on their plates: delivery and returns!

Customers can’t just download their hardware, or sign up by clicking a button. Whether it’s delivered to a business address or purchased through a major retailer, product purchasing requires another suite of functions: supply & demand, fulfillment, logistics, packaging, and retail partnership.

Packaging plays a crucial role: it’s the first way users experience the product. Good packaging is attractive, functional, and durable, not to mention includes clear instructions on getting started. And returns are much more than simply reversing delivery logistics — what about warranties, or diagnosing issues and failures, or refurbishing?

Certifications

You’ve probably seen labels on your phone or appliances proving your electronics conform to standards and certification specs. These regulatory bodies ensure that all electronic products used in a certain region are manufactured to meet a certain emission and safety standards. And guess what? If you’re creating a payment-processing device, you’re looking at an entirely separate world of certifications.

These standards are great, but sometimes they have specific set of requirements that can dictate or limit product behaviors. It provides the product team with extra challenges in coming up with ways to develop a product that meets all the requirements while not degrading the user experience.

Sounds like hardware is complex, time-consuming, and full of constraints. Why do you love it so much?

It’s called HARDware for a reason! Sorry for the cheesy joke, but that’s what makes this field great. It’s a true challenge to create beautiful, functional software-integrated hardware — and an even greater challenge when mass-producing products like Square’s hardware, that is used and beloved worldwide. There is something special about a product one can touch and feel physically that is enjoyed by so many around you.

Switching to a hardware definitely stretched my abilities as a PM. I had to step up my game in communications and creative problem solving. Documentation becomes more important than ever with so many parties involved, product decisions to be made, and requirements to be understood. Advance planning and testing is a must when any changes can throw a huge wrench in product schedules. With the level of quality Square strives, PM also ends up sweating even the small details because we want what’s best for the user experience even if it means more work — just the sheer volume of product decisions to make increases the scope of PM. And keeping a team motivated throughout a process that spans months or even years is no small feat.

I feel very lucky that I got a taste of product managing both hardware and software, and even luckier that I got to do that at Square — a company that makes beautiful solutions that integrate both hardware and software and are loved by many. So far, my experience product managing hardware products has been awesome, and maybe this post will get some of you who love challenges excited to work on one as well!

Product managing an integrated hardware product at Square was originally published in Square Corner Blog on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

It wasn’t until I actually switched to working on hardware that I realized the complex inner workings of making a hardware product — especially software-integrated, mass-produced hardware.

PMing integrated hardware is not as common in Silicon Valley tech companies. While my experience is limited to Square, I’ve noticed a few key differences in making the transition from software to hardware.

Scope and Complexity

I switched to hardware because I wanted to learn about something exciting and completely new. I should be careful what I wish for — the first few months felt like information overload!

Of course, there are plenty of complicated software systems, and just as many simple hardware products — but the fact that there are so many Engineering teams involved in building hardware makes the PM’s scope quite sizeable.

A typical software PM might work with two or three different Eng teams. For hardware at Square, I can count at least nine different teams — Client (Android, iOS), Server, Embedded Software (Firmware), Hardware Security, Platform Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Manufacturing Test Engineering, QA Engineering — and that’s just for Eng. Even for design, I work with both industrial design and software product design.

Launch and Iteration Cadence

Iterating on a software feature or product is mostly within your team’s control, but hardware manufacturing, of course, involves numerous external parties in addition to careful coordination among many teams within Square. Hardware development also brings a natural timeline that means once you cross certain milestones, you hit points of no return, where changing course can mean major delays in your roadmap — not to mention major additional costs!

For example, Square’s contactless and chip reader has red and green LED lights. What if, in the middle of development, the PM had decided to add blue LEDs? Between the board design team redesigning and prototyping; the manufacturer ensuring it can produce the new design; actual production; sourcing new components (that will be delivered on time and at cost); additional testing; and updates to firmware — this process can take weeks.

Compare that to a UI color change on a software product that usually takes minutes.

It’s normal for a brand-new hardware product to take more than a year to ship. Even iterations on software updates for already-launched hardware products can require a combination of server, client, firmware, and OS changes, all of which make for a much more time-intensive process.

Physicality of a Product

Hardware is, by nature, a tangible product that ships to customers, meaning hardware PMs have another separate issue on their plates: delivery and returns!

Customers can’t just download their hardware, or sign up by clicking a button. Whether it’s delivered to a business address or purchased through a major retailer, product purchasing requires another suite of functions: supply & demand, fulfillment, logistics, packaging, and retail partnership.

Packaging plays a crucial role: it’s the first way users experience the product. Good packaging is attractive, functional, and durable, not to mention includes clear instructions on getting started. And returns are much more than simply reversing delivery logistics — what about warranties, or diagnosing issues and failures, or refurbishing?

Certifications

You’ve probably seen labels on your phone or appliances proving your electronics conform to standards and certification specs. These regulatory bodies ensure that all electronic products used in a certain region are manufactured to meet a certain emission and safety standards. And guess what? If you’re creating a payment-processing device, you’re looking at an entirely separate world of certifications.

These standards are great, but sometimes they have specific set of requirements that can dictate or limit product behaviors. It provides the product team with extra challenges in coming up with ways to develop a product that meets all the requirements while not degrading the user experience.

Sounds like hardware is complex, time-consuming, and full of constraints. Why do you love it so much?

It’s called HARDware for a reason! Sorry for the cheesy joke, but that’s what makes this field great. It’s a true challenge to create beautiful, functional software-integrated hardware — and an even greater challenge when mass-producing products like Square’s hardware, that is used and beloved worldwide. There is something special about a product one can touch and feel physically that is enjoyed by so many around you.

Switching to a hardware definitely stretched my abilities as a PM. I had to step up my game in communications and creative problem solving. Documentation becomes more important than ever with so many parties involved, product decisions to be made, and requirements to be understood. Advance planning and testing is a must when any changes can throw a huge wrench in product schedules. With the level of quality Square strives, PM also ends up sweating even the small details because we want what’s best for the user experience even if it means more work — just the sheer volume of product decisions to make increases the scope of PM. And keeping a team motivated throughout a process that spans months or even years is no small feat.

I feel very lucky that I got a taste of product managing both hardware and software, and even luckier that I got to do that at Square — a company that makes beautiful solutions that integrate both hardware and software and are loved by many. So far, my experience product managing hardware products has been awesome, and maybe this post will get some of you who love challenges excited to work on one as well!

Originally published at https://developer.squareup.com on February 20, 2017.

I worked at Facebook for 6 years before joining Square 3 years ago. Almost every interviewee at Square asks me why I left Facebook. There is no doubt in my mind that Facebook was and still is a great place to work. I learned a lot and feel grateful and lucky to have been a part of Facebook during its crucial period of growth. But I had good reasons why I decided to leave and have no regrets. Maybe some of my thought process will help you when/if you are considering embarking on a new journey with a different company.

Before you think about switching roles or companies, I think the most important thing is to do a bit of research about — yourself. Being self-aware and being honest about what you enjoy and do not enjoy can be very helpful in decision-making and providing you that gut check.

For me, I knew that I was the type of person who always seeks a change of scenery. Being bored or complacent is one of the worst fears for me, so I’ve always sought change in my role, job, industry, or city every 2–3 years. Another thing I know about me is, I like learning new things and challenging myself, and once I commit to something, I tend to give it my all. So I was pretty careful about what I chose to commit myself to. I was also aware that there were pros and cons to this type of personality. Nonetheless, knowing this about myself was very helpful in making the difficult decision to leave Facebook.

During my 6 years at Facebook, I was a business analyst, a product analyst, and a product manager. I also had the opportunity to manage a team of analysts and to work on a lot of different products in various stages. When I was trying to look for the next exciting change of scenery within Facebook after my 6 year stint, I ran into a few problems.

I knew too much about the reputation or the problems of a team/org or person. Honestly, no team, organization, or company is perfect. But even if a product seemed interesting to me, if I initially knew that I would not work well with some key people in the team, it was hard for me to get excited about it because we all know having compatible co-workers is invaluable. Similarly, even if I really liked the key leaders on a team, if the product wasn’t exciting to me, it was hard for a product manager to switch to that team.

And truthfully, I was getting a bit tired of working on social media and realized that I am not really passionate about ads-based revenue making. There are actually a lot of interesting and challenging problems in both social media and ad spaces, but I was learning about my likes and dislikes through my experience.

I even considered moving to a different office in a different city, but at the time, most core product decisions were made in HQ, so that decision would have optimized for something other than working on a product I was excited about. In short, I was becoming too picky and jaded, and I didn’t want to stay at Facebook in that state.

At the same time, Facebook was on its way to becoming a behemoth of a company, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about continuing on at such a large firm. I joined Facebook when there were about 500 employees, and when I left, there were 8,000. I feel extremely fortunate that I was able to experience the different growth stages of a company like Facebook. Generally, with a lot more resources, Facebook, as a company size of 8,000, can make a lot more impact than as a company of 500. But also with a bigger size, I found that the percentage of my time spent on communicating, sync’ing up, making sure that all the cooks in the kitchen are looped in, and coming to a decision was way higher than I would like.

Also, seeing an explosion of new hires and unclear ownership of responsibilities, sprinkled with politics among some leaders, made me really miss the good old days when we could stay nimble and scrappy. In the grand scheme of things, I do not think Facebook is anywhere close to being a “political” company. Since each team and organization is different, I can’t say that this is what other Facebook employees would have felt either. But for me, I preferred my experience at a smaller company.

Last reason for leaving Facebook that I don’t usually mention to interviewees is that I wanted to prove to myself that what I learned and gained from Facebook was actually valuable outside of Facebook.

I have seen cases where senior people from other companies would come to Facebook and fall very short of expectations although they were successful at their previous companies. We like to believe that tech companies are a 100% meritocracy, but in reality, for a rapidly growing company, when you join plays a significant part in your future growth and promotion within that company. Sometimes just having the context and history of that company and its products alone can make you highly valuable. It is possible that Facebook is so unique in its problems, organizational design, and culture than other companies that these senior folks’ knowledge and learning simply aren’t as transferable. Perhaps, their roles at Facebook aren’t the right fit for them, or the current structure at Facebook does not set them up for success.

Regardless, I wanted to know for myself, “as an early employee of Facebook, would things I learned at Facebook over the 6 years be valuable and transferable at other companies? Am I just another beneficiary of someone who joined the right company at the right time?”

Would I have made more money had I stayed? Definitely. Would I have had other new opportunities had I endured through that rut and stayed a little longer? Probably. But I knew that I would not be happy if I couldn’t find work that has a purpose I believe in and keeps me excited everyday, so I felt like my time at Facebook was coming to a close.

I have no regrets about leaving consulting and moving from the East Coast to join Facebook. Actually, that is probably one of the best decisions I have made in my life. Also, I have no regrets on my multiple role/job changes within Facebook as well as deciding to leave.

I am glad that I was able to find purpose and passion at Square and proved to myself that after all, I did learn a thing or two from my time at Facebook. At the same time, I am equally excited and happy for my friends who stayed at Facebook, doing new and great things, and for those who are just embarking on a new journey at Facebook.

Now to another question almost every interviewee at Square asks me after asking about why I left Facebook: Why did you join Square? Stay tuned for that story!

1. Find projects that allow you to work with Product/Eng teams within your current role

Almost all functions at a tech company work with Product or Engineering teams in some way. For example, the Customer Support team will work with Product teams to bubble up key feedback and inquiries from the customers as well as surface issues and conduct investigations to help Engineering identify the root cause.

Also, some might work with an engineering/IT team to make sure the company’s proprietary tool or a 3rd party tool, such as Salesforce, has the right integration for the team. In this case, Supporters are the customers of this product, and the person who is in charge of the integration is assuming a part of the product manager responsibility.

In all my years of working at a tech company, I have never seen a case where there isn’t a shortage of PMs. This means that there are more than enough products/initiatives that can use some PM love. See if any of them is related to your current role or knowledge you have. Talk to your manager and see if you can spend a part of your time acting as a product manager for that area.

As an example, when I was a product analyst at Facebook, I worked with engineers on geo-location algorithms as an acting PM. The partnership made sense in two ways: it was an important area without a PM, and the highly analytical nature of the product made it a good fit for an analyst. At Square, I have a mobile app release manager, who transitioned from the Customer Support team, working on a side project of product managing the Help section of the app with guidance from senior PMs.

2. Make it a two-step process

“I am in Sales, and I have no experience working with PMs/Eng. But I want to be a PM.” Errr…. sorry to break it to you, but it doesn’t work like that. You should go back to my point #1 above and look for opportunities where you can work with PM/Eng. After all, how are you going to know what a PM does and whether you will like it or not without a little field research?

Related to that point, if you are not in a role in which you are not working with PMs closely already (e.g. Eng, Designer, Product Analyst, Product Marketing, etc.), I highly suggest you look at it as a mid-term goal and consider a two-step transition.

The ideal scenario for your transition is that other PMs and Eng will support and vouch for you, because they have worked closely with you, and saw that you have the skill set and potential to become a successful PM. If you are not in a role where that can happen, consider transitioning to a role that will allow you to do that first, almost like a pre-requisite.

3. Get experience elsewhere that preps you for a PM role

Sometimes people will leave the company to join a small startup, found a company, or get an MBA. Small startups are great in that you will have a lot of opportunities to try a different role or wear multiple hats, and prior experience might not be as necessary as at more established companies. Getting an MBA seems to provide somewhat of a free pass to change your career. However, companies will still look for some relevant experience for MBA PM interns, so keep the aforementioned two points in mind.

Also, if you are serious about transitioning to a PM role, each company will have its own process for internal transfers and interviews. So I recommend you get more information about it upfront to know what’s required or expected.

Product Management is a role that requires a variety of skills, and product instinct and user empathy do not necessarily come from one particular background. More and more companies are realizing that and moving away from the once very rigid technical background they looked for in product manager candidates. So if you want to transition to a product manager, keep working towards it! You won’t regret it! :)

Heads up, we’ve moved! If you’d like to continue keeping up with the latest technical content from Square please visit us at our new home https://developer.squareup.com/blog

Almost all job descriptions for tech company Product Managers (PM) have something similar to the following:

• Lead the ideation, development, and launch of products
• Define a product vision, strategy and success metrics
• Define requirements for products through various research, analysis, and studies
• Drive product development and iteration with a team of (“world-class”) engineers and designers

You also may have heard a lot of tech companies in Silicon Valley describe the PM as a CEO of product.

Those are somewhat obvious representations of what PMs do—but any experienced PM knows there are many other traits that are important in being a successful PM.

For context, I am a Product Manager at Square, where I’ve worked alongside around 100 engineers during my three years at the company. I’ve worked on various app features, Invoices, and most recently on Square’s industry-leading contactless and chip reader.

I understand that every PM has a way of describing his/her role, and depending on the nature/size/stage of the company or product, PMs might have to adapt and make use of a certain set of traits more than others. But one particular view, or attitude rather, has kept me grounded and helped to develop close-knit, collaborative, successful teams.

Fair wind

I compare my role as PM to fair wind. As defined by Google: “Noun (nautical) A wind blowing in the direction the sailor wants to go, i.e. favorably”. So imagine that you have a destination you want to get to (success metric, goal, product launch, etc.). You have people on a boat who want to sail to that destination (your crew, including designers, engineers, and your many cross-functional partners). There are so many different routes your boat could take to the destination—and, inevitably, obstacles along the way.

The PM’s job is to be the fair wind that guides the boat to its destination in the most effective way. While there’s no denying that PM is a leadership role, I deliberately didn’t use the analogy of the boat’s captain. Fair wind is in the background — people might not notice when fair winds are blowing and it’s smooth sailing, but they will definitely notice when fair winds are not there. To be a PM is largely a behind-the-scenes job.

Now, back to the main point. What are some of the lesser-known traits that are important in being the fairest wind?

1. Be a champion for your team

This is not necessarily unique to PMs, but is good practice for all leaders. A PM often is the “face” of the team as the main contact person or DRI (Directly Responsible Individual, borrowing Apple’s term). This means when things are going up and to the right, the PM tends to get credit or visibility on behalf of the team from other teams or execs — and when things are going south, the PM also needs to take responsibility on behalf of the team.

Good PMs will own both sides. You should be taking as many opportunities as possible to give credit to the team and individuals going above and beyond, and celebrating small wins often — and conversely, shielding the team from unnecessary distractions and blame, and helping them focus, particularly when things are not going well.

2. Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.

Let’s start with being a good note taker. :) While taking notes, be curious (identify open questions, ask for more details, question the rationale), and be clear (note the decisions made with rationale, options considered, specify next steps and action items with clear owners).

If your team is small and communicates often, you may not think this is important. But this practice serves multiple purposes beyond intra-team communications. First, you have something to go back to if your memory fails you. I don’t know about you, but my senility is catching up with me. When new team members of the team or other partners ask you what you have considered, tried, and decided—and why—you don’t want to depend on your memories. Second, as the team or company grows, there might be broader implications on decisions. It helps to communicate widely in a succinct form to keep people in the loop. Third, specifying clear next steps, action items, and owners helps give the team focus and accountability.

Keep in mind that good communication doesn’t just apply to within your team. For a bigger company with many product teams, the PM will also have to be the biggest evangelist for the team’s work and make sure it’s visible to a broader audience. Consider monthly/quarterly summary emails with key accomplishments, Lunch & Learn-type presentations to the company, a roadshow in various all-hands meetings, etc.

3. Be smart about delegating decision-making.

This may seem counterintuitive, but PMs shouldn’t be the decision maker on every single thing. I see a lot of junior PMs fall into this pitfall. You do not need to have a strong say or opinion on everything. You work with smart engineers and designers, and you all share the same goal. Trust them. If an engineer needs to work with a designer, have them talk to each other directly. The PM doesn’t need to babysit or facilitate. Have them own it. Verify their decision and intervene only if you have a strong opinion. Also, trust me: if they reach an impasse, they will come to you. If a decision needs to be made on a technical implementation detail, leave it to the Tech Lead or Eng Manager. If there are product implications, make sure you work with your team to weigh pros and cons. Providing autonomy on problem-solving and room for making decisions will empower the team — and free up the PM’s time to do more high leverage work!

What are other important PM traits you have learned over time?

The traits you need as a Product Manager that you won’t find in job descriptions was originally published in Square Corner Blog on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

But over the past few years, I have been getting questions from many people about my experiences in and out of work. Also, as I am getting older, I am realizing that all of us are just flawed/imperfect human beings trying to understand and figure things out. Human minds, relationships, and this world are very complicated, and there is no one right or true answer. It is natural for us to seek information, empathize, connect and get inspiration from experiences of one another. So in 2017, I decided to get out of my comfort zone a bit and scribble some of my experiences and questions in the hope that both you and I can learn and grow together through the process.

Now, a little bit about me that might be helpful as the context of some stories I write about:

• I‘ve been working at Square for 3 years as a Product Manager. Before that I was at Facebook for 6 years. Before that I was a management consultant in the East Coast for a couple of years.
• I came to the US from Korea when I was 14. Since it’s been only about 20 years since I came to the US and started speaking English, I still get asked “Where are you from?” from Lyft/Uber drivers 50% of the time. Ugh. Stop it please stop.
• I am a dabbler in terms of hobbies and still trying really hard to figure out one main hobby I can do for the rest of my life. I dabble in traveling, golf, tennis, piano playing, snowboarding, hiking, camping, yoga, pilates, scuba diving, biking, reading, movies, TV binge-watching, and taking random craft classes. I do enjoy learning and trying new things so I can dabble even more.

Almost all job descriptions for tech company Product Managers (PM) have something similar to the following:

• Lead the ideation, development, and launch of products
• Define a product vision, strategy and success metrics
• Define requirements for products through various research, analysis, and studies
• Drive product development and iteration with a team of (“world-class”) engineers and designers

You also may have heard a lot of tech companies in Silicon Valley describe the PM as a CEO of product.

Those are somewhat obvious representations of what PMs do-but any experienced PM knows there are many other traits that are important in being a successful PM.

For context, I am a Product Manager at Square, where I’ve worked alongside around 100 engineers during my three years at the company. I’ve worked on various app features, Invoices, and most recently on Square’s industry-leading contactless and chip reader.

I understand that every PM has a way of describing his/her role, and depending on the nature/size/stage of the company or product, PMs might have to adapt and make use of a certain set of traits more than others. But one particular view, or attitude rather, has kept me grounded and helped to develop close-knit, collaborative, successful teams.

Fair wind

I compare my role as PM to . As defined by Google: “Noun (nautical) A wind blowing in the direction the sailor wants to go, i.e. favorably”. So imagine that you have a destination you want to get to ( success metric, goal, product launch, etc.). You have people on a boat who want to sail to that destination ( your crew, including designers, engineers, and your many cross-functional partners). There are so many different routes your boat could take to the destination-and, inevitably, obstacles along the way.

The PM’s job is to be the fair wind that guides the boat to its destination in the most effective way. While there’s no denying that PM is a leadership role, I deliberately didn’t use the analogy of the boat’s captain. *Fair wind is in the background *- people might not notice when fair winds are blowing and it’s smooth sailing, but they will definitely notice when fair winds are not there. To be a PM is largely a behind-the-scenes job.

Now, back to the main point. What are some of the lesser-known traits that are important in being the fairest wind?

1. Be a champion for your team

This is not necessarily unique to PMs, but is good practice for all leaders. A PM often is the “face” of the team as the main contact person or DRI (Directly Responsible Individual, borrowing Apple’s term). This means when things are going up and to the right, the PM tends to get credit or visibility on behalf of the team from other teams or execs — and when things are going south, the PM also needs to take responsibility on behalf of the team.

Good PMs will own both sides. You should be taking as many opportunities as possible to give credit to the team and individuals going above and beyond, and celebrating small wins often — and conversely, shielding the team from unnecessary distractions and blame, and helping them focus, particularly when things are not going well.

2. Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.

Let’s start with being a good note taker. :) While taking notes, be curious (identify open questions, ask for more details, question the rationale), and be clear (note the decisions made with rationale, options considered, specify next steps and action items with clear owners).

If your team is small and communicates often, you may not think this is important. But this practice serves multiple purposes beyond intra-team communications. First, you have something to go back to if your memory fails you. I don’t know about you, but my senility is catching up with me. When new team members of the team or other partners ask you what you have considered, tried, and decided-and why-you don’t want to depend on your memories. Second, as the team or company grows, there might be broader implications on decisions. It helps to communicate widely in a succinct form to keep people in the loop. Third, specifying clear next steps, action items, and owners helps give the team focus and accountability.

Keep in mind that good communication doesn’t just apply to within your team. For a bigger company with many product teams, the PM will also have to be the biggest evangelist for the team’s work and make sure it’s visible to a broader audience. Consider monthly/quarterly summary emails with key accomplishments, Lunch & Learn-type presentations to the company, a roadshow in various all-hands meetings, etc.

3. Be smart about delegating decision-making.

This may seem counter-intuitive, but PMs shouldn’t be the decision maker on every single thing. I see a lot of junior PMs fall into this pitfall. You do not need to have a strong say or opinion on everything. You work with smart engineers and designers, and you all share the same goal. Trust them. If an engineer needs to work with a designer, have them talk to each other directly. The PM doesn’t need to babysit or facilitate. Have them own it. Verify their decision and intervene only if you have a strong opinion. Also, trust me: if they reach an impasse, they will come to you. If a decision needs to be made on a technical implementation detail, leave it to the Tech Lead or Eng Manager. If there are product implications, make sure you work with your team to weigh pros and cons. Providing autonomy on problem-solving and room for making decisions will empower the team — and free up the PM’s time to do more high leverage work!

What are other important PM traits you have learned over time?

Originally published at https://developer.squareup.com on January 6, 2017.