Moving Up to Director: Organizational and Career Skills for Product Managers
3 Weeks
·Cohort-based Course
Product managers often wonder how to move "up" to director-level roles and how that would change their work. We'll dissect that journey.
Moving Up to Director: Organizational and Career Skills for Product Managers
3 Weeks
·Cohort-based Course
Product managers often wonder how to move "up" to director-level roles and how that would change their work. We'll dissect that journey.
Course overview
We will focus on product organizations, career paths and 'soft' prod/exec skills
Getting your first product management job was very challenging. And it's going well -- understanding users/customers, working with engineers and designers, building products. But you may be thinking about what's next...
We'll map out the next level in most product organizations: Director, Group Product Manager, or similar titles for people who oversee teams of product managers/product owners. What's the same/different versus PM roles? What do they do more of, less of? Is that a good fit for me, my current situation, my preferences?
How do we pursue such roles? We'll talk about approaches, strategies, organizational challenges.
And we'll have exercises around the Language of Money; product outcomes and financials; R&D budgets at an executive level; building whole teams; and justifying product headcount.
You'll get practical, hard-hitting, no-BS advice and tools that will help shape your career -- no out-of-bounds issue!
This course is for current product managers/owners
01
We' focus on organizations, roles, and working better with executives/leaders. You will already know how to do core product management.
02
You're already thinking a bit about your next challenge or opportunity. You're succeeding as a PM but open to new challenges.
03
This course is a safe space to talk through careers, interview frustrations, company challenges, real stuff. We'll share what's happening.
What you’ll get out of this course
Understand a typical product career organization and ladder
Every company has its own title scheme, division of labor, and approach to product work... but we'll map out the general approach
Learn how to raise your hand for director-level roles, humbly
Most product managers are great at managing their products, but not their own career paths. We'll walk through signaling that you're interested in moving "up", and thoughtful internal outreach
How changing companies to get promotions works (or doesn't)
Changing companies in order to get a bigger role/title is challenging. We'll dig into that, share some networking strategies, and do some quick resumé reviews.
Practice the Language of Money
Product folks love to talk about development processes, tech, user experience. But most executives need to hear about economics, outcomes, revenue. We'll unpack this, practice, learn to identify our different audiences.
This course includes
3 interactive live sessions
Lifetime access to course materials
9 in-depth lessons
Direct access to instructor
Projects to apply learnings
Guided feedback & reflection
Private community of peers
Course certificate upon completion
Maven Satisfaction Guarantee
This course is backed by Maven’s guarantee. You can receive a full refund within 14 days after the course ends, provided you meet the completion criteria in our refund policy.
Moving Up to Director: Organizational and Career Skills for Product Managers
Course syllabus
Week 1
Jan
8
Session 1
Product Manager vs. Director roles
Is this a fit for you?
Q&A/AMA and peer networking time
Week 2
Jan
15
Session 2
Internal Promotions
External Promotions
(2 volunteers) resumé review
Q&A/AMA and peer networking time
Week 3
Jan
22
Session 3
The Language of Money
Course Takeaways
Q&A/AMA and peer networking time
What people are saying
Ala
Karen
John
Krish
Meet your instructor
Rich Mironov
Rich coaches product executives, product management teams and revenue software organizations.
Rich has been the 'product guy' at six start-ups (including as CEO) and parachuted into 15 companies as interim VP Products/CPO. A seasoned tech executive and serial entrepreneur, he is a relentless blogger, speaker, teacher and mentor on software strategy, product management: aligning “what-we-can-build” with “what-markets-will-pay-for.”
Join an upcoming cohort
Moving Up to Director: Organizational and Career Skills for Product Managers
January 2025
$320
Dates
Payment Deadline
Course schedule
2.5 hours per week
Wednesdays in January
8:00am - 10:00am Pacific
Cohort dates are January 8, 15 and 22.
All three 2-hour sessions are on Wednesdays at 8am Pacific, 11am Eastern, 4pm/16.00 GMT. Via Zoom.
Very light preparation
< 20 minutes/week
Attendees will have some lightweight preparation ahead of each session: looking at your own R&D spending budget, sketching out how your products make money, thinking about your own motivations/goals.
After the course is over...
All participants will get access to Rich's calendar for an hour of private 1-on-1 coaching or mentoring.
Learning is better with cohorts
Active hands-on learning
We'll have a series of in-class exercises, discussions, and real-world examples.
Interactive
With very light preparation, you'll learn from Rich and each other - shared online worksheets, breakout rooms, and some peer social networking time.
Learn with a cohort of peers
Your class peers will be in similar roles and situations. We'll all be surprised (not!) that so we share many challenges/issues.
Frequently Asked Questions
Join an upcoming cohort
Moving Up to Director: Organizational and Career Skills for Product Managers
January 2025
$320
Dates
Payment Deadline