Imagine sitting at your desk six months after starting a new job. Your head is in your hands and you ask yourself, “This job sucks. How did I get here? All I do is move stories around a bloated backlog.” You failed to ask your hiring manager 5 critical questions before taking the job. Before you accept your next job, know what you need to learn about your role, your team and your leadership at the new organization so that you land a job where you know you will have an impact!

1. Austin VOP
5 Questions To Ask Before You
Accept Your Next PM Job Offer
Reza Shirazi
Product Camp Austin 22 - February 2019

2. Austin VOP

3. Austin VOP
About
Reza Shirazi
Senior Product Manager
AffiniPay
Austin VOP
Austin Voice of Product
Austinvop.com
Interview product leaders to share their
insights and build a stronger product
community in Austin
Biweekly Newsletter
tinyletter.com/austinvop

4. Austin VOP
“Last year, we asked product managers whether they’d recommend their chosen career path. They responded with
moderately high advocacy for the role, giving product management an NPS score of 20. This year, their enthusiasm
was more muted, with an NPS score of 3, with slightly better scores from managers and executives. There was almost
no difference in job satisfaction by reporting line, but PMs with a technical background say they’re a bit happier in
their roles. It makes you wonder whether the low job satisfaction is a function of the various misalignments we’ve
discussed throughout this study.”

5. Austin VOP
1. What degree of autonomy do I
have to manage my product?
● How is my success measured?
● Do I get to talk to customers so that I can learn their pain
points and priorities?
● What influence do internal stakeholders have on my
priorities?
● Am I a product owner or product manager?

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2. Is there a technical lead on the
team for me to collaborate with?
● Do I have a technical partner on the team to define the
“How”?
● How is the development team organized? Is it aligned with
my product?
● Is the team co-located or remote?
● How is technical debt prioritized?
“If you’re just using your engineers to code, you’re only getting about half their value.”
Marty Cagan, Inspired

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3. Are there UX and Data team
members I can work with?
● How does the UX team and Product team collaborate?
● How does the Data team and Product team collaborate?
● How do I negotiate for other resources such as Product
Marketing and Customer Success?

8. Austin VOP
4. What degree of autonomy do
you* have to set product vision?
*Head of Product
● Do you have a seat at the Executive table?
● How much do Executives influence your product vision?

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5. Can the product team have an
impact on the company’s success?
● Can the company attribute their success to things the
Product team works on?

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What other questions should you ask?

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Thank you
austinvop.com
tinyletter.com/austinvop
@RezShirazi