40: Transferable Accounting Skills When Shifting into Product Management

In this episode of the How to Succeed in Product Management Podcast, marketing professor Jeff Shulman and The Product Management Center advisory board members Red Russak and Soumeya Benghanem welcome Lennon Liao (Atlassian) to talk about accounting skills that are useful when breaking into product management. There are skills that are helpful and can play a big role when it comes to becoming a product leader. There are also skills that one will need to unlearn to become a more effective PM. What matters the most is you know how to prioritize the end user and their experience with the product. 

Support for How to Succeed in Product Management is brought to you by Apptentive, which enables product managers to measure shifts in customer emotion and gather actionable feedback across the mobile customer journey. To learn more, go to Apptentive.com/UW.

What to Listen For:

• 00:00 Intro
• 05:53 Accountancy skills that are helpful in product management?   
• 11:51 Unlearning skills to succeed in product management
• 21:49 How ego can play into or potentially hurt a product manager succeed
• 30:35 Consumer product versus enterprise product management
• 34:21 Resources for accountants trying to switch into PMs
• 43:16 Always put your end users first
• 44:22 The indicators of successful experiment