Product Management (Digital Business)

In digital business, product management is the process of conceiving, defining, delivering, monitoring and refining products in, and withdrawing products from, a market in order to maximize business results.

Product management tasks range from researching markets, customers and competitors, to analyzing customers and products, to developing and maintaining a product vision and roadmap. They also include working with product delivery teams to test and prioritize delivery of product capabilities in order to maximize customer value and business impact and derive growth from digital initiatives.

These tasks are performed by people with a wide range of titles, such as product manager, product owner, business analyst, product marketer and service manager. Tasks are often distributed within a product management team according to the skills of its members, who may range from strategic visionaries to detail-oriented virtual members of a delivery team.

Product management must accommodate the rapid delivery cadence of digital business by emphasizing speed and innovation, while managing a complex environment with many dependencies. Artifacts such as roadmaps have shorter “shelf-lives” than those associated with physical consumer products, and therefore suit approaches that are lighter in weight, such as Lean Startup.
 

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