Product Manager Leveling Framework
As a product organization, you need to know what you expect from your product managers. And you need transparency regarding what makes a good product manager at every experience level.
Why this format?
- Make levels and expectations transparent
- Make levels easy to use (for both PMs and line manager)
- Make the differences between levels clear
- Make it as concise as possible and as compete as needed (this is the 3rd iteration within 3 years of using it)
How to use it?
- Product managers and line managers fill it out individually (~30min)
- Both discuss it at least every 6 months and before any planned growth plans (full walkthrough takes 1 hour)
The leveling
| Area | Skill | Junior | Regular | Senior | Lead |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Summary | — | Starts their product career. | Continues their product career. | Has proven their skills continuously | Excels with skills |
| Completes small initiatives. | Completes medium-sized initiatives. | Completes large-sized initiatives. | Completes XL-sized initiatives. | ||
| Communicating initiatives appropriately. | Communicating initiatives appropriately. | Drives above-average outcome in team | Drives stellar outcome in group | ||
| Collaborates with immediate peers. | Collaborates with peers within product group. | Influences initiatives in product group | Influences full organization initiatives | ||
| Gets close assistance from experienced product manager | Leads a team on their own with trust. | Support other PMs | Fully engages in strategy | ||
| No strategic work | A little strategy influence | Medium strategic influence | Mentors/leads other PMs | ||
| Scope | — | Team | Team | Group | Group |
| Insights | Quantitative insights | Measures team progress using existing dashboards and ready-made solutions like Hotjar. | Monitors team progress with fully owned dashboards. Uses GA and database to perform analysis. | Excels and improves and is an expert in product group insights. Can independently analyze data in own domain.  | Drives group insights and is an expert on company-level insights. |
| Qualitative insights | Collects and summarizes what is known about their users. | Creates and uses own insights about their users occasionally. | Uses insights frequently and as a basis for product decisions. | Drives insights-based and is an expert on company-level insights | |
| Market insights | Keeps track of competitors' offers, related to own features. | Expert on competitors in our market and performs benchmarks | Reports on market trends. | Finds new opportunities in markets | |
| Solution Design | Outcome driven | Defines OKR outcome of team with the help of manager. | Drives OKR outcome of the team on their own. | Creates above-average OKR outcomes with the team. | Creates top OKR outcomes for the group and beyond. |
| Problem-solving | Defines problems and possible solutions with help of manager. | Defines problems and possible solutions on their own. | Picks the right problems and solutions. | Identifies problems and solutions beyond own team. | |
| Prioritization skills | Prioritizes initiatives with help of manager. | Prioritizes initiatives on their own. | Influences group initiatives. | Shapes group initiatives with HoP | |
| Execution | Ship solutions fast | Ships small initiatives fast to learn and adapt. | Ships medium-sized initiatives fast to learn and adapt. | Ships big initiatives fast to learn and adapt. | Ships big cross-team initiatives fast to learn and adapt. |
| Performance ownership | Understands performance on feature-level | Understand product performance in own product group | Understand total product performance | Understand business performance on company level | |
| Project management skills | Supports the team to coordinate tasks and people in team. | Empowers the team to finish selected tasks. | Manages initiatives beyond own team. | Drives initiatives within and between groups. | |
| Leadership | Collaboration | Collaborates with team members and manager. | Occassionally collaborates with related teams. | Regularly collaborates with teams across the company. | Regularly drives collaboration across the company. |
| Communication and stakeholder management | Communicates plans and results with manager. | Communicates plans and results with related teams. | Proactively communicates and shapes stakeholder management | Supports group's teams with difficult stakeholder and communication setups. | |
| Leadership | Builds trust of team members with execution of initiatives. | Leads team with data and prioritization. | Leads cross-product-team initiatives with data and trust. | Leads cross-organization initiatives with trust and data. | |
| Vision and strategy | Understands product vision and makes product decisions based on OKRs | Prioritizes product vision and build strategy in all OKR initiatives. | Advances product vision and strategy beyond own team. | Shapes strategy and influences product vision for the group | |
| Core values | Can name the values of Visable. | Lives values in team | Lives values in group | Drives values in group | |
| Growth mindset | Works on improvement for either insights, solution design or execution area. | Works on improvement of leadership and 1 of insights, solutions, execution | Works on improvement of leadership and 1 of insights, solutions, execution | Works on improvement of org-level leadership |