JJ Rorie
- 1 min read

Soft Skills in Product Management

Updated: Sep 6, 2022

Episode 031

Manosai Eerabathini: "For me, as I've evolved as a PM, my style has just definitely developed and I feel like the confidence that comes in kind of being comfortable in your own skin is something that also just gets better over time. But whether it's interviewing or it's on the job, having that genuine voice and having that authenticity, I think is one of the most critical ingredients for how you can build strong relationships, right? That's sort of what people latch onto when they get a sense of like who you are, what kind of person you are, what kind of values you stand for. So that's where I like to dig deep with people I work with and sort of bring out that style, right, bring out their own sort of natural sense of self."

Episode Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

role, product, soft skills, people, pm, career, folks, important, point, feel, person, thinking, learn, build, talking, pms, product managers, product manager, style, terms

Intro (the phenomenal Sandra Segrest - if you need a voice actor, she's the one) 00:03

Welcome to Product Voices, a podcast where we share valuable insights and useful resources to help us all be great in product management. Visit the show's website to access the resources discussed on the show, find more information on our fabulous guests, or to submit your product management question to be answered in our special q&a episodes. That's all at product voices.com. And be sure to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite platform. Now, here's our host, JJ Rorie, CEO of great product management.

JJ 00:37

Hello, and welcome to Product Voices. We talk a lot about hard skills needed in product management, technical knowledge, you know, the understanding of processes or frameworks, methodologies, etc. Financial business acumen, those sorts of things. And of course, those are very important. But truth be told soft skills are human skills, if you want to call them that are every bit as important as hard skills. In fact, I would argue that soft skills underlie everything we do in this profession. That was a big reason why I wrote my book immutable because I think some of those so called soft skills are really timeless and an absolute truth that if you're going to be happy and productive in this role, you have to have some of those underlying soft skills. And so on this episode, we're going to be talking about those soft skills and what you need to know to succeed in product management. My guest with me today is Manosai Eerabathini. Manosai is Product Manager at Figma. He was formerly a product manager at Google Maps, working on social features involving collaboration and sharing. He's been in product for eight years he's been with, of course, Google. He's been with Microsoft, he's been with vivo, he's got a tremendous background. And I'm really excited to speak with him and hear his insights on this man aside. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Manosai 01:55

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me.

JJ 01:57

Yeah, it's gonna be a really good important conversation. So give me a little bit of background on you. But tell me a little bit more about your journey in product management, and specifically how you've learned how important soft skills are for the role.

Manosai 02:12

Sure, happy to. So I think my journey into project management Funny enough, I've only ever hit PM, in terms of having full time roles, although my journey and definitely I did meander my way into kind of finding out about the role and learning what it would take to succeed in it. My background more formally, is mostly on the engineering side. But I was in a program in undergrad called network and social systems engineering. And the focus of our program was to try and understand why some of the companies in the early days of web 2.0, were succeeding in terms of going to the market doing really well, having a lucrative financial business models. And also sort of what were the innovations in the technology there. So my undergrad experiences, were really going deep on both building the technology and understanding how this technology works, as well as getting a little bit more to the the social sciences side of it, learning about, you know, the network effects and the dynamics involved in making some of these companies really succeed and take off. And I thought the combination was very fascinating. But I kind of knew from early on point in college that I didn't really want to spend all my time only doing the building from an engineering point of view. So, you know, I dabbled through a couple different roles, but stumbled upon the product, mainly because it was hearing about it a lot of times from folks who are older than me, going through recruiting for full time positions and winding roles out there at big tech companies within product. So that's kind of how I found my way, I landed role at Microsoft, as kind of first as an intern, and then as a full time employee, but on the product side. And I think that's exactly where also for me, I learned on the ground, some of these attributes around soft skills being important for the role. In particular, the first pm role ever had, I never actually worked with a designer, there was no front end that I had to look after. I was basically a very technical pm for my first job out of college. And I remember thinking, you know, everything I've learned up to this point, the technical side, learning how to write PRDs learning how to lead meetings, like all these all these hard skills that I thought I had, sort of ready to go. They didn't really equip me to do a good job of being an effective pm on the spot. I think I sort of had this trial by fire even in my first role where I realized, hold on, I've got to spend a lot of time building a tight partnership with the tech lead that I'm going to be partnered with and em that that tech lead reports to and just kind of figuring out the landscape of stakeholders that I need to think about. And so I think I, sort of, by by, by virtue of just basically I think having to survive in this role and figure out how to succeed, I think I had sort of this first very important lesson where I, where I thought about, you know, how do I have to lead? How do I actually have to combine my hard skills of product management with the soft skills? And, you know, it's a lesson for sure that I've, I've continued to kind of learn from in all the roles and all the experiences that I've had afterwards as well.

JJ 05:38

Yeah, you know, what's interesting about that is you had a very unique educational program, your when you were talking about that, I was thinking, wow, that's really, really cool. I love that I think I think more folks who ended up in product management would benefit from that. But to your point, even with a unique, you know, education that kind of talked about the networking, and you know, all of those things, you still had to learn that on the job. And I think that's a really important point that no matter what we think, we know, going into the product manager role, we always learn that there are some things that we're not prepared for.

JJ 06:12

And I personally teach at Johns Hopkins some product management courses, and, of course, I teach the, you know what to do in the job. But I also really try to infuse how to do the job. And it's not like they can get it necessarily in a classroom. Of course, it's interactive, project based and that sort of thing. We do everything we can to make it real. But the truth is, until you get in that role, and really realize the the interconnected humaneness and the cross functional nature, it's it is quite hard. So love that story.

JJ 06:44

So next question for you, in addition to your product rule of figma, and all the awesome companies you've worked for, you have your own practice of The Product Lens. And so you do some interview and career coaching for product managers. You know, taking what what you've learned and, and helping so. So what are the most important soft skills are human skills or whatever you want to call them that not only you rely upon in your role at figma? But but that you coach and teach product managers about. What do you think those most important soft skills are?

Manosai 07:17

Yeah, I spend an awful lot of time I think, both in the context of like interviews and interview prep, because I think this is relevant there as well. Right? When you're interviewing for a role, there are a lot of great candidates super qualified on paper, and you're thinking about, you know, how do the strongest candidates sort of jump off the paper? What is it about them, that makes them stand out and seem like they would be a great fit, and it does come down to, you know, how they carry themselves as a person, what sort of values they espouse. There is a, I think, a softer signal side of even interviewing that is important to screen for, especially, you know, as you're thinking about interviewing at various stages of companies. But definitely when you're on the job as well, right? I talked to a lot of folks who, who are exceptionally smart people with very hardworking, have a lot of really good intentions for wanting to do good, meaningful, impactful work, but feel that they are not empowered or stuck in some sense of unlocking another level of velocity. And a lot of time that I spend with, with my clients and talking through sort of their scenarios is, is really thinking about, you know, in the environment that they're in, what are those sort of factors on the interpersonal side that are potentially preventing them from, you know, getting to the next level of success that thereafter, right, I think there's a lot of focus inherently with the pm job on you. And you know, as one person, you're sort of sphere of control and influence, you think about sort of things as they affect you and what you can do, and I think the effectiveness of a pm as an overall role, though, is one that has massive scope, right? The number of people you're talking to working with partnering with, it's, it's really unique in that sense, in terms of a role where, you know, your, your success depends indirectly on the actions of so many others. So I think that's one one big area of focus for me, which is really understanding and going deep into, you know, when you're on the job, the kinds of relationships you've built, the kinds of partnerships, I think a lot about, where you have the sense of trust in the people that you work with, to the level of, you know, being able to share some of you know, your worst fears and work your vulnerabilities like who can you talk to in the workplace where you're able to sort of talk about your open thoughts about projects that are going well and not going well? Making sure you feel like you have a sense of sort of support? I think within within the context of your work your working walls there I think is super important.

Manosai 10:00

And I think about that also intentionally from where you may not have the right partnerships and where you should invest a little bit more heavily. And think about building those relationships, building those cross functional stakeholder alignments. And I think the main thing I'll emphasize, though, about this, especially in terms of my practice, and what I tried to bring in, and in my approach, and I think a philosophy for me is, I look for authenticity, I think there's a lot of people who know these things are important and are in in one way, forcing it. And it's really by no fault of their own. I mean, I think there's a lot out there that talks about, you know, the soft skills or these attributes that are sort of important on paper, but then I think there's there is a bit of a missing gap around finding your own voice or finding your own style, it is one of those things where you sort of have to try it, see how it lands, and then maybe iterate sort of titrate until you get it right. It's something for sure. For me, as I've evolved as a PM, my style has just definitely developed and I feel, you know, like the the competence that comes in, kind of being comfortable in your own skin is something that also just gets better over time. But um, whether it's interviewing, or it's on the job, having that genuine voice and having that authenticity, I think is one of the most critical ingredients for like how you can build strong relationships, right, that's sort of what people latch on to when they get a sense of like, who you are, what kind of person you are, what kind of values you stand for. So that's where I like to dig deep with people I work with and sort of bring out that style, right, bring out bring out their own sort of natural sense of self into into whether it's interview prep, or just, you know, meetings with the tough stakeholders, right? That you're trying to win over? How do you sort of think about those being the same side of you coming out, as opposed to having to like put on this very intentional face just for the sake of like being an effective? Yeah, because I think that's, that's just tougher to sustain in the long run.

JJ 12:10

It is, and I want to dig into that, you know, product managers finding their own style in a minute, but But before we get there, because I think that was a really important one. And I want to pick your brain on that. But before we get there, I want to dig a little bit into the important point you made about being authentic, being transparent, being vulnerable. One of the things that I know, I certainly suffered from early in my career, and a lot of the newer product managers that I meet and work with, also have this kind of fear of looking, or seeming as if they don't know what they're doing, right? Because they're new, because there's a lot of things that they don't know, but they but they tend to, to try to fake it, they tend to try to cover up their, you know, the areas in which they need to learn. And to your point, being transparent, being vulnerable. That's where we build trust. And that's frankly, where we also learn. So have you found some ways that you know, that has evolved over your career? You know, when you when you started, you probably tried to fake your level of knowledge, just like the rest of us. And then have you found some tips that have helped you just kind of, you know, pull back the veil and really be transparent, and be vulnerable. And any tips you can share on how someone can go about being being that way being that open?

Manosai 13:39

Yeah, absolutely. That's a really important topic, right? I think. I mean, the overall the overall concept here of like feeling as a pm in new role in a new space, at any point in your career, really, there's definitely, definitely elements of that imposter syndrome, right, that that you're referring to. So I think I have a few, maybe different tactics or strategies I can think about. And mostly stemming from my personal experience as well, you know, I've been a generalist in terms of my product background. So I haven't gotten really, really deep into one domain. It's, it's, it's not the style of PMA that I that I've sort of built my career on. So most of my tips, I think, are kind of in that lens as well thinking about, like, constantly having to sort of face that conundrum of like, there are just other people who know more about this or who've been doing this longer.

Manosai 14:27

So I think with that being said, I do think you touched upon number one for me, which is probably the most important thing in terms of the mindset. Having a growth first mindset, I think is super, super important. Every role I've taken and every every job I've ever, ever wanted to have liked. Everything I've sort of optimized around in my career has been in the vein of finding more growth opportunities. And I think there's something powerful when you are very clear about what you're up to lysing for, whether it's with your manager, or whether it's just honestly to yourself being really clear about like, what you're trying to get out of an experience, when you accept that, you know, you have room to grow, and you have a lot to learn, it changes everything else from that, right? If you have that mindset that there are other people here who I can grow from, who I can learn from, it does humble you in a good way, right? It opens you up to listen and to take in information as opposed to feeling like, you know, what you need to know, and you just need to move forward, you need to operate. So I think that's sort of like a foundational, maybe, point of point of anchoring to which is, there's always room to go, right, no matter what stage you're at, of course, there's pattern recognition as you get further and further along in your career. But not every situation that you're in is the exact same as the past one. So try to anchor to that.

Manosai 15:56

I think the second point, though, in terms of how you then sort of take that mindset, and then make it more real, more tangible out there. I think one concrete tactic that I found is like, who can you work with, or who can you sort of tap to be a trusted confidant in this sense, where there's someone you're comfortable expressing, you know, this is an area that I'm you know, struggling in or something I want to know more about, oftentimes may not be your manager, it might be a peer, it might be, you know, in my career has been like really helpful. senior engineers on the team that I just joined, who are taking the time to sort of walk me through the complexities of a product and give me some background information about what the team struggle with, right? It's not necessarily my edge manager partner, or my design design manager partner. It's just, it's more like looking for folks who are also willing and able to help you in your growth mindset and your growth trajectory. And it's odd, because it doesn't directly benefit them in any concrete way, right. It's not like you're their report, or they're getting some immediate boost out of doing it. But I think those are the folks also who recognize like the importance of cultivating a culture where people feel empowered to share that they don't know something, and then they want to learn, I think they're the folks are sort of championing for a healthy overall culture around, you know, this kind of nurturing and mentorship and kind of growth for everyone. So let's people tend to just be really good partners anyways, to build strong relationships with so I would say, the second point around that is just trying to identify who those people could be, and investing some time and, and then building those relationships, or honestly, just talking to them, the more the more cycles you get, I think, anyways, you'll sort of build that over time with more reps.

Manosai 17:52

And then I think the third thing I would say, which is super empowering is my read, you know, someone said this once about, you know, saying I don't know, really often, like saying it a lot, actually is very liberating, very empowering. And I think that's, it's one of those things where you have to try it, you have to, like wear it and give it a spin. And then you'll realize like, that worst case scenario, that fear that you've had in the back of your mind about if I say, I don't know, what is this person gonna think of me, you know, what is the director of product? gonna think about me the next time I come forward with some proposal or what is engineering manager, you're gonna think of me in the next team meeting, like how to sort of hurt their impression of me, I think these types of fears are really top of mind, especially when we're new, especially when we're feeling like the brunt of impostor syndrome. But I think, though, the lesson that needs to be learned here, and it's only something you can learn directly, right, you need to feel it firsthand is by saying it and realizing, actually, the worst case scenario is not that bad, though. Really, the thing that ends up happening more often than not, is someone just explains to, and gives you that piece of information you're missing out on so really, most of the time the best case scenario ends up happening, which is, you know, you learned you like actually picked up something you didn't know before. And maybe even better, you know, the person that you're working with, is starting to also maybe build a sense of rapport around you know, how I can work with this person and close the gaps of knowledge start to trust them over time as they see them picking up more knowledge. I think it's it's like offering a handout right and waiting for the other side to like, take it as well. But I definitely would encourage people to, to, even though it's uncomfortable to be facing that directly and saying I don't know, as often as possible when you when you really don't, right. There's no need to fake it at that point.

JJ 19:48

Exactly. I love that advice and echo it it's, you know, reminds me of a story actually, the last two of finding kind of someone to a trusted resource and confidant. And then being able to say no, or excuse me being able to say I don't know. And I remember one time and it actually wasn't even early in my career. It was a time when I felt like I should have known this. And it was it was more on kind of the financial acumen. And I mean, I had an MBA, for goodness sakes, but I still felt very inadequate, knowing the data behind the financial reports, right? Or the stories behind the financial reports, I should say, I could, I could read them. I knew the data, but I didn't know the stories behind them, if that makes sense. And so I went, Yeah. And so went to like a financial analyst, you know, person that I knew in the company, and I said, Hey, I am getting these questions in some of the meetings, and I'm having to say, I don't know, which makes me feel like I should know, they're asking me the questions. I think I should know these questions, or these answers, and can you help me and so we would like go to coffee or lunch and, and talk about what the numbers meant to our business, like the context behind them, and what was driving them and those sorts of things. So, and it became a really a career changer for me. So I love I love that advice. I think, you know, anytime you can, you can open yourself up and say, even even if you're educated on something like I was I take an MBA level finance classes, but I still needed some help, right in the real world of doing it. And so I think that's great advice.

Manosai 21:20

Yeah. What I what I love about your story in particular, too, is like, I think there's an important nuance there right about it. Maybe in all circumstances, it doesn't feel appropriate, it doesn't feel approachable to say, I don't know. So recognizing also like how to distinguish between who you can go to and when you can go to them around, you know, wanting to learn more and saying, I don't know, then better equipping yourself for all those moments, right? Where you feel it's higher stakes, or you feel like you have a little bit more there to prove. I think that's also important because it's, it's, it's definitely true, right? It's it's, I think, easy to sort of take this advice on paper and say, Well, I can't I really can't say it in every scenario, right? I don't know, because certain scenarios do just feel more high stakes. So I think that's also a really important lesson in your story, right? It's like you have to carve out the opportunities for you to say, I don't know, not every moment will will be will feel right for that as well.

JJ 22:14

Exactly. And once you once you have that that learning experience, right, so after a few coffees with my financial friend, guess what I didn't have to say, I don't know, so often, when asked those types of questions, because I didn't know. And that's the whole point is you're on this learning journey, and you don't give yourself the grace to do it. So I love that.

JJ 22:34

Okay, so I want to go back to something you said, because I think this one's really important. Talking about how a product manager can find their own style their superpower early in their career, I know you've mentioned it, I myself, as well can can agree that, you know, once I realized that, you know, I'm not I'm somewhat of a casual person, I build rapport, I build relationships, I'm never going to be the most serious person in the room. I'm never going to be the most technical person in the room. But I am who I am. And that's my superpower, I think started to click for me. So talk to me about how you found ways that product managers can can find their style and be you know, a different type of product manager, if you will, and really kind of hone in on their strengths.

Manosai 23:26

Yeah, I want to recognize first, firstly, that there is an inherent tension right between wanting to constantly have like a growth mindset. And then also feeling like you're developing and leveraging your own style. So there is some something that will feel a little bit, you know, at odds at times there. But I think it's still important, right? In terms of building confidence, building your own brand as you progress in your career. So in terms of being early on in your career, I think the number one thing still is to index on the growth mindset and say, what are what are experiences or opportunities scenarios where I can sort of place myself out of my comfort zone? And I think the mindset I would think about there is like, trying something on to like, see if it feels right, I think it's sort of one of those, one of those areas where you think you might know what you're good at what you're bad at just innately based on having a strong sense of self like your self awareness, but in the context of like pm styling pm styles, I think you'd have to actually try variations of it, that feel reasonable, like, it might be certain roles that you take on that are looking for PMS to flex, in particular sense, you know, displaying one type of muscle over another. It might be within the same role, you know, if there are projects or areas or gaps that you've identified where you can sort of plug in and be a little bit more involved. You know, I think a couple of like examples and I'm thinking about Top of my mind, are worked with really, really strong sort of visionary product leaders in the past. My first manager at Google was one of those product folks who was like a lifelong entrepreneur landed at Google, after a bunch of startups, and every meeting we ever went into, you know, he was the person who would just distill the conversation down to the most important question that needed to be addressed by that group, you know, very effective, and basically, getting down to the crux of the issue. And then also an exceptional storyteller, every presentation he ever gave was just, you know, everyone would basically be on his next word, waiting to hear what he had to say. And, you know, I, I learned a lot from him, working, working on his team and getting a lot of feedback getting coached by him. And you know, I think it's something in my career as well, where I recognized like, there's a lot to aspire towards in terms of seeing really effective PMS more seasoned, more experienced PMS and thinking about what is their style, what and their values? And what in their approach can you embody? Can you sort of take and also replicate? But then I think the next part of evolution is also recognizing, you know, you are not the same as anyone else, right? I'm not who my manager was, there's a lot of things he's good at, that I'll never be great at. And vice versa, right? There's just certain things about me and my style that I need to recognize and bleed into. But I think you have to intentionally think about the growth mindset, again there and think about, you know, what can I learn from people who I who I look up to, to the extent that it feels right and appropriate for me to be be that way? And that I don't have like a great shorthand answer for I think that is something to just be intentionally reflective about, intentionally. Even with their managers and peers, it's something to talk about, it's something to basically build awareness around. Because I think it's one of those things that if you don't think about consciously, you end up sort of inadvertently anyways, building a style, right? One way or the other, you might, you may not even be your authentic self, like I've worked with, with clients and peers of mine who, who feel this disconnect of like the type of pm that they're becoming on the job and the kind of person they are in the real world. And that's where I think about again, like what's sustainable in the long run, right? If you're kind of in a in a spot where you feel like, you have to put on this sort of different face to be this like high energy, high octane PM, who's sort of rallying folks and, you know, doing something on the job, which is actually very different than your natural self. Like it's doable. I know people who can succeed at it. But it's, it definitely takes a toll. Right, it definitely feels like something you have to intentionally be doing every day. And for some people that might feel okay, but I think a lot of people I talked to who are sort of feeling the emotional toil of being a VM, I think it's something where they're, they're really what they're after, is trying to bridge that gap. And that's what they're spending time talking about, you know, thinking about what can they can change and sort of their approach and the small things to close that gap inch by inch?

JJ 28:18

Yeah, that's a really important point. I think a lot of product managers tend to think and I think it's partially because of, you know, the literature out there, and the way that we teach what a product manager is, and what that role is and what they need to be doing. And there's no question that it's cross functional, there's no question that it's people oriented. But I think a lot of folks shy away from the, or get intimidated by some parts of the product manager role, because they personally are introverted. And they think that those two things are mutually exclusive, right? Like being this, this orchestrator and being this kind of almost boisterous Product Manager versus your personality. And I think that's actually, in my experience, the reverse is true. I think some of the best product managers are actually introverts, by nature, but they tend to build real, real relationships. And so I think that's a really important point to not, you know, box yourself in before you get in there and learn what to do. So find the things that you admire, and others love that advice, try to build those in yours in whatever way that works for you and your context. And then also, you know, be confident in what makes you you and try to make that kind of a foundation of of your role. I think that's, that's really awesome.

Manosai 29:40

Yeah, absolutely. I think that's one of the beauties right of the role and like, as it's evolving, I think we're seeing this play out in industry, too, that you have more and more folks from diverse career backgrounds, diverse career paths, ending up in product, which I think is an absolutely amazing thing. I think I think it's it's only going to be net positive in terms of the types of products and experiences that are that are being put out there. So I think that's 100% a positive, I think, on the potentially negative side that people feel, you know, it's sort of like when the literature and the resources and sort of what is in front of you seems to point towards one type of successful PM, in the most vocal or the most influential, the person who's kind of really good at a lot of different things. It creates maybe this expectation, or the sort of false pressure around having to morph yourself into that person as well. And I think that's where people also, I guess, need to see and like, get some data points around like other types of PMS, that's that succeeded, that are doing really well that are, you know, playing true to their strengths as well. I completely agree with your point that, you know, some of the most effective PMS are actually, you know, the ones who are being very thoughtful and intentional about when they speak and what they have to say, and, you know, their natural tendencies are maybe to be more introverted, but they still have influence, right. It's not like, the only way you can move and shake things is by being the loudest one, oftentimes that, you know, at a certain point, that's just noise. So I think it's, it's, it's there's enough room, I think, within the role to say there's probably a good way for you to find your balance, right. In terms of your style, and and what what a successful pm could do, you know, again, maybe not for every single person out there, but I think it's wide enough that for most folks are interested in the role and in the role for the right reasons, like they should be able to close that gap.

JJ 31:35

Exactly. Exactly. Completely agree. Okay, so final question. You have great insights, you've obviously grown tremendously in your career, what resources have you found value? In what resources? Would you recommend that product managers out there trying to grow their soft skills or human skills and really embracing this? This side of the role? What resources would you suggest for them?

Manosai 31:59

Yeah, absolutely. There's a ton out there. So I definitely feel like as I've seen it, there's been more and more folks out there writing intentionally sharing their learnings. So I think if I had a plug a couple, just, you know, intentionally, point to high high value high kind of signal folks. One in particular, I think, Brandon Chu VP , Shopify, is a, here's a blog post, or kind of blog series, black box of pm.com. Ton of great stuff out there. But in particular, one of his articles I think, is sort of an evergreen resource pm should look at it's called Product Management, mental models for everyone. And I really love this framing around really clear ways to think about key decision making centers as a product manager. And I like the idea of like, mapping them to mental models, because I think the overall, the overall hypothesis here is like, most of these decisions that you're making are patterns that you can sort of match to. So if you come up with these mental models that feel familiar over time, you know, it'll be more useful. It'll be something you can kind of develop as like a framework, right to think about these scenarios. I think there's a lot in there that that people can, people can unpack. And the other one else, I'd just point out, you know, for sure there's a lot of folks on Twitter, just generally, the product community on Twitter is super active, very, very useful to connect with peers to connect with, you know, thought leaders out there, folks like Trish Doshi, a lot, a lot of interesting people putting stuff out there. But I think, yeah, if you, if you aren't already, I would definitely say get a get a Twitter account and start contributing, start sharing thoughts there. I feel like I've learned a lot just by reading over over the years and connecting with folks that way, as well.

JJ 33:54

Awesome. And you also do a lot of great writing and thought leadership. So your website is TheProductLens.com Right?

Manosai 34:03

That's right. Yeah, I've written and contributed to various blogs over over the years, but I've consolidated a lot of my posts and musings on things like soft skills and more accurate pm job descriptions, so people don't end up in the role and somehow feel overwhelmed or shocked, like the rug was pulled on them. And now they're in some role that is actually a lot harder than they thought. So I try to shed some light on you know, topics that in particular, I wish I had learned about or someone had told me about before I haven't gotten into the role, because those are the lessons learned the hard way for me. So there's there's a bunch of different posts in there as well that you can check out.

JJ 34:43

Awesome, awesome and for listeners, of course as always, we will put those links to those resources, Brandon's. Manosai's. Etc. on productvoices.com And in the show notes, and again, you can find Manosai's work at theproduct lens.com So, Manosai, Eerabathini, thank you so much for joining me on this episode. I've enjoyed our conversation and loved hearing your insights.

Manosai 35:06

Absolutely, it was a blast. Thanks for having me on.

JJ 35:09

And thank you everyone for listening to product voices. Hope to see you on the next episode.

Outro 35:15

Thank you for listening to product voices hosted by JJ Rorie. To find more information on our guests resources discussed during the episode or to submit a question for our q&a episodes, visit the show's website product voices.com And be sure to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite platform.

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Soft Skills in Product Management

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