Why Great Product Managers Are Business System Stewards

Lonnie Pacelli is an Accenture/Microsoft veteran with four decades of learnings under his belt. He frequently writes and speaks on leadership, project management, work/life balance, and disability inclusion. Reach him at [email protected] and see more at ProjectManagementAdvisor.com.

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Topics: Product Management

Several years ago, I consulted with a large IT organization working for the VP of program management. This VP and I have a long history of delivering results for more than 25 years. His organization was comprised of program directors with varying levels of project managers working in each program director’s organization. The program management VP had a peer VP accountable for product management. The product management VP also had directors, which included product managers and product owners.

The product management and program management organizations didn’t get along well. There was confusion on role clarity, and a chronic “that’s not my job” mentality. The product managers didn’t think they should be accountable to the program managers, and the program managers had difficulty pinning down what the product managers were—and were not—accountable to deliver.

Shortly after I started my consulting gig, the VP of product management hired a new product management director. In one of his first meetings, which included the program management VP, the product management director referred to himself as “CEO of the Product.”

In an organization where there was already animosity between program and product management, this didn’t sit well at all with the members of the program management organization, VP included. The…

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