What kind of PM are you?
tl;dr — figure out what values you want to embody, and lead consistently with your values. I want to be a kind, transparent leader who gets sh*t done.
Today’s goal is to remind myself what kind of PM I strive to be.
I want to create products that make lives better. I’m listening to Dreams by Fleetwood Mac today.
Types of PMs
What do I mean by this? Every person, every leader, every PM has their own style of working with and leading others. In the same way companies may have peacetime vs wartime CEOs, PMs can also vary in approach and aggressiveness. PMs often come with their own default flavor of:
- Decision-making and conflict resolution style: are you a bottoms-up consensus-builder, or more a top-down director, or a coy inceptor of ideas (a personal favorite, but difficult to master), or a something else?
- Secondary skill trees: some PMs come with sales or mgmt consulting backgrounds, and others lean more engineering, or ML/data science, or UI/UX design, or project mgmt. This will affect how we approach problems and finalize decisions.
- Communication style and charisma: two different leaders can be highly effective and have wildly different vibes when it comes to how they work with others. Maybe you present as a polished and methodical leader, or maybe you exude confidence, authenticity and “keep-it-real,” or perhaps you’re someone who likes to stay out of the limelight and keep it humble. This affects the types of people who resonate with you and how you build teams and networks.
Most effective PMs master the ability to employ the right strategy and approach to the right situation, and can switch to a different mode as needed; however, most folks have a default style they prefer. What type of PM are you? :)
Determining my PM style through my values
Now you might read through the above and think: “Geez, I’m not sure, I think sometimes I’m more like X and at others more like Y.” That’s not uncommon to hear, the reality is we wear multiple caps and swap them out as needed for the occasion.
To figure out what my natural style was, I went back to my core values. As Adam Grant describes it: “A core value is a one that is ‘intrinsically significant’ to you. […] It’s just important to me. It’s just who I am.” I thought about the characteristics I’ve strived for and admired of role models over the years. I came up with a list and clustered them into several categories based on the key roles I have for my team at work:
Anchoring around my values helped me create a clear picture of the type of PM I wanted to be. Tuning into my values makes it easier to present a coherent persona where my thoughts, feelings, and actions make sense together.
I’ve realized that I want to be a kind, transparent leader who gets sh*t done. I’m not 100% there yet and even if I was, I won’t always get it right… but it’s who I strive to be, and having a clear goal is half the battle. :)
I promise I’ll do my best to consistently lead with these values in mind. I want my core values to deeply embody who I want to be — and hopefully am — to my family, friends, and my team.
