By Marty Cagan · svpg.com · LinkedIn
Marty Cagan reflects on the many competing definitions of the product role and argues that how a product person defines their job reveals a lot about their experience. He highlights an analysis by technology analyst Benedict Evans, which, though not about product management, describes the skills of effective product people well. Evans identifies three abilities: seeing the underlying problem behind surface pain, discovering a solution that actually works for customers, and understanding the company well enough for that solution to be viable internally. Cagan maps these to problem discovery, value risk, and viability risk. He concludes that AI lowers the barrier to building tools but not the harder work of knowing what should exist and how, which keeps the product role essential.
01Key takeaways
- Notice how colleagues define their product role; the emphasis reveals their model and mindset.
- Good product work starts by seeing the broader problem behind a stated pain or idea, not just the surface request.
- Knowing how to use a tool is different from knowing how to build the right one; separate those skills deliberately.
- Evaluate solutions for both customer value and business viability, including legal, compliance, data, and integration constraints.
- Don't assume customers will adopt AI tools the way product people do; most people and companies are not tool builders.
- AI lowers the cost of building, but the scarce skill remains deciding what should exist and why.
02Key sections
- Why the product role is hard to define
- Cagan notes that there are many definitions of the product role, shaped by different operating models and by people's preference for catchy phrases. He treats a candidate's definition as a revealing signal in interviews.
- Benedict Evans's three skills
- Evans describes spotting the general problem behind pain, discovering a good solution rather than just using tools, and understanding the business well enough for the solution to fit across functions.
- Mapping to product concepts
- Cagan translates Evans's points into problem discovery, value risk in solution discovery, and viability risk, noting these skills are rare even though they are not exclusive to product people.
- Confusing ourselves with customers
- Cagan admits he previously overestimated how many people think like product creators and warns product people against assuming customers will use AI the way they do.
- AI doesn't change the core job
- Writing code and building tools is not the hard part; knowing what should exist and how it should exist is, which keeps the product role essential.
03From the post
“I’m just guessing here, but I’d say over the years I’ve seen at least one hundred different definitions of the product role (i.e. product manager/product owner). I’m pretty sure that anyone reading this would have seen at least several. Part of the problem is that there are different operating models that require different responsibilities and... The post A Fresh Definition…”
04Frameworks mentioned
Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.