Glossary: Product Management
Explore the core principles and practices of product management. From product-process matrix to program management, enhance your skills for successful product delivery.
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A Product in Product Management
A product in product management is the result of work produced by a management team. It offers clients an innovative item or service with unique features. A product can be organized into different categories depending on its functions and purpose.
AARRR Framework
AARRR stands for Acquisition, Activation, Retention, Referral and Revenue. Bringing these metrics together in the AARRR framework helps start-ups to grow and scale.
Agile Product Management
Agile product management is a style of project management that involves incremental progress and adaptive strategies. It allows the vision for a product to evolve as the product is developed and launched.
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Bill of Materials (BOM)
A bill of materials is an exhaustive list of the components, parts, and raw materials required for manufacturing a product.
Bubble Sort
Bubble sort is a beginner's algorithm in programming that can be used throughout your career. It sorts data from high to low (or low to high) by comparing each element to the one that comes after it.
Business Intelligence (BI)
Business Intelligence refers to the uncovering, interpreting and application of relevant data and information to help businesses make better decisions.
Business Model Canvas
A short summary containing strategic details of the requirements to get a product to the marketplace.
Business Transformation
Business transformation is the process of redesigning, restructuring, or expanding a business to adapt to relevant internal or external changes.
Business-to-Business (B2B)
Business to business is a transactional model that describes companies who sell products or services to other companies.
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CIO vs CTO
A CIO or Chief Information Officer is internally focused on the company and technology infrastructure, whereas a CTO or Chief Technology Officer is externally focused on customers and technical products.
CRC cards
CRC cards are visual tools used to brainstorm and better understand the role a software product can play for a certain group (“class”) and how it can allow them to perform jobs (“responsibilities”) with other members of their team (“collaborators”)
Cannibalization
Product cannibalization is when a company has several products that compete with one another within the same market.
Captive Product Pricing
When pricing captive products, businesses usually follow a twofold strategy that combines a lower price for the core product with a higher price for accessories or replaceable items.
Cash Flow
Cash flow shows how much cash is moving in and out of your business every month. As they say: “Cash is King”. So being aware of your cash flow is crucial to the running of a successful business.
Cash Flow Budget
Often referred to as a cash budget or a cash flow, the cash flow budget allows a company to keep on top of cash income and outgoings over time.
Change Management
A methodical approach to aiding staff covert from one system or process to another.
Channels of Distribution
Channels of Distribution (or a distribution channel) are channels of businesses or intermediaries which a product or service travels through before reaching the final customer.
Chief Product Officer in Business
In business, Chief Product Officer, or CPO, is the title given to the executive team member who is responsible for leading the entire product organization.
Cost Of Goods Sold (COGS)
The Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) is how much it costs to produce a finished product for the market. Put simply: it is the cost of making the goods a company sells, including the cost of materials, production time and labor.
Cost of Sales
Cost of sales (also known as cost of goods sold) refers to the cost required to manufacture or purchase a product that is then sold to a customer.
Customer Development
A framework that assesses whether or not the product fulfills the customer’s needs.
Customer Journey Map
A customer journey map outlines each step, across all touchpoints, that a user takes to interact with or buy from your product, service or brand. Customer journey maps can increase empathy with users and reveal areas for added value.
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DACI Decision-Making Framework
The DACI Decision-Making Framework is a model designed to make group decision making faster and more effective by assigning specific roles to team members. These roles establish clear responsibilities and help avoid unhealthy disagreements.
Data Product Manager
A data product manager is an emerging role in product development. A data PM is responsible for championing data-driven insights in design, and actively leveraging the flow of data, too.
Definition of Ready
In the Scrum agile framework, the definition of ready (DoR) marks the completeness of preliminary actions for a task or project to be processed.
Dependency
A dependency describes the relationship among activities and specifies the particular order in which they need to be performed.
Design Concept
A design concept establishes the core idea of driving the design and development of a product. It outlines what a product is, who it’s for, and how it works.
Design Ops
Design ops applies to the process of organizing and optimizing a design team’s workflow, structure, and processes to maximize its value to a company as a whole.
Design Thinking
Design Thinking is a user-centric approach to innovation and problem solving. Focused on empathizing with users, Design Thinking is concerned with developing meaningful products that keep users’ genuine wants and needs at heart.
Digital Product Management
Digital product management is the process of bringing digital products from idea to market.
Digital Transformation
Digital transformation refers to the integration of digital technology into all areas of a business to redesign processes and products for the digital age.
Director of Product
As the name suggests, a Director of Product is the person who leads and oversees the complete product development lifecycle, guiding others and ensuring the product is delivered on-spec and on time.
Disruptive Innovation
Disruptive Innovation refers to a product or solution that establishes a new market, business model, or industry (ultimately, “disrupting” those that already exist).
Distribution Models
A distribution model shows how products go from manufacturer to retailers and include every step along that path.
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Enterprise Architecture
Enterprise architecture is a practice wherein a business makes decisions on how to handle various scenarios, typically disruptive ones. This enables businesses to quickly respond to critical situations with an informed and effective approach.
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Feature Audit
A feature audit provides businesses with a quick snapshot of their product's feature usage. Using a graph that plots customer activity on two axes, they outline how features are performing.
Feature Bloat
Feature bloat relates to products carrying excessive features, perhaps becoming overloaded to a point that core functions are impaired.
Feature Factory
A feature factory is a company that consistently comes out with new features for an existing product. This is a derogatory term, as it implies that the features are poorly implemented or simply not necessary, and only serve to prop up a mediocre product.
Feature Flags
Used within software product development to change and deliver programming code.
Features
Features are the defining attributes of a product that make it valuable to customers and distinguish it from the rest of the market.
Features, Advantages and Benefits (FAB) Analysis
A FAB analysis describes the features, advantages and benefits of a product, and how they work together to help differentiate a product within the market.
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Gantt Chart
A Gantt chart visually displays how tasks spread over a timeline. This technique helps project managers successfully plan, coordinate and track all resources and efforts related to a specific project.
Gantt Chart vs Kanban
Gantt Chart vs. Kanban board — both are great tools to help you visualize projects, but how are they different, and which one should you use?
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IT Product Management
In information technology, product management consists of defining, conceiving, delivering, refining, and monitoring products in a market to achieve maximum business results.
Ideation
Ideation involves generating ideas through group brainstorming sessions, which may include sketching and roleplay.
Implicit Requirements
Implicit requirements are those features of a product or app which are so fundamental that they don’t need to be explicitly specified during development.
Information Flows in Product Management
In product management, info flow is the strategy of making sure that everyone working on a product is on the same page. PMs who use strong info flow tactics can avoid miscommunications, reduce emergency meetings, and ensure a smoother development process.
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Method of Procedure (MOP)
Method of Procedure refers to a step-by-step project plan, guiding employees or teams to the completion of a specific task.
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Operating Expenses
Operating expenses are costs that are incurred by the day-to-day operations of a business. For example, overheads (rent, utilities, office supplies) and payroll.
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Payback Period
The payback period refers to the length of time a business expects to wait before the initial investments in a product or project are recovered.
Pendo
Pendo is a platform created for companies dealing with software development. It is designed to help them understand their customers more accurately.
Persona
A persona is an imaginary profile designed to represent the details of a set of end-users.
Pitching a Product
Pitching a product is the process of trying to get investment for a new product launch by selling it to potential investors. A sales pitch is designed to explain the product and how much investors are expected to make.
Pivot
Pivot is a strategy that is used to redirect the business objective of a project or product.
Platform Product Manager
A Platform Product Manager is responsible for the management of not just a single application, but an entire platform. Examples of these platforms include operating systems, operating environments, and web services.
Product Analytics
Product analytics is essential for developing a comprehensive understanding of how users engage with products. This feedback is often more accurate than other forms of user input as it tracks actual user behavior rather than relying on qualitative remarks.
Product Culture
Product culture refers to the philosophy behind a product’s development. Product culture covers concepts such as innovation, customer focus, and product management principles.
Product Description Sheet
A product description sheet defines the scope of a product in specific terms. The document is used during the planning phase to create a clear idea of what the final product should look like, and is then passed on to the development team for execution.
Product Design
Product design refers to the process of conceptualizing, creating, launching and improving upon a product that solves a user problem (while adding value to the business). Winter coats are an outcome of product design, as is the laptop computer.
Product Designer
A product designer (sometimes known as an experience designer, user interface designer, interaction designer, information architect, etc.) takes responsibility for a product’s overall user experience.
Product Development Lifecycle
The product development lifecycle is the series of stages that a product goes through, beginning with product development and ending with the obsoletion of that product.
Product Development Manager (Pdm)
A Product Development Manager (PDM) is responsible for researching, assessing, and coordinating the development of innovative and compelling new products. They also work on the development and improvement of existing products to better meet customer needs.
Product Development Process
A Product Development Process can be described as all of the stages that must be completed by a business in order to take a product from its idea germination through to the point at which it becomes available on the market.
Product Differentiation
Product differentiation is how a business distinguishes a service or product from others that are available in the same category.
Product Disruptor
A product disruptor is an innovation that adds new value to a business, by future-proofing against market threats, competitor rivalry or customer behavior change.
Product Enablement
Product enablement increases awareness and understanding of a business’s product(s) across the entire organization, with the aim of making each and every employee higher performing.
Product Excellence
Product excellence refers to a framework for developing a product or feature based on a deep understanding of user needs. Product excellence enables businesses to innovate more efficiently, enabling them to get the right products to market quickly.
Product Leadership
Product leadership refers to a cross-departmental approach to making an organization’s products a success. It is not one singular role but a collection of responsibilities shared by department leads, managers, and even C-suite employees.
Product Levels
Product levels provide a way to visualize customers' needs about a particular product. They can be psychological needs or core needs.
Product Line
A product line represents the products that a company creates using a single brand. All products in a product line share traits and are designed for the same target market.
Product Management Audit
A comprehensive assessment concerning the processes and strategy of an organisation’s product management.
Product Management Process
The product management process refers to the sum of strategies that concentrate on launching a new product or improving an already existing one.
Product Management Talent
Product Management Talent refers to a selection of candidates who have the skills and qualifications required to be successful in a particular product role.
Product Manager
A product manager is responsible for the success of a product. The product manager has profound knowledge on the developed product and everything that goes with it.
Product Marketing Manager
This is the person who’s chief objective is to broadcast the value of the product to the market.
Product Mix
A product mix is the complete set of products or services offered by a business.
Product Ops
Product ops, referring to product operations, supports a cross-functional product team to constantly ensure and improve their efficiency.
Product Owner (PO)
The product owner (PO) represents next to the ScrumMaster and the development team a key player in a Scrum team.
Product Portfolio Management
This refers to the strategic administration of all the products owned by the organization.
Product Positioning
Product positioning refers to the practice of presenting your product as unique in the marketplace and describing the benefits to your target audience. A product ’s positioning will either attract target buyers or turn them away.
Product Principles
Product principles form the foundation for your products that helps guide development.
Product Spec
A product spec provides teams with critical information to guide them as they bring products to market, covering such contextual details as the target audience, user goals, and intended outcomes.
Product Stack
This refers to the tools that a product manager has at their disposal in order to get the product to the marketplace.
Product Tree
The Product Tree is a visual tool used by product managers to prioritize and manage product feature inputs from both customers and stakeholders.
Product Value
Product value is the core benefit a product delivers to its customers. It represents a product’s ability to meet customer needs and is a crucial driver for product design and pricing strategy.
Product-market Fit
Product-market fit refers to the way in which a brand’s product is capable of satisfying the current market, by supplying enough units of a high-enough quality to meet demand.
Program Management
The grouping together of multiple projects to meet a strategic objective.
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R&D: Research and Development
R&D (Research and Development) is the first stage of the product lifecycle. During this phase, a product team will conceptualize and assess the viability of a new product to decide whether it is worth taking to market.
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Scope Creep
Scope creep describes the tendency for projects to gradually expand, and take on a different scope of activity or output than was initially planned.
Shipyard Engine
A shipyard engine is a tool used to help teams communicate while continuously updating a software product. It goes above typical VCS systems, forcing team members to justify the updates they ship and to notify other team members of their updates.
Six Thinking Hats
The six thinking hats is a method used to make creative discussions more productive. It's based on the work of Dr. Edward de Bono, a widely respected psychologist and author.
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Technical Debt
The accumulated later cost in the development of a project - in time and resources - of a mistake or technical decision.
Technical Product Manager (TPM)
Responsible for getting the product to market and its success or failure, and similar to a product manager but with more in-depth technical expertise.
The 4 Ds of Time Management
When to-do lists start to grow overwhelmingly, the 4 Ds of time management can help product managers discern essential from non-essential tasks and get things done.
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