How To Break Into (& Upskill for) Product, Project And/Or Program Management - w/ Farah

I was selected to join Apple AIML in Seattle as an engineering program manager do product managers need to have technical expertise and I'm on that's a million dooll question my friend and I think this is going to make it to the YouTube beginning of there when I applied for the Google technical program manager position I remember one of the questions being how would you explain primary key in SQL to a 5-year-old product management company X and product management company y might be doing very different things if you're just constantly communicating then escalation will not be a problem program managers are often not the ones prioritizing the work they are often not the stakeholder management do you think that agile is the best way to manage a team's progress I want to give a book recommendation to

anyone Welcome to The Ready Set do podcast where we learn from journeys of not experts who are just two steps ahead of us I'm Nam Pand and in this episode featured not experti is far fella 2C Farah is an Engineering Management student at puru University with extensive experience as a program/ project manager in organizations such as capital 1 Bank and apple having many coveted certifications under her belt including scrum safe and agile product management our discussion today is centered around PM roles an umbrella that consists of product project and program management we go over exactly what each of them entail the overlaps as well as the differences and how one can break into each of the above in great detail indeed Farah takes us through all the skill sets that one has to cultivate

the skill sets that one has to cultivate to get to their PM role of choice including the why and spoiler alert that can look very different based on which PM role you're targeting and then finally Farah shares some incredible resources that I have Linked In the description below for you to get a strong grip on what is the agile methodology in keeping with our theme of learning from somebody that's just two steps ahead of us instead of an expert my goal with this episode is to Spotlight Farah's incredible career Journey so far and share with you how you can break into your PM role of choice this is The Ready Set to podcast and to support it subscribe on YouTube and leave me up to a f star rating on Spotify or your favorite podcast app do also check out the links in description

also check out the links in description for more direct ways to support me and now my friends without any further Ado here's far far welcome thank you it's great to be here saying hi to all the Ready Set d podcast listeners yeah likewise really excited to dig into the really fascinating subject of just I'm just going to say PM for now because you know it's such a big umbrella term there's so much that goes under it and often there's just a lot of confusion about exactly what it entails so we'll be getting into all of that but just for our listeners to get some context around you and your background do you mind just providing a really quick and dirty snapshot kind of your of your career so

snapshot kind of your of your career so far and you know the type of work that you've been doing in this field yeah of course uh well I have about seven years of experience uh doing project management program management in Canadian Financial technology uh which is very revent to my undergraduate degree I have a math and Physics degree from ufd um and now I'm pursuing my masters in Engineering Management at Purdue University and I was lucky to have an internship at Apple as an EPM and I hope to pursue the engineering program management/ product management going forward that makes a lot of sense and obviously you know you don't need an expert to realize that apple is just such a high ticket uh you know option or a place to get your internship at so are

a place to get your internship at so are you willing to talk about how that experience was um you know how you applied and what that interview process was like for that particular internship yeah absolutely uh well I there's a long process of uh application and uh and you know selection process for uh getting such an opportunity at Apple um I can't talk much about the product details but uh as you know uh but I was very focused with a brief uh you know snapshot I was very focused on getting recommendations to all the available internships um I was also a winter intake into uh meem program so I was very aware of the time crunch uh so very focused on getting referrals and um you you know being able to Showcase my past experience and the relevance of

past experience and the relevance of that experience into the internship uh qu you know qualities and the job requirements um um through my resume and through recommendations uh I went through a four four-step interview um not including the recruiter's uh screening call uh and uh I was selected uh to join Apple AIML in Seattle as an in program manager the role was um a you know a lot of switch between product management and program management um uh we we didn't have a product manager as per se in our group so we had to you know uh play the both roles interchangeably that's very fascinating so just for some context I will share the one experience that I have had in this in this field and um obviously that

this in this field and um obviously that didn't end up converting for me which which is what brought me to a completely different career track but and and the whole point of doing this is just so U maybe listening to that you will be able to maybe comment on whether you had a similar experience cuz I know you referen that you you're not willing to share exactly what was asked which I completely understand but I'm sure our listeners will kind of be looking at it from the point of you know how do you prepare for that like what are some skills or uh what is the best way to you know put oneself in the position to excel at these type of interviews so in 202 to when I applied for the Google

202 to when I applied for the Google technical program manager position um I only got through like one round and in that it was I remember it being just a whole hour of um it was fairly intense actually like there was a lot of um I don't use the word lightly but grilling really going on and I remember one of the questions being how would you explain SQL or you know just the primary key in SQL to a 5-year-old and I thought that was such a great question like it's genuinely such a good question and I I ended up saying something we don't know whether it was right or wrong or if it was good or bad but we'll just assume it

was good or bad but we'll just assume it probably wasn't good enough because it didn't make the cut and you know that's how I knew that maybe I should have prepared for that like because those type of questions if you're prepared it just becomes easier to have a plan of action and then you're not on the spot in front of the interviewer trying to get your thoughts together so was your experience similar or and you know going back what are I guess some things that students can do to prepare themselves for these type of interviews yeah definitely very similar now okay and for me it was also a lot of um as you know I had seven years of experience so uh I had to do a whole unlearning of the past learning and start again as a student

learning and start again as a student going through the internship uh interview process because um you really want to display and um assure your interview of your ability to learn and your uh flexibility and Agility through changes and how well you can perform without being fully prepared for any situation uh so that's that's one of the key things that uh I I had to work very hard on uh because my myself I was U before coming back to school and wanting to do my internship um interview process I was very familiar with my role and most of my interviews was within my network folks I know uh products I'm familiar with so to be able to Showcase hey I'm starting all over again and uh I am you know willing to learn and put the

am you know willing to learn and put the effort uh that is required from an intern from um you know brand new field brand new company brand new country and culture I'm willing to be adaptable enough to um understand the situation and navigate uh making the best decision based on the limited resources I have so that's my number one answer number two is being yourself I think um as I I heard your uh conversation with udj I watched it one of my favorites I follow him on YouTube um and he's great yeah he's so great you guys talked about saturation in the market and um reflecting the same concept into program management and product management is so important to be able to stand out and show that authentic self that unique Journey you went through as a person as opposed to you know an identity or a

opposed to you know an identity or a program or you know all these other things that uh thousands of other folks have gone through the same things so being able to Showcase that unique self of yours who you are and what you have to offer to your own personal journey and everything you experienced as a person so far that would be something that I think you would need to practice for and that's my second um answer to that um and third is practice practice practice do a lot of practice there are so many tools out there you don't have to spend $1,000 doll you know there are tools uh that you can use in leverage often provided by your University and also working with a friend uh Reach Out to people who have been through these interviews before a lot of folks reach out to me and I am very happy to spend

out to me and I am very happy to spend time helping them and I'm sure there are so many other people like me I reach out to so many people and they're so kind to help me at the same time so um definitely practice this is something you need to put effort in and you can't just wing it and make sure you get the best result you know that definitely Rings through I mean at least um the first and the third thing you mentioned are 100% spot on if I can just apply that to you know my own experience because yeah I spoke to zero people about this I just went online and I was I just looked at you

online and I was I just looked at you know I just Googled how to prepare for Google TPM which is kind of ironic in itself but what you saying and what I agree is really what I should have done is reach out to um other Engineers that are in that position right now and find out about the type of work they do um it's not even necessarily tell me what you were asked in your interview right that's not the point the point is understanding what type of work they were doing and how I can as you said adapt to Showcase how I would fit in if I were asked to do all that same work so that's really interesting and I love that you call that out from there I'm kind of you know thinking about this

kind of you know thinking about this interplay between the three PMS so product program and project management so maybe I can share in a very you know Bare Bones nutshell um you know type of scenario what those things mean to me and then maybe you can correct me if I go somewhere or you know just add more context so does that make sense okay so we'll make this really Snappy right so product management I feel like is easier to tackle first CU I think it's the most distinct of the three so you are responsible for shipping either it can be an entire product itself or it can be features within a product so say somebody wants to add you know like a new voice message feature to say

new voice message feature to say messenger so that would be the uh responsibility of a product manager who would have then you know a team of engineer engers who would make sure that it's the requirement that users want and then kind of be that bridge between what's needed and what's being developed so that's product right there project is one single track of say some company it doesn't even need to be a product company wants to do migration they have certain tools and processes in across certain systems they want to Port these over to a new system that entire thing is a quote unquote project and then somebody has to manage that make sure there's no deadlines being missed um things aren't going over budget and all of the you know those three uh things that are I think it's budget uh schedule and I think there's one more thing which

and I think there's one more thing which maybe you can you can Enlighten us and then the third thing is program which to me feels like you would be managing multiple projects all at once so I'll pause there that is my understanding of this subject but maybe you could you know throw more light on anything I missed or add anything that I didn't cover yeah definitely first I start with the three things it's called iron Triangle it's h the time the cost and scope that's something that project managers will have to know inside out for their project and they're really the sole people responsible for uh ensuring everything's in balance and unchecked or at least be aware of at what stage those three things are um I I very much agree

three things are um I I very much agree uh with uh your explanation regarding product management project management and program management um for our audience I want to take a step back and um provide a context for everything I'm going to say going forward uh to mention a lot of these roles Naman are very interchangeably used in different companies so uh what we talk about in terms of roles and responsibilities here really comes down to that um organization's uh you know different of that role and sometimes it even gets to that specific team so a product management in um you know a product management company X and product management company y might be doing very different things but also a product management in company X in team a and a

management in company X in team a and a product management in company X in Team B might also be doing different things so very much of it comes down to also even team agreements and uh what type of U you know support would that delivery need at that very point in time even I also want to add this as as as an extra layer cherry on top even a single person's role within a team evolves over time so what stage of product management you're in initially if it's a kickoff stage and design stage you might need to be doing a lot more of exactly what you said figure out the Gap and the need but eventually as the delivery is in

eventually as the delivery is in progress and the product is shipped and you know uh enhancements are being added so much of the work of product management is going to be prioritization of work which would require understanding of the time scope and the budget so I just want to add this context for the background of everything else I'm going to add and just share my experience regarding the difference between these three piece absolutely that's perfect yep thank you um so uh regarding uh the program management or product management I I'll start with those two first because as you said they're the most distinguishable so to me I always think about product management role being the Navigator and the decision maker of which direction should we go whereas the program manager

should we go whereas the program manager is within the team and within the operation making sure everything's working well inside so a lot of stakeholder management for example outside of the team is being done by the product manager a lot of the uh Gap analysis product analysis user research uh so much of understanding what should be done first in order to provide the best quality product to our customers meeting their needs that would be the job of product management and uh this will have to be a very proactive role they have to be ahead of the market they will have to be ahead of the company they have to be align with the vision they need to know all the other products in the industry and the way they're navigating um and also fully understand

navigating um and also fully understand of the three four steps ahead and the type of uh resources they would require for future um uh navigation and future enhancements and make sure all of that exists within the team so that that's how I look at product management roles so much of uh Vision um Vision setting uh Vision alignment goal setting as well as prioritization what should be done first in order to provide the best quality product um as well as um now I'm going to get into quality control but some type of quality control to make sure um you know the the product uh created meets the requirements and um sense yeah and then also right and probably also do some sort of uh um you know survey maybe survey is in the best

know survey maybe survey is in the best word but get out get your beta version out and get feedback feedback is the word I guess I was looking for and what you're saying so far makes perfect sense um the only I guess question on that specifically around product management is uh and I know you said it differs so first of all that was such a great call out I actually had no idea and I feel like that changes everything so I'm really glad you shared that but for the most part um do product managers need to have technical expertise like are they in the weeds writing code or more often the not they're doing this other stuff that you talk yeah that's a very good

that you talk yeah that's a very good question um it definitely helps if uh you understand the technical skills required and we're talking software here but product could be anything you know if they understand the technicalities and the engineering required to build the feature they're proposing to the team it definitely helps but um um but the most high performing teams I have seen are the ones where product manager fully trusts the engineering team and although they are understanding uh the the language they do not um enroll handson with the code they're not engaging um you know with the code and fully trust uh the engineering team and Engineering Management with their decision making regarding architecture regarding scoping and how they see the um the work should be done so a lot of a

um the work should be done so a lot of a product management answer is the what and a lot of what the engineering does is the how of it so yeah that that's so well put yeah that makes total sense yeah exactly so I I think it definitely helps especially when you talk about the top tech companies in the world um it's definitely um I would say a big plus or maybe a must I I am trying try to not say uh strong words maybe not a must but it definitely helps to understand the technical um aspect of uh the product You're Building let me say it this way Naman the way I look at it is uh these three roles uh being uh the CEO the CTO

three roles uh being uh the CEO the CTO and the COO of the company if you run every team like your own company like your life depends on it like every penny make comes out of every product you sell right um and it really helps you a lot when you put yourself in those shoes to me the CEO is always a product manager the CTO is a technical team and the COO is going to be the program manager SL project manager wow huh I mean when you put it like that it just kind of slots into place you know it all it all makes sense um and actually on that topic of you know being CEO is there an element of you know scrum Master type

of you know scrum Master type responsibilities that product managers would benefit from or is that something that again they would have somebody like a dedicated you know um I think the role is called a scrum lead or something right so yeah is that interchangeable or is that also one of the feathers in the proverbial ideal product manager cap yeah that's a good question I I can't I can't give a correct or wrong answer there's no right or wrong answer I'll share my opinion but I I do let you know because I did spend a lot of my uh past life before coming back to school within the agile world and working with agile

the agile world and working with agile teams um the best product managers I worked with are those who are uh CSM certified and are familiar with the concept of agile and really try to uh be agile and fully understand uh the full circle of you know daily check-in proper planning um and um you know retrospectives and demo at the end so that that would require a full grasp of uh short iterative and incremental delivery and the best product managers I work with are those who fully have that grasp um now would there would there be a scrum master um product manager you know uh overlaps with the role again I think it goes back to the team a lot of things do not have a scrum master so the product manager will have

master so the product manager will have to put on the hat uh the the con of this situation would be the overwhelmed overworked uh product manager because there's a lot of work that goes into stakeholder management product mission and vision and everything you have to focus regarding the customer feedback and a scrum Master's job is really most of the operation and team performance and team productivity um I also have seen a lot of the times where scrum Master will have to step in to slow down the product manager in terms of because they demand better faster product and the engineering team although they said boundaries there can be um you know uh some disagreements at times and I think having a scrum Master who's a third

having a scrum Master who's a third person and can you know interject and say Hey what if we find a middle ground between delivering the best quality the fastest versus delivering you know the most technically feasible so uh my my answer to that is there is pros and cons to having a product manager wearing both hats but it's not impossible and it will go back to the team on what do they decide on you know I just want to you know take a little moment here and commend on commend you on your ability to find the nuances that EX exist in all of this I'm just kind of pleasantly pleasantly surprised by how you never

pleasantly surprised by how you never like no this is it or that is it you're like both could be it but this is what it all depends on which I think is it's just spot on for you know I feel like myself and I hopefully for most of our listeners but I really just wanted to you know take a moment and you know comment you on that but and then yeah so continuing before I detracted you from this road we covered product management pretty well I feel like and then yeah you were going to continue sharing about your experiences with the other two so if you don't mind I appreciate I appreciate you saying that n if you don't mind I add a comment about it

don't mind I add a comment about it before I talk about program man oh absolutely I I I'm actually really passionate about the topic of team performance and uh you know team productivity um it's it's something I truly care about and if it wasn't for this this um you know passion of mine to help people work better together I might have not left my very comfortable life in Toronto and come down to states to pursue my Master's Degree I really wanted to do uh pursue the science of Team Team academically um and um and it it really means uh so much because I've seen it work I've seen there being a science behind how to actually um build the best quality product in the fastest way all while everyone's actually happy doing it it's possible it's called high performing team and uh I think people

performing team and uh I think people should enjoy their work and everyone should get the high quality product they deserve and a lot of it goes back to the science of um how to fully understand the system within the which team operates so thank you for saying that I appreciate it yeah and just real quick I feel like you know both of us are P you mem well I'm an Alum but and you're going to be but we're both associated with PUO mem yes but in all my years of being a student and interacting with other students that are in the cohort I feel like somehow maybe this is on me more than anybody else but I've actually never had somebody say this about their motivations for you know trying to learn

motivations for you know trying to learn this you know the most common thing you get is oh I'm an engineer and then I wanted to manage other Engineers so I'm studying Engineering Management which makes perfect sense but I think what you just laid out gives that entire experience of the degree just such a completely different flavor and to me that that feels you know a layer deeper than just oh it's time for the next step in my career like it really sounds like you know exactly what where your passion lies and this degree would be the only thing really that would you know put you or connect you to your future self where you see yourself doing this so yeah just wanted to share that observation but I I do think that is really cool I

do think that is really cool I appreciate you saying that that's that's why I am specializing in systems engineering uh to actually look more into understanding the way different components of the system operate together and uh it's it's true uh I think um although I'm not unique I see uh very few of the folks who come back to and come back to school after many years of experience but it's often for a switching career whereas I I I like what I'm doing I want to better understand it and do it better yeah that's right I appreciate you saying that I yeah big big shout out perdu mem thank you for watching this boil boiler up boiler up that's right now going back to program management um I think uh program management as I mentioned would be the CEO of the company slash team slash and

CEO of the company slash team slash and you know the group of people people operating together a lot of it goes back to um operations and how to um as you mentioned the Iron Triangle uh uh scope the time and the budget of the project um it will often have to be at if you want one to be very high the other two would be low if you want you know so it will all often have to be a compromise between the Tre and that's why they call it a triangle yep um uh program management would require in terms of uh preparation it would require understanding a lot of the different elements um into um into that program specifically so for example with the product what really helps as you

product what really helps as you mentioned is a domain expertise so if uh you're working on credit cards for example it will help for you to fully understand the existing credit cards in the market and what goes into the credit card system that you're trying to build whereas with program management a lot of the it does help to understand the product but it's more important to understand the delivery structure of of this project so you're no longer I mean again it goes back to specific team or organization but you're no longer defining specification or stories or the breakdown of work um program managers are often not the ones prioritizing the work they are often not the stakeholder management management however okay um most of the yeah however most of the reporting being done by a program manager so um for leadership

program manager so um for leadership they showcase we spent this much money with these many people to deliver this much work within this amount of time basically basically so uh you know uh that that would be a lot of so tools for example like Gant chart which uh would help so much for you to familiarize yourself with or um a metric like throughput um how many critical path stuff like that exactly exactly things like this would would help a lot um and there are so many uh pro project management SL program management tools available uh out there that um folks can you know take quick uh crash courses on like jira like MS project management there are so many others um but a lot of uh what you need

others um but a lot of uh what you need as a program management is organizational skills m be able to organize your work for yourself and for the people around you so if I were to say three main things you need as a program management number one would definitely be organizational skills because uh you don't want to miss um a risk you want to raise to tomorrow because oops I forgot you know that that would be a big big uh cost for all the dependent teams and the produ and the leadership so that that's not something that is more tolerable for program manager uh second skills I would say a program manager needs to have is communication skills you can never over communicate in this role I cannot

communicate in this role I cannot emphasize that enough you will always have to be able to talk to the team talk to the stakeholders talk to the leadership um this will have to be also relationship building skills it's not only about hey Naman how much more is left to this work it's about yeah you can't burn any Bridges here right cuz the moment you do that the rest of the future of the project is you know immediately in in you know in a problematic exactly so it's it's really not just about hey Naman how much more work is left it's more like hey Naman are you feeling better you weren't feeling well on Friday I just wanted to check up on you you know some things like that and then you get back it's like hey I'm feeling much better I think

like hey I'm feeling much better I think I would be able to finish this by today so a lot of it really goes back to relationship but I I'm I'm categorizing relationship building under a communication umbrella and I think they're very highly corelated that makes sense 100% definitely agree on that and also on the topic of communication something that I've seen come up really just in my career and I'm assuming other people might have seen this also is that the the ability to escalate at the right time you know so okay you've been tracking your go triangle one of those things seems at risk but you you think maybe it's still manageable and you continue to think that and then 4 days later it is definitely no longer manageable so what advice can you share

manageable so what advice can you share around when it is the best time to escalate and are there any metrics that one could look at to quantify that if x happens it's escalation time you know stuff has hit the hit the wall and there is no uh getting out of this without escalation yeah and I'm on that's a million dooll question my friend and I think this is going to make it to the YouTube beginning of the that's so true that's a million doll question my friend when to escalate that's well I I will tell you the way I approach escalation sure um number one is you don't want escalation to be a surprise especially to those you care about like your direct manager their manager leadership you do not want to

manager leadership you do not want to escalation to be a surprise so make sure as soon as you sense the possibility of delay you or I'm just putting time as a factor here you could be going over over budget or you could be getting more work as soon as you see the possibility of risk raise it just talk about it casually hey by the way this happened just want to let you know I'm going to take this step to make sure I'm going to mitigate it but if it doesn't happen that will be risk so make sure an escalation is not a surprise and is initially uh informally communicated in some sort of way that's how I approach it in terms of metrics it really does vary in all teams based on what they measure um uh for example if you have

measure um uh for example if you have teams that are if you're working on a customer facing product and you have marketing teams that have already advertised a release of a feature you do not want to go over time in these you can go over budget you can do less goope but you do not want to go over time on these so different measurements are uh you know um it very much depends on the team or the type of product uh but um I would say make sure again going back to relationship building make sure you have the right support in your team or in your organization who are your Champions and are familiar of everything happening

and are familiar of everything happening in your world even the little inconvenience so then as soon as that slight little inconvenience becomes a big inconvenience or becomes a big risk they are already familiar and they're your Champion um and somehow a shield in front of leadership or all the other areas where uh you know there is going to be um some negotiation needed because of the risk uh imposed um and also be on top of mitigation uh it's it's always big one yeah it's always good to in terms of escalation it's always good to talk about mitigation right after escalation so hey Naman we're going to be late in delivering this feature but if we remove option b and c we might be able to meet on time or but if you pay

able to meet on time or but if you pay me this much more I can bring in someone who can fix this so make sure you always have plan B and C in place and this again comes back with organizational skills being able to see ahead of time being prepared as you're doing your reporting as well as communication skills uh so you make sure it's not a surprise for everybody I love the you know two main call outs for me from what you just laid out was and I I I don't even know which one I like more but the first one being that if you're just

first one being that if you're just constantly communicating then escalation will not be a problem because as you said it won't be a surprise to begin with you know you had already communicated that and you can even just get on top of all of that simply by just communicating um as much as possible as you said so I love how that just one one directive covers you know that aspect of escalation as well and then the second thing I think is just a classic uh don't come to me with a problem come to me with a solution and you we hear this all the time and you know we know it makes sense but it's always interesting to me

sense but it's always interesting to me to see just how many places it shows up you know just this very simple concept that when you're going to some body that's higher in the power hierarchy maybe power is in the right word but in the corporate hierarchy than you it's not your job to add to their problems it is potentially your job to go to them with a solution so at least they have a starting off point on how to address a problem that you went with so yeah very true that's exactly right it's I think it's also important to just point out it's not really about their uh hierarchial position it's also about the higher you go the Lesser you know about

higher you go the Lesser you know about what's on the ground so you providing options help them understand what are the feasible possibilities in the team so you say we have we can do this with these pros and cons or we can do this with these pros and cons so definitely I do want to mention the third skill that I think is very very important for a program manager um and that is the ability to navigate through change and uh uh this is a very critical one and a bit of vulnerability here may be the one I struggle with and I'm working on very very much working on I'm working on very very much and trying to be better at it but you spend so much time passionately caring

spend so much time passionately caring about a certain deadline to deliver a feature and dedicate so much of your time and effort into making sure everything happens as you wish and just the last week before release something goes wrong and trust me this has happened way too many times in my career it's not a rare occasion and everything changes so being able to accept that all of that is going to change now and let's find the next most feasible uh approach without calling everything else a waste and making sure the path forward is towards success is a very important skill um uh and it's it's it requires a certain mental Clarity yep as well as uh you know um logical decision making and negotiation skills uh with yourself and the team um

skills uh with yourself and the team um and also as a program manager again the COO the director of Chief Operating Officer you will also have to navigate the team so there might be so many conflict conflict management arising so there would be disagreements as sudden changes happen and you know technical team and the product team business might have different perspective marketing might have different different perspective I would always think this is the job of a program manager to you know keep the calm of everyone and find the middle ground as the third um perspective into the matter so you will have to not only be able to adapt to change but also have the Buy in and find the middle ground

the Buy in and find the middle ground and negotiation skills with everybody else in the team to make sure you make the right decision going forward so um adaptability agility and flexibility to accept uh the change and um you know find a path forward it would be the third skill that it's very hard to train for unless you are in this situation I was just going to say yeah how do you train for that like you know how do you do a a mock drill drill training course for a crisis you know it feel almost counterintuitive yeah that is very hard and this is why I always tell folks who reach out to me for resume help and resum review I always tell them mention

resum review I always tell them mention your teamw work anywhere you worked with the team as much as possible because things like this happen with the team and you want to showcase your negotiation skills your teamwork ability you know uh these are the things that help uh with navigating going forward Conflict Management so um similar uh smaller scale situation uh that could happen in a project you deliver with a course or um you know a little um out of school out of work personal project you've been working on or if you were in a any sport team sport team also has a very similar for example they work very hard to qualify for a league and they don't make it so what's the next thing

don't make it so what's the next thing so a lot of these things can showcase to your right clubs and student organizations exactly yeah I feel like all of those would be the you know most fertile soil for this type of thing exactly I feel like we we're covering such amazing Nuance here I feel like all three of these PMS could have been an episode by themselves and you know maybe that is something we can explore in the future but just close the hatchet do you want to close us out by well close out as in for just this for the PM umbrella stuff um go over what entails the entire field of project management it feels like to me after what we've covered

like to me after what we've covered again I could be wrong but it sounds like a little bit it's just like a mini baby version of program management but I have a feeling that it's not so I'll let you I let you continue from here um in in my perspective it it is very much interchangeably use program and project management that's what I thought yeah yeah yeah I think um so much of program management is more than just project management project management would be set of skills to have in terms of really how to manage a project whereas a program involves more reporting to leadership more maybe stakeholder management maybe

management maybe documentation uh update maybe uh so much of the more within operation of the team and the way they work with dependent teams around them so to me program management as you said exactly is more project management but Nam if I were to make it three because you did mention tree I do want to add the quality assurance into this tree um now in big Tech uh organizations if we're talking software so much of the quality assurance is incorporated within the algorithm uh except for a very little bit of user testing that is often done with the product team um not much of the testing is being done as it's known but I don't think that's the case with manufacturing um and I'm not an expert in the field I think there are so many

in the field I think there are so many folks who can talk more about it but quality management and quality assurance is also a very very important pillar that would be to me the third element if there's engineering product management program manager then I I think quality Engineers are also um a big part of it because we're not talking technical roles so everything technical separate but then it would be product program and quality assurance um and Inter interesting and so and I mean that actually unlocks this it's it really seges really well into the question I had for you next which was um off late we have been seeing a big Focus especially by big Tech and really any big company really but um there's this

big company really but um there's this push towards um the or the promotion of individual contributor roles of all the three PM roles that we mentioned so from what you've shared with us here today it feels like for product managers I honestly don't even know what they could possibly be doing more than what they're already doing you know it really does feel like their plates are completely full I can see if somebody had to make that argument for program/ project managers that you know maybe they should be contributing more individually um I I can see that but I'm curious to hear your take on the direction this is headed and what the future holds for these positions uh you know starting like 2025 will say yeah definitely it's um I I can share I I operated as a

um I I can share I I operated as a individual contributor when I was in Canada as a program manager um I can share my perspective into the journey uh but it's slightly different South of the Border here in States um and also uh as as we know 2022 2023 were the biggest uh layoff years of the tech industry since uh the do com boom in 2004 so um I I personally think um this is uh going to change so much about individual contributor aspect and it could also be partially the cause of uh companies pushing towards hiring individual contributor because as I'm sure you know um clausing a contract does not mean uh firing someone or so definitely comes with that now I did listen through your conversation with sanjie you guys talked

conversation with sanjie you guys talked about risk and I think so much of individual contributor versus full-time um position goes back to risk and for a person to analy where in life they are and what they're hoping to get out of that role or that job um and um see how well they would be able to risk you know um certain areas because there's pros and cons with both absolutely like do you want a health insurance you know that's a risk that's like that yeah health insurance is a perfect or pay time off um for example for um ladies maternity leave do you care about being able to take now I think it's six months here in states in Canada we have up to a year year yeah yeah I aware of that yeah yeah so you

yeah I aware of that yeah yeah so you know things like that is what someone would have to see where they are in life if they're able to risk it are you I I think it would very much depend on the role but on average an individual contributor makes more per hour than a full-time person does in exchange for the risk they're taking exactly so would you need a big cash up front you know uh or or not do you care about Job stability you know how do you even find contracts that's another big one right it's not guaranteed like what if your contract ends and you have nothing planned in the future and then you're just going door too trying to find where your next pche comes from definitely makes sense yeah exactly that's exactly

makes sense yeah exactly that's exactly right so much of the layoff that happen although it was mass and huge but they provide some support packages for individuals up to few months after they're no longer working with the company until they can find their next position so uh you know so much of this is going to be the risk that you're taking whereas with a contractor the day the contract ends that's it makes sense um and then for for this last section I really want to you know pick your brain about the subject that you shed that you're passionate about and I think that was really an interesting call out because I mean for multiple reasons the biggest being I just really like talking to people about things that they're passionate about you know what bigger

passionate about you know what bigger reason is there to talk to somebody about something so I kind of want to pick your brain about team performance and you know best best ways or best practices to get to that and I want to start off with an intentionally kind of you know we'll just say hot take a little bit maybe so do you think yes or no uh that agile or you know scrum actually agile is the technically the right word is the best way to manage a team's progress um yes or no and then I would love it if you could shed some more light into a lot of agile slander that I've been seeing lately some of which I will confess make sense in my mind I can't give yes and no answer

mind I can't give yes and no answer because it depends on the team I'm on but uh I'll say yes okay hold on so let me help you break down me help you let me help you break down some more constraints so we'll say it's a tech team like they're trying to ship a you know a technique or a software product we'll say the team size is 10 members and I guess yeah what are some other you know uh like placeholders that we can proceed with just so you can give a slightly more uh you know balanced answer yeah definitely I I'll say yes now I also let your audience know that my opinion in this is biased I got my first uh certified scrum Master certificate from uh um berti in Canada shout out berti um doing

berti in Canada shout out berti um doing advertising for that's awesome yeah I'll reach out if they want to sponsor I'm just kidding there's no way this is back in August 2016 so how many years is this eight years or yeah yeah so uh that's that's my first introduction I I learned about scrum right then I learned about campan um squirrel North another shout out to folks uh who are providing agile trainings in Toronto I worked with them um you know uh with the with the their Founders back then the company wasn't there like back in 2016 2017 um I I learned so much about XP which is um very technically heavy uh agile software development um I work with cand scrum safe I worked a little bit um safe certified I was very active

bit um safe certified I was very active within agile community in Toronto and I really liked it because uh one of the agile's main principles is people and interactions over processes and things and uh there is four uh main um you know yeah four main um uh things they have um and uh four I think there's 12 principles but uh yeah yeah yeah yeah it's it's very people centered um very very interesting yeah sorry go ahead very much about um you know fully understanding what the user needs as a person and fully understanding what the team is capable of around and creating the process around that um when I first entered the agile world I really sense the Gap in strong governance because I was in banking technology as well and it's very

banking technology as well and it's very different in financial sector anyone working in financial sector is familiar with very high regulation if you're in healthare if you're in financial SE uh sector if you're in government and regulations they have very rigid uh firm governance systems and that really takes away the ability to inovate in 2024 you should be able to adapt to the change and adapt faster and do it without the pressure on your uh you know team members and users as well so this is why I was passionate about agile I want to give a book recommendation to anyone who cares about high performing team um please read uh the Phoenix project um by Dr Kim Jean Kim um and uh please read uh 10,000 hours by uh Dr Carl Ericson um he passed away in Co in

Carl Ericson um he passed away in Co in Florida but I was talking with him one onone on the email to oh wow yeah to better understand his perspective towards productivity and being able to uh actually deliver more without feeling more pressure and burned out and how much that amplifies when you are in the right setting of the team uh if you have people performing based on their skills and passions and uh you know their their area of contribution and collaborate well together it creates something called High performing team where um everyone uh would be happy doing what they do and what they do would be the best out there so um I'm truly passionate about this I can talk a lot more about it whenever want yeah I can

more about it whenever want yeah I can tell um and then for the resources I'll be sure to link both these books in the show note descriptions for anybody that's looking for a link to the so a link to that so thanks for sharing that but I guess coming back just in just in really in terms of agile slander um the thing that I've heard the most or in my head at least the thing that makes somewhat sense in my head is actually exactly what you said about it focuses on people over processes and some people have the opinion that um it stifles Innovation by doing so so say a developer that has been written you know a user story of say you know like 15

a user story of say you know like 15 hours that week say that developer finishes his 15 hours and because of agile now he is constrained to not doing more so maybe this person could have written like he's let's say like a you know 10x developer or a top 10% developer he could have written more code that week but he was not able to do that and thereby the team's overall progress was stifled because of the methodology itself and I I I get that this is like a very intentionally cherry-picked Corner case probably doesn't happen all too often but I am looking or I am curious to your uh you know take on this particular criticism that some people have about aile yeah definitely thanks for asking that so I I do want to mention a bad

that so I I do want to mention a bad framework implemented well is better than the best framework implemented wrong so I have seen so much of agile being misused people and just call it agile like uh it's it's yeah it's truly not that I I it's the the best best possible methodology and process implemented wrong causes a lot more problem so agile is no exception to that um I I I don't I don't know where would in the world would a developer be asked to not develop more in a Sprint um the thing is um line of code is actually fun fact was Google's um productivity measure between in early 2000s for about seven eight years as a EV valuation

seven eight years as a EV valuation technique and they very immediately realize it's causing more complication because developers end up writing more lines of codes and it just overcome T the code something that could be they call it LC Paradox Google it folks it's very interesting so then they learn that they learned the evaluation technique and the measure the metrics they measure actually impacts the way team operates and their behavior so we have a short time frame we have a small increment we have to deliver in that short time fra frame and we're going to collaborate all of us cross functionally together um so everyone take a piece of this work to make sure by the end of that small time we have delivered that small chunk that's how I see AI um now yes I do

that's how I see AI um now yes I do agree with you that it might be implemented falsely or in a very bad way so from what you're saying because of the philosophy of agile what that team should do is that next week they should give that developer like 25 uh you know whatever user stories worth of or 25 points worth of user stories and you know adapt as you said to what's going on and that is I agree 100% the correct way to implement that in that because they saw that they were leaving stuff on the table let's not continue to do that next week onwards that's literally the whole point of this not being a waterfall where you where you cannot go back and change requirements or if something isn't needed or you have two new members that join the team Etc so exactly just like individuals and

exactly just like individuals and interactions over processes and things there's no firm way of doing anything thing exactly so yeah maybe this is actually and so I'm actually currently considering getting the CSM also so I am curious to see how that experience is like for me and you know would love to you know like remain connected to share about uh you know how that whole experience was for me and you know how much it's changed and all of that but you know far I really want to thank you today for taking us through all of the amazing nuances that you shared with this rather complicated subject and I say complicated because a lot of times it feels to me with these three things the 3 PMs and quality assurance I didn't even know that was a thing that's

even know that was a thing that's embedded in there but apparently it is um and it always felt to me like um untangling the threads of a yarn you know like where does one end where does the other begin what's going on why are they the same color it it it was just such a mess in my head but I feel like literally from this um 1 hour conversation I'm now able to approach that subject in a much more less scatterbrain fashion like I understand what the three are how they interact with each other but also how they exist individually so thank you so much for doing that I'm sure anybody that watches this will bring will take away immense value and yeah really really want to thank you for your time today thanks for

thank you for your time today thanks for having me now I really appreciate it and I'm excited to see what the future holds for you I'm following you and I really love your content just don't forget be you know that's true it is actually applicable to areas in life other than high performing teams because I like my podcast only has two two people so barely even a team but there are certainly things I could be doing today to make my processes more agile and maybe this is a call to action for me to do just that so thank you thank you so much appreciate it bye that brings us to the end of episode 38 of The Ready Set podcast thank you all for sharing these conversations with those that continue

conversations with those that continue to benefit from them if you would like to support me the easiest way to do that is by subscribing to me on YouTube leaving me up to a f star rating on Spotify or your favorite podcast app and telling all of your friends about what an incredible podcast this is catch you all in the next one new episodes every Wednesday