Career Growth is Product Management

Carlos González de Villaumbrosia, founder of Product School, shares how product management has evolved, best practices for interviewing, and how to grow into a leadership role.

Product management looks a lot different now than it did in 2016, when Carlos González de Villaumbrosia first appeared on this podcast.

“There’s much more appreciation and structure around product management within organizations. There’s also a clear career path, which I think is great. Actually, a lot of CEOs these days come from a product background,” says Carlos. “Something that’s very interesting now is that product is not just management. We see product marketing managers, product designers, project managers, product operations.”

Carlos founded Product School in 2014, which offers product management training and certificates. Today, the company has 20 campuses worldwide and an online campus. And as product management’s influence and importance on organizations has grown, Product School has expanded their catalog of certifications to match the evolution.

“When we started the business, we were all about teaching aspiring product managers how to get a job. Or helping product managers with that first job. Now we've expanded into additional certifications for experienced product managers who want to continue leveling up their career,” says Carlos.

Much of Product School’s mission remains intact, but the curriculum has been diversified. And Carlos has tweaked his approach to teaching, based on industry trends he’s seeing.

His advice for those starting out: find ways to build your portfolio, whether that means taking on a side product gig, participating in a hackathon, or finding a product manager mentor in your network. If the goal is a leadership position, soft skills like communication and creative thinking become more important, because as you level up, you’re spending more time on product strategy, conflict resolution, and communicating with different stakeholders.

In this episode, you’ll learn a lot about product management, interviewing, and growing your career.

Here are the highlights: 

• The product management evolution Carlos has seen in the last six years (3:06)
• How product management’s evolution has affected Product School’s curriculum (6:30)
• What skills to hone when growing into a product leadership role (12:51)