3 Lessons from Product Management
by Joshua Pielago, Managing Partner of LOKAL
Last Updated April 22, 2025
This page is updated as new trends, courses, and other significant information emerge.
Lessons I learned when I was just starting out in Product Management
This is a deck I used when I was presenting for the first time in Product PH. In this deck, I went through several things through my journey into landing into Product and how I eventually become better doing what I do.
A Quick Story
My journey into
Product Management was unlikely if you look only at my academic and early career decisions.
For one, I took up AB Philosophy and Human Resources Management from San Beda College and then eventually finished AB English from Tomas Claudio College. For another, after college and while finishing my English degree, I was deep into the BPO Industry as an HR - Partner, serving medical accounts for the first three years of my career. Eventually I became an HR Manager for a couple of companies until through various twists and turns, I ended up as a Product Manager.
I pitched my company, Truelogic , to give me the position of Product Manager. When I applied initially to that company, I was applying for a Human Resource Manager post. But over our discussions and interviews, I was hired instead for a Production Manager role, a role that was so nebulous that I had to figure out what I had to do. It was pretty quick for me to figure out that what I really want to do was Product, not Production and after pitching that to our CEO and our General Manger, they gladly acquiesce. The rest was history.
My First Product Role
It was a pretty challenging position that I got myself into, but our team in that company was also very flexible and got me into a good place pretty quickly.
As the first Product Manager of the company, I positioned myself as heading both the Digital Marketing Products that we sell, and the Digital Software that our clients produce. It was two vastly different roles that really tested what I can learn in short span of time, and what I can do. Many, many mistakes were made. In the Digital Products side, I had to learn the different techniques of digital marketing and figure out the costing, manpower hours, and all the costs involved in servicing a client for a particular marketing package. And then from there, build more solutions and suggest more products that we can do to grow our revenue.
In the software side, I had to quickly develop rapport with our development team and then create a roadmap for our Products. I had to learn the stack that we were using, how each technology relates to the other, and how I can utilize different personalities and talent to build different products our clients needed.
My Learnings in Product Management
I stayed in that role for three years before leaving to build other things.
The lessons were endless, but the key lessons I learned for Product itself are as follows:
- Product Management is Leadership. With little authority to compel people, you need to be able to sell them the vision of what you are building. There are so many times that I needed to get the best out of people, and the only thing I had was my ability to convince them that we were doing was great
- Product Management requires a lot of Soft Skills. More than tech skills, soft skills are the most important asset for a Product Manager. The different between an average Product Manager to a great one is their ability to movitivate all stakeholders, manage all communications to make sure everyone is aligned, and then lead everyone into building greatness.
- Your Ultimate Product is your Team.This is the biggest lesson. The longer you work on your team, the more you're able to make sure that they can deliver the best product you want them to produce. Always take a moment to work with your team, work with their skills and expectations, and then align them along the way so that you can build the best product you can build
You can only connect the dots backwards
One of my favorite commencement speeches ever given was Steve Jobs', specifically for the his talk on "connecting the dots". In his 2005 Stanford Commencement speech, he talked about how his accidental inclusion in a class on calligraphy eventually lead years later to the first fonts on the Apple Computers. This is what I feel about where I am now based on where I am from.
Today, I operate
Lokal - a digital marketing agency and product management agency in the Philippines that focuses on working on great campaigns that deliver results, and helping businesses build better products. We work with a lot of the old Digital Marketing Products I used to work on -
Local Search Marketing ,
Full Service Digital Marketing ,
Web Design , and
Reputation Management among other things.
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