Remote work is rapidly growing in all industries. Some professionals might try to push away this new way of working, seeing it as simply a current necessity. They might not think it's fit for a product manager who’s constantly managing team members, strategies, client and partner communication, and upcoming challenges.

But let me tell you this:

Product management can be even more effective when done remotely.

No need to fear going for this career path.

I’ve put together this detailed guide to help you understand the challenges of remote work and its implication on your product management career.

First, let's have a look at a remote product manager’s core duties.

What it means to to be a remote product manager

I’ll just say this from the start:

There’s not much of a difference between what a remote product manager does when compared to someone who works from the office.

In fact, you’re probably already doing part of your work remotely. Like conducting user interviews or holding meetings with your stakeholders.

Your role in remote product management

So what does a remote product manager even do?

Different companies and products have specific needs. Your daily activities as a product manager or owner can be similar though. Remote PMs have the exact same roles as their office-based counterparts.

Here are some of the duties a product manager has:

• Lead the development of the product and its strategy across multiple lifecycles
• Discover user requirements through user interviews
• Develop the positioning and vision of a product
• Use a variety of tools to produce wireframes and mockups, gather feedback, and deliver results
• Establish clear timelines and feedback patterns
• Define quantitative and qualitative metrics and use these to evaluate the success of the product and review delivered work to ensure alignment with the specifications
• Build actionable user stories
• Create and manage the product roadmap
• Maintain consistent client and stakeholder communication
• Partner with other teams to ensure a unified product development and delivery process
• Lead the product team and take full responsibility for its actions
• Create new feature announcements and content

Who hires remote product managers?

To find a new remote job and make the first step towards this ideal lifestyle, you can simply look under the Product category of these remote-exclusive job websites:

• Dynamite Jobs
• DailyRemote
• Working Nomads
• Remote Age
• Remote Global
• Remoters
• Jobspresso
• NODESK
• letsworkremotely

Good news is that more and more companies are starting to consider switching to distributed teams and even accepting remote workers for highly skilled professionals. If you need an overall look at some of the companies who are hiring remote product managers, here’s a list to start with:

• Buffer
• Canva
• MailerLite
• Close.io
• Convergys
• ConvertKit
• Hotjar
• MeetEdgar
• Pearson
• Dell
• DigitalOcean
• Glassdoor
• Pluralsight
• Toptal
• VMware
• Zapier
• Apple
• Automattic

Keep an eye on their job boards to see when a new opportunity pops up.

Note: You can always just ask your current employer to let you work remotely or reach out to companies you’d love to work for and inquire into any available positions.

Why working remotely might not be right for your product management career

Just like the skills of an in-office and remote product management expert are similar, there are a couple of personality traits and habits that will influence whether or not you’re the right fit for working remotely.

To get it out of the way, it’s safe to say that bad communicators will never make it as remote employees. These are those people who can’t take feedback, always have to contradict other team members, and just don’t want to answer your inquiries on time.

Product management is fast-paced. ? Especially in small teams who are commonly the ones looking for remote members anyway. So communication needs to be done in detail and accurately even when you’re not face-to-face with the rest of the team.

There’s no time to nudge people into sharing their thoughts or asking questions when they don’t know how to move forward with a task. Even more so, the product manager should be the one to tie together all team, user, client, and other stakeholder communications.

That’s why most remote product management jobs start with “X years of experience in a cross-functional product design or product management role”. Companies want their product managers to be dependable. Sometimes even more than what they expect from the rest of their team since they’re literally handing over the product to you.

If you’re a constant slacker who’d rather scroll through Reddit for hours than create one more ticket, you’re better off somewhere else.

What are the skills you’ll need to land a remote product management job

A product manager in general needs to have some of the most varied soft and hard skills in a team. Honestly, besides exceptionally good communication and organization skills, the traits and abilities you need to develop are roughly the same as for any office job.

I had a look at 100+ remote product manager jobs on Glassdoor so you don’t have to assume what the top skills for such professionals are. Next are the results that prove my point. ?

Here are some of the most commonly mentioned skills that employers are looking for from their next remote product manager:

• Strong leadership skills
• Organization and prioritization capabilities
• Critical thinking
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills
• Strong client management abilities
• Ability to manage multiple, simultaneous projects
• Time management and budgeting skills
• Command of diverse product development frameworks, strategies, and/or rapid prototyping solutions
• Ability to troubleshoot customer issues and create detailed bug reports
• Ability to work autonomously
• Passion for working cross-functionally
• Problem-solving skills
• Strong technical understanding of how software products are built
• Ability to collect and structure qualitative and quantitative research that will be used for making product and design decisions
• A clear understanding of key metrics and ways of measuring a product’s success

All in all, the requirements depend on the company you apply to. Some will prefer a strong communicator who is able to work cross-functionally and bring the entire team together. Other employers will have specific needs such as programming language knowledge or stronger experience when it comes to user interviews or focus on a specific stage of a product’s life cycle.

What you’ll need above any of the above skills is product sense. This means you’ll first have to become a subject matter expert and learn all the ins and outs of the product. You’ll then own the entire creative process around generating new ideas, spotting challenges, and creating the whole roadmap along with doing user research, keeping track of metrics, and prioritizing tickets.

Simply, you need a complete product-oriented skillset along with dependable traits that will allow your employer to trust you with their product’s evolution and fixing potential problems.

Where to start your remote product management career preparation

There’s no training in particular that you need to go through separate from your usual product management courses.

However, before jumping into this entirely new work style, I recommend you test it out for a couple of weeks or months. Try a side project or get a part-time job that will have you interact with clients and other team members through multiple time zones. Having this kind of beforehand experience will show you if you actually like collaborating this way, if remote work is suited for you, and where you need to improve.

You might not like using multiple tools to maintain communication or maybe you’re just someone who only feels productive in an office environment. For tiny problems like the latter, try to find an actionable solution. In this case, go to a coworking space daily or set up a fully equipped work desk.

If the issues are huge [like when you’re not productive at all without supervision], there’s really nothing you can do.

If you’re at the beginning of your PM career, being ready for remote work is the least of your worries. You’ll first need to develop and grow your product management skills overall.

Some of these skills include learning how to conduct user research and market analysis, knowing what goes into a product roadmap, understanding how PM frameworks can be used within different types of teams, learning how to set and monitor key metrics, and so many more product-focused skills and roles you’ll put to use for real products.

By far the biggest struggle new PMs always have is worrying about their interview process.

What will I say?

What if I don’t know the answer to a question?

I’m not ready for this job.

All natural concerns for any product manager newbie. There’s so much help out there though. ?

I’m a huge networking fan so the best tip I’d have for you is to connect with experienced product managers who are willing to coach and prepare you for your next interview.

If you’re the shy type, you can always opt for classic LinkedIn messaging instead of face-to-face meetings but bear in mind you’ll have to get over your fears to nail the interview. ?

Remote product management best practices

So you’ve landed a new job or you just want to prepare yourself mentally for what’s to come? I’ve put together my 6 best tips I’ve acquired throughout the years from my own experience and talking to other professionals:

Maintain a regular schedule

One of the top perks of remote work is flexibility to work whenever you want to. Honestly though, as a product manager you might have to mold your schedule according to when the rest of the team is online.

Postponing work [and implicitly communication] can cause serious gaps in productivity. If you don’t know when you have to work on your tasks, when it’s time to dedicate yourself to prioritizing other colleagues’ duties, and when you can still fit in time for feedback and meetings, you’ll end up postponing everything indefinitely when you’re really supposed to be one of the faster responders in the team.

As a PM, others look up to you and expect your input and instructions at all times. So compared to the asynchronous communication that remote companies are used to, sending feedback and holding video conferences in real-time works better for product managers and their teammates.

This takes me to the importance of establishing clear communication patterns and methodologies.

Communicate

You already know the story: communication rules when it comes to remote work. Yet, in this kind of work situation, one-on-one meetings are more insightful than ever. They allow product managers to talk to every single member of a team individually, get feedback, and improve not just their product, but also the employee-company relationship.

Beyond this, you need to understand that working remotely takes extra effort for maintaining those friendly work relations you would in real life.

Managers have a top duty here: to create strong bonds that will eventually build up employee retention.

No ideas? Turn to your team. Hold special opportunities for non-work related activities like get-togethers or just a weekly one-on-one meeting to allow employees to get to know each other better, learn about their hobbies, and make a new friend.

Turn to video tools to bridge the communication gap

Your basic Slack back-and-forth messages or email exchanges create huge information loopholes. They don’t give enough room for clarifying any details and you might end up with results that are totally different from what you’ve expected.

Video, on the other hand, fully replaces your face-to-face office meetings. All remote fun aside, in-person meetings are still an essential part of work for humans as they allow your team members to understand that there are other people who depend on their performance and it’s not just them working from an empty office.

This, in turn, creates accountability, making the entire collaboration process much more effective.

Plus, screen sharing will save the day every single time.

Establish clear review patterns

There’s no such thing as working aimlessly. You need goals and set performance review methods to assess whether the work you and your team puts into a project or product is efficient and spot potential bottlenecks.

To keep everyone involved in this review process, set up a defined timeline for your review tasks and meetings. For instance, decide when and how to hold your daily stand-up meetings. Working remotely you have lots of possibilities for every single review process.

For the stand-ups you can opt for video conferences or use a Slack bot to automate everything and save time since team members can simply write down what they worked on, what they’re taking care of on a given day, and their potential challenges.

The review workflow doesn’t just end here as you’ll probably have to take over and see how and who can help a person with their issues so the product development process can run smoothly.

Address risks ahead of time

While strong communication is a common trait both on-site and distributed teams need to develop, what remote product managers need more than anything are plans. Particularly a highly-detailed action plan for tackling risks before panic installs.

I’m talking here about a common document any team member will access to read and find out how they can manage their own crisis.

Keep your whole team on board

Working remotely is a collective effort. As the person who’s held responsible for any success and failure of your colleagues, you’re in charge of cultivating a desire for remote success within the team.

Here’s the list of everything your team needs to understand and work on before you jump into the world of fully-distributed companies:

• The benefits of remote work
• Communication guidelines
• Risk management techniques
• The importance of feedback and staying connected
• Staying accountable for one’s work
• Get involved in the teams’ overall growth by supporting its cohesion and moving collaboration processes forward
• Developing traits and skills such as discipline, empathy, dependability, and self-organization [in other words, constantly developing themselves on a personal and professional level]

Key takeaways

So yes! You can work remotely as a product manager and be just as effective at your work. No performance limitations here.

Product managers still have the same duties and roles when working from home or an exotic beach in the middle of nowhere.

Daily work is quite similar too but your quality of life is highly improved. Here’s what a day in your life as a remote product manager might look like:

• Take care of urgent tasks or team/client inquiries
• Stay updated with any industry or market changes
• Do some networking ?
• Stand-up meeting time! ?
• Work on the product roadmap
• Take a well-deserved lunch break ?
• Answer some more emails
• Respond to tickets
• Client meeting
• One-on-meeting with one of your teammates
• Sprint retrospective! ?

Do keep in mind that product managers have some of the most diverse days with a constant flux of new challenges and opportunities that need to be covered.

Already a happy remote worker? Share your best tips with fellow product managers or people who are considering this career but have been hesitant thinking it’s not suited for the remote lifestyle.

If you want to get more technical with your product management skills, being able to work with flowchart or diagram creator apps is surely on your list.

The following guide aims to save you hours of time you’d otherwise spend researching the best diagramming solution for your project while at the same time perfecting the design of your flowcharts.

As a general rule, a flowchart or diagram is used to communicate requirements, processes, and workflows in a logical way so complex concepts will be a little less complicated.

In product management, workflows are commonly used to describe:

• User flows
• Processes and other systems involved in them
• Dependencies between systems and inputs, outputs, or other conditions

I’ve tested and reviewed several tools for creating flowcharts and workflows over the past few years. Here, I've picked 5 that you must try out to describe your product’s funnels and flows.

But first…

Why are diagrams so powerful in product management?

While the whole idea of using flowcharts and diagrams might be overlooked or seem like it’s an unnecessary step, there are several benefits to using diagrams in PM:

• It simplifies all processes
• It helps you spot issues or weak points at a glance
• It allows you to find any duplicate parts of a process
• It establishes clear funnels
• It supports your Quality Assurance team during the creation of test scenarios
• It acts as a roadmap for software architecture

So how do you choose the best diagramming software?

Creating any kind of diagram is a fairly easy process. Building a successful one, though, takes a bit more research and time.

That’s why you need to choose a tool that will help you save hours of work while also giving you the predefined requirements you’ll need to build accurate diagrams and keep the process fun.

The key aspects to pay attention to when choosing a flowchart creator software solution are:

• Availability of ready-made templates
• Lots of choices for shapes and arrows to work with
• Extra tools or integrations
• Exporting options
• Strong collaboration features
• Ease of use from the beginning

To make it easier for you to select your next tool for building diagrams, I’ve highlighted all of these aspects for every individual solution across the following reviews.

Next up are my favorite free flowchart creator and workflow diagram app picks you need to take into consideration.

5 free flowchart creator and workflow diagram tools

Lucidchart

Lucidchart should be your top-of-mind solution for creating customer experience maps and systems diagrams in particular. From the very beginning, the tool makes it easy for product managers to select the type of flowcharts they want to create. Matter of fact, the onboarding process and resources available online make it a tool with a fast learning curve.

From the very beginning, you’ll get all possible templates needed for you to create product strategies, create roadmaps and product flows, and even pitch your ideas to stakeholders. With ready-made templates and literally thousands of shapes and arrows to choose from, there are endless opportunities for product managers to create their materials in no time.

Also, if you’re like me and like to add a few too many colors, this diagram app comes with a bunch of theme options to help you nail the design of your creations. Bonus points for customization here from non-designers.

The reason I’ve placed Lucidchart first on this list is that it’s a complete flowchart creator tool. Collaboration options are some of the strongest with comments that can be left on charts just like you would in Google Docs, slides that can be used to present your diagrams, and even sharing and exporting options.

If you’d like to take it all one step further, you can choose from dozens of integrations with tools you might already be using like Slack, GitHub, or Salesforce.

You can also check out my video tutorial on using the tool so you won’t have to find your way around Lucidchart yourself.

Pros

• Free plan available
• Easy to learn
• Lots of templates and elements to choose from
• Strong collaboration features

Cons

• Limited space for free accounts
• No desktop app

Draw.io

Draw.io is a top choice for many PMs since the tool’s free, so you might have already been using it for several other business processes. Since the tool belongs to Google the interface is similar to other Google Apps like Docs and Slides that you’re probably working with anyway.

Compared to Lucidchart, Draw.io might be harder to use for non-designers since there are no theme colors to choose from if you want to make your diagrams eye-appealing.

Whenever you want to create a new diagram, you’ll get to choose from a series of templates ordered by their structure. There are no specifics for product management.

The flowchart tool does save itself through lots of elements you can use on your workspace. I advise you to use the search bar to find a specific item or element faster.

Since the tool is so simple that even a child could use it, Draw.io is missing the advanced functionalities and collaboration features that would otherwise allow you to communicate with your team directly on the document. To do this, you’ll need to integrate it with a tool like Confluence or Quip.

Pros

• Free to use
• Clear interface which makes it easy to get accustomed to

Cons

• Limited templates
• No collaboration options
• No mobile apps
• Few integrations

Creately

Creately is only a free workflow diagram app if you can accept the fact that all of your design will be public and you’re limited to 5 documents. Team plans start at $12 which is a fairly decent price considering you’re getting all the features with it.

I specifically found their onboarding process handy since it introduces you to the tool so you won’t start and have no idea what to do next.

In many ways, the tool is similar to Lucidchart. You’ve got lots of templates to choose from, all of which are ordered by their purpose. Then you’ve got your elements which are some of the most beautiful I’ve seen, along with other styles and theme options to help product managers who aren’t that skilled at design too.

One thing people struggle with while using Lucidchart is file organization, a feature that Creately nails by turning their tool into an alternate file storage app. The tool also eases the process of working with several elements by integrating Google search so you can find images to use without leaving the app.

In terms of collaboration, Creately works similarly to a prototyping tool, allowing people to leave comments on the exact element they have feedback to offer on. Collaboration is done in real-time via the online or desktop version of the app.

Pros

• Lots of templates to pick from
• Theme options
• Communication options
• File organization option
• Works offline too
• Easy to learn

Cons

• The free option only allows you to create public content
• Some features are still under development but will be released soon

Whimsical

Whimsical is a user-friendly visual communication tool that’s commonly used to create wireframes but has separate options for putting together flowcharts, mind maps, and sticky notes.

While the tool is highly visual, there aren’t that many template options to choose from. This is because the app is centered around creating basic wireframes and flowcharts for internal use only. Shapes and connectors are also limited, but there are hundreds of icons to go for if you want to add some extra color to a mind map or flowchart.

On to the benefits of using the tool: collaborating on each project takes fewer than two steps, with comments being placed on every single element you want to leave immediate feedback on. All work is easy to share, export, and even embed.

Ever been annoyed by losing your past versions for a product development flowchart you were supposed to show to your stakeholders? Whimsical is one of the few tools that has a fully-featured file versioning option that records every single change you’re making on a chart so you can restore better versions.

Pros

• Strong design options
• Easy to learn
• Sharing and exporting options
• Lots of icons to add to your creation
• File versioning
• Free version available

Cons

• Limited template options

Canva

Canva is not really a common option since it’s usually used by marketing and social media teams who need highly-visual content to display publicly. If you’re also looking to create a flowchart to present on your social networks, in your pitch deck, or to any other stakeholders, it’s definitely worth giving it a try.

Not only is it easy to use, but the fact that it’s a general app instead of being tailored only to building diagrams also means it has thousands of elements and icons you can choose from. Illustrations, arrows of all kinds, customizable charts, you name it. Even videos.

As for the sharing options, they’re top-notch. You can export your content into any file type you want, resize your workspace to share it on multiple platforms, and use the presentation mode, complete with notes for presenters.

Once you invite your team into the tool, you’ll be able to leave comments on your designs to keep everyone on the same page.

Pros

• Free option
• Extremely easy to use
• Versatile
• Focused on great design
• Lots and lots of options for elements
• Collaboration options

Cons

• Limited template options for product management

Haven’t decided yet?

Start by creating a list of your own requirements. Are you in need of strong templates so you don’t have to build everything from scratch? Or maybe you can give up on lots of elements as long as collaboration options are on point.

Based on your own needs and goals, go over the above list to pick an option that works best for you and give it a try. Each option has its own unique features that distinguish it from the others:

• Lucidchart - lots of template options for PM
• Draw.io - super easy to use
• Creately - most features in one tool
• Whimsical - clear interface for internal use
• Canva - focused on design

If you have any other tips on helping product managers choose their next flowchart creator workflow diagram app, let me know.

One of the most common questions I get asked is, “How do you get a Product Manager job if you haven’t been a product manager before?”

The chicken and the egg problem

A while ago, I had the same question. It’s the quintessential chicken-and-egg problem — you can’t join the club unless you’re already a member of the club.

As an account manager at an Edtech startup, I became really interested in working on the product. I hoped to transfer internally to a product role at my company. I felt like my deep understanding of our content creators’ and our learners’ needs gave me an advantage. But I was told, “Sorry, we just really need someone with product management experience.”

Over the last few years, after a lot of work and research, I was able to successfully transition into product management. Periodically, I’ll get random inquiries or introductions to acquaintances who all have the exact same question: “If I want to be a product manager, but I’ve never been one, how do I do it?”

This is my shot at sharing my own journey a bit more efficiently and widely. I can’t guarantee any results after using this formula — I just know after a lot of trial and error, this is how I got there. I wish you good luck on your own journey!

Step 0: Work on product (or at least get as close to it as possible)

Wait, what? Isn’t the whole point that I’m trying to get a job where I start working on a product?

Yep, but here’s the thing. You can’t really crack the chicken-and-egg cycle without getting a little taste of what it’s actually like to be a chicken. It can often feel like you aren’t really doing “product” things if your title says something different, but there are all kinds of things that qualify:

• Collecting feedback from users, prioritizing it based on business impact and consumer impact, and sharing the information with relevant decision makers who can make changes happen
• Coming up with a new idea for a feature and detailing out all the things it would do, then figuring out whether it can be built
• Analyzing data from your website / app to determine common user paths or whether certain business events had a major impact
• Managing revenue or profit and loss lines for a specific product or service and making changes that increase that revenue
• Leading a project from start to finish that involves people from different teams coming together to build something

Before I had an official product manager title, I collected experiences that were centered around product. As an account manager, a lot of my success came from a deep understanding of all of our product’s intricacies and being a fierce advocate for new features my partners needed. As a lead of a vertical that made $100K+ a month, I prioritized marketing, writing, and product resources to help my business grow.

Step 1: Read

Here are the things I read while prepping for job interviews and considering whether I really wanted to switch over:

• Cracking the PM Interview - pretty basic, but gives a good sense of what common questions and exercises might be. If you haven’t done case interviews, this is good practice.
• Stratechery - Daily newsletter covering in-depth analysis on tech, including breaking down companies’ strategic moves, mergers, why certain products fail and others don’t, and so on. I actually didn’t start reading this until I started my current job, but it is totally worth the $10/mo subscription fee if you want to beef up on macro-level strategic thinking about the tech landscape.
• Ken Norton’s Bringing the Donuts Newsletter - Advice on how to actually do the product manager job well. Also includes job postings and recommended books.
• Julie Zhuo’s blog and newsletter - Honest, personal stories from her career as the VP of Product Design at Facebook and lessons learned. She’s great at addressing the personal quandaries that come with being a product lead (dealing with insecurity, breaking into the industry, handling conflict, responding to rejection).

Step 2: Ask questions

I asked my friends to set me up with any product manager they knew, even acquaintances of acquaintances. Then I prioritized the contact info of the product managers I met into the following categories:

1. I’m not at all interested in working at their company
2. I’d love to work at their company

I set up 5 - 10 calls with the product managers in group 1 to ask all of my PM career questions:

• What do you look for when you interview PMs?
• Here’s my honest experience, what parts do you think I should highlight?
• How did you get to where you are?

Because I wasn’t actually interviewing with them, I felt comfortable sharing my vulnerabilities openly and asking for candid advice — things you can’t always do in an actual interview.

From these calls, I was able to develop my own understanding of the “ideal” PM: analytical, technically savvy, consumer-driven, critical thinker, strategic, and able to work with many different types of people and motivate them.

I thought about what my own strengths and weaknesses were. I was weak at deeper quantitative data analysis and programming knowledge, but stronger at working with many different types of people and prioritizing for the good of a business.

I shaped my PM search towards roles that played to my strengths and had a strong support network to bolster my weaknesses (For example, data scientists and analysts to help grow my quantitative analysis skills, strong tech lead engineers who could help me direct and prioritize the development work).

Step 3: Prepare your own story and put yourself out there

After all the informational calls, I was able to develop a more ideal pitch of why a company should hire me as a PM, even though I didn’t have the official title on my resume. I focused on all of the PM-like activities I had done:

• Working with PMs and engineers to build new features
• Assessing user needs, and balancing complicated stakeholder groups
• Analyzing data to make business decisions

Given how difficult it is to transition into product management, the PM title felt like a secret society that only superhumans could break into. But all of the informational calls I had were very helpful in demystifying the role and giving me courage that I had the skills I needed to do the job.

To give myself confidence and assess my own market value, I put up my profile on Hired.com, a marketplace where employers reach out to you and offer you salary bids. I got a good sense of where I stood in the market and what salary range I could ask for. Updating my LinkedIn profile and setting it to “open to new opportunities” also helped with some inbound recruiting requests.

Step 4: Info interviews that were likely to convert to real interviews

Back to group #2 - PMs (and other people) at companies I’d actually be excited to work at. I didn’t have people introduce me to these contacts until I felt like I’d done enough research and crafted my narrative of my experience.

When I talked to them, I did it with the mindset of it being an actual interview, and spent most of my informational questions asking specifically about the company, how it was doing financially, and future strategic plans. In almost every case, the person ended up referring me to their head of HR to begin the initial phone screen process.

Step 5: Interview, interview, interview

Once I made it past the HR phone screen, the real work began. The general process would be: informal phone chat with someone who works at the company -> HR phone screen -> hiring manager phone screen -> take home exercise -> onsite, usually involving a presentation of my work, situational exercises, or both.

The topic of how to get through a PM interview is a meaty one that I may tackle in a future post :)

As I mentioned before, this is very specific to my own experiences, and I don’t think there is one universal path to becoming a PM. The PMs I’ve met and worked with have come from a wide range of backgrounds, from poetry major (me), to former programmers, to people who graduated and went straight into product.

I hope this brief overview is helpful for those of you who are hoping to transition into product management, and I wish you the best of luck!

Looking forward to hearing your own experiences and advice in the comments.