# Cracking the PM Interview  ## Metadata - Author: [[Gayle Laakmann McDowell, Jackie Bavaro]] - Full Title: Cracking the PM Interview - Category: #books ## Highlights - a PM takes holistic responsibility for the product, from the little details to the big picture. The PM needs to set vision and strategy. The PM defines success and makes decisions. ([Location 221](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=221)) - The PM talks to all possible sources to create a large list of potential features or development work. Then, based on factors like customer needs, the competitive landscape, business needs, and the team’s expertise, he prioritizes the features and scenarios. ([Location 251](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=251)) - Dogfooding comes from the term “Eat your own dogfood,” and simply means using your own product yourself. For example, people at Microsoft run early versions of the next Windows release on their computers every day. Facebook employees use Facebook Groups to communicate. ([Location 292](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=292)) - As feedback comes in through dogfooding, usability studies, and experiments, the PM identifies the most important issues and iterates on the feature design to find better solutions. ([Location 307](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=307)) - Product managers are responsible for identifying problems and opportunities, picking which ones to go after, and then making sure the team comes up with great solutions, either by thinking of the solution themselves or by working with the designers and engineers. ([Location 377](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=377)) - Marketing folks focus on getting users into the product, while product managers define what happens once the user is in the product. ([Location 384](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=384)) - Specs aren’t meant to be comprehensive guides for how to build every piece of a feature. Instead, they’re meant to document the non-obvious decisions the team makes so people can reference back to it later. ([Location 810](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=810)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - If you’ve always been really strong in product design, see if you can learn data analysis. If you’ve been working on deep technical problems, see if you can spend some time doing user research. ([Location 955](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=955)) - try learning a time management system like Getting Things Done. ([Location 1217](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B00ISYMUR6&location=1217))