5 Critical Considerations (and Mistakes to Avoid) Before Hiring a Product Management Leader

When growing your company, CEOs and founders often wonder about the ideal timing for hiring a product management leader (CPO, VP, or Head of Product Management). As an Executive recruiter specializing in product and engineering leadership, here are five key considerations and common mistakes to avoid when making this critical hire.

It’s generally recommended to consider a VP-level product hire when your business has gained traction, achieved product-market fit, secured significant funding, and expanded the engineering team. At this stage, product management becomes more crucial. Drawing on my experience, I share these insights below to guide you through the process.

1) Understanding the Right Time for Founders / CEOs to Let Go

It’s a significant step for CEOs or founders to shift from daily product management to concentrating on the broader business. They often become overwhelmed with product tasks, detracting from broader business goals. The best company leaders understand that managing the product and the business requires separate, full-time attention. Some notable exceptions, like Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg, were product-centric, but even they, over time, delegated product-specific decisions while maintaining the broader product vision.

Signs indicating the need for product leadership include:

• Excessive involvement in product details, despite having PMs who can do this for you.
• Limited experience in managing PMs.
• The product is gaining traction, and there is a desire to launch new product lines.
• There is a growing disconnect between engineering and product teams.

2) Avoid hiring a product leader that’s too senior prematurely

Once you recognize the need for a dedicated product leader, assess the required seniority level. Many tend to seek a high-level VP prematurely. In contrast, early-stage companies often benefit more from hands-on product managers focused on aligning day-to-day development with the founder’s vision and prioritization. The ideal candidate for most newly-funded startups is someone who can grow into a VP role, has a deep understanding of your business and customers, can manage a small team, focuses on execution, and is adept at working under constraints.

3) Defining Success and Scope Before Determining the Level

Before deciding on the level of hire, it’s crucial to define the role’s scope and success parameters. Consider the challenges you aim to address and the key results expected within the first 12–18 months. Will the hire primarily oversee product function and lead execution strategies, or are they expected to shape the product vision, identifying new market opportunities and pricing strategies? Initially, you might need to focus on prioritization and execution. However, as products and customer needs grow more complex, it becomes essential for the VP of Product to oversee strategic direction. This doesn’t mean founders step away entirely, but having someone deeply connected to user needs guiding product development is beneficial. You may even have multiple revenue-generating product lines emerging, which may be time to consider hiring a Chief Product Officer.

4) Consider an Up-and-Comer

For a new or small product team, consider a driven candidate who can achieve 90% of your outcomes in 12–18 months. A director-level individual with strong potential who is still closely involved in execution might be ideal. While ideation is an integral part of product management, the priority at this stage leans towards execution and developing a framework for evaluating and implementing ideas effectively.

5) Understand the Difference Between VP and C-Level Product Leaders

Understanding the differences between VP and C-level product roles is fundamental. A CPO or SVP of Product typically adopts a more strategic stance, focusing on overarching product vision, market positioning, and managing larger teams and multiple product lines. This role becomes crucial when a company achieves significant market presence across various product lines, and the complexity extends beyond the scope of a single VP. On the other hand, a Director/VP of Product is more operationally inclined, concentrating on the day-to-day development and execution of the product roadmap.

These key roles are defined as follows:

• CPO/SVP of Product: They are responsible for crafting an effective product strategy, incorporating market insights, customer feedback, economic trends, and technical understanding. Their role involves prioritizing major market opportunities, strategic planning with stakeholders, sprint planning aligned with business goals, and fostering cross-functional collaboration. They also play a critical role in liaising with the board and C-level executives, driving consensus, and steering the overall strategic direction of the product.
• Director/VP of Product: Their focus is operationalizing the product roadmap, managing core products, new features, and monetization strategies. They ensure the delivery of product features, collect feedback from customer success teams, troubleshoot issues, and coordinate closely with engineering and marketing to meet deadlines and achieve product goals. Additionally, they are involved in developing user stories, roadmaps, mockups, and data models, conducting experiments and retrospectives, and implementing processes for effective communication and streamlined delivery in collaboration with engineering teams.

In conclusion, before making a product leadership hire, ensure you consider these five critical aspects:

1. Recognizing when founders and CEOs should step back
2. Avoid hiring someone too senior, too soon
3. Clearly defining the role’s success and scope before the level
4. Consider an up-and-comer
5. Understand the difference between VP and C-level product leaders.

Next, in our Master Hiring Series, we’ll explore selecting the ideal product leader, examining key considerations such as business, marketing, or engineering backgrounds, and elevating how stage and domain play into making the right product hire.