Product Owner vs Project Managers

Table of Contents

During my career as a software developer, I’ve met many different managers. Some were the kind of “I tell — you do”, others more open and “show me what’s possible” kind, which is most of the time the best kind of a manager you can have.

The only issue is that when a product is being developed — be it as a startup or in a venture studio — two types of people are necessary: the ones who have the vision and the ones who take care of the execution. But who’s leading the project?

This article won’t be interesting to senior managers who already have their career paths set, but very useful for people who are figuring stuff out and touching the waters of product development.

Also while writing this article and doing research, I've found many contradictory articles, so this can be considered another one of my subjective opinions.

The differences

Project Managers thrive in pre-planned, strictly organized systems where everything goes according to some specific guidelines, and the measurement of work can be calculated as a line on a monthly report.

Product Owners work best in constantly changing environments. They build the vision, the roadmap, and the prioritization. They can already see and touch the product in their mind. Project Managers build the execution of this vision.

The difference grows the larger the company. In a startup environment, you can and should be both at the same time. But if you’re part of a big organization, the executive part of the project should be separate from the vision part.

Before we dive in into each role, I must say there are quite a lot of things each of those roles does. The Manager does not only nag the developers, “how fast can you build it”, and the Owner does not only sit the whole day envisioning the success of the product. There are a lot of steps in-between that eventually lead the product to success, so there is no need to think one is better than the other. These roles are just different.

Let's look at the difference between these roles and start with the definitions.

PRODUCT OWNER

The main concern of a product owner is the product itself. They own it. They want it to succeed. This is a person who makes it happen on all fronts. They talk with everyone — marketing, support, development, flower people, promotion agency, plumber guy, etc. They can be compared to a miniature CEO inside a company. Their only task is to make the product cool for users and profitable in the end.

As CEO of startups fail, so do product owners fail. The idea showed promise but did not realize the potential, then you pivot. You have to be prepared to do constant research, come up with new features/improvements/ways-out-of-death-valley, analyze changes in business metrics, and defend your ideas to everyone.

A Product Owner is responsible for defining and prioritizing the features and requirements of a product. They work closely with all the teams to ensure that the product meets the needs of the target audience and is a financial success. To be effective, a Product Owner should have a clear vision for the product and be able to communicate it effectively to both the development team and business stakeholders. Also, bonus points if they are technically savvy as they need to understand the technical capabilities and limitations of the product.

💡 The main KPIs the Product Owner follows are the Number of Users, Revenue per User, Revenue Growth, and Churn.

PROJECT MANAGER

This is the right-hand man of the Product Owner, they’re an equal tandem, and both cannot survive without the other unless they also do their work, which sometimes does happen in a small company.

You can view the project manager as a bridge between the vision and the execution. They are a translator from the language of ideas to the language of understandable tasks with adequate deadlines for the other. From the chaos of unconnected ideas, the project manager creates a clear action plan, oversees the quality of work, controls the project budget, and minimizes risks.

A Project Manager is responsible for the overall delivery of a project and creating accountability in others. Together with the product owner, they are responsible for managing expectations and ensuring that the project is completed on time and within budget. To be effective, a Project Manager should be organized, detail-oriented, and excellent at software-developer-speak and also conflict resolution.

Yes, Communication in a project is not a cliché from a resume but a reality. The manager interacts closely with the team, discusses challenges and opportunities to improve the project processes, and communicates ideas with the product owner. A typical working day consists almost entirely of meetings and reporting, so you need to love communicating and have emotional intelligence.

💡 Their main KPIs are meeting the deadline, staying within budget, and keeping on course with the goals. Their main objective is to keep everyone on the development team accountable.

At a glance

Here are the key points that differentiate Product Owners and Project Managers:

Focus: Product Owners focus on defining and prioritizing the features and requirements of a product, while Project Managers focus on planning, executing, and delivering a project.

Responsibilities: Product Owners are responsible for the vision and direction of a product, while Project Managers are responsible for the overall delivery of a project.

Stakeholders: Product Owners work closely with all the stakeholders, even the ones you forget, while Project Managers act as the primary point of contact for the development team and are responsible for managing expectations.

Skills: Product Owners should be technically savvy and have a clear vision for the product, while Project Managers should lean more towards management savviness — organized, detail-oriented, and love reports.

Scope: Product Owners focus on the long-term success of a product, while Project Managers focus on each successful delivery of an increment.

Salaries: Salaries are the same, no worries.

Which one suits you better?

No idea. But are you more interested in launching products, improving them, collecting feedback, and communicating with customers forever, or more tactical activities, keeping track of budgets, allocating tasks, making plans, and managing chaos?

Do you like to deal with short 2-3 month cycles at a time or deal with multi-year issues?

Still undecided? There are two ways to figure this out:

1. Join a startup, try out a few hats, and see what feels better. Timeframe 1-2 years.
2. Apply to some bigger companies where the roles are clearly defined. First, go for the Product Owner role, suffer a few years, then either switch to a different department or a different company and do Project Management, suffer a few years, and then decide which suits you. Timeframe 4-5 years.

I hope this helped to clear things up for you.

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