The Hindu Business Line : Product managers in demand in IT cos

Bangalore June 7 If you are a techie looking to enter management, product management may be right up your alley. Product management is a new role that is gaining in importance with the mushrooming of software product development companies in the country.

Market-savvy and technically skilled hires who can straddle marketing and engineering responsibilities are in demand.

They define and modify, if needed, new products and are involved throughout the product development stage - right from conceptualisation and defining specifications, through development and completion.

Expected to be intuitive about the future market, they will help define niche, and what are being called "disruptive" products.

"Product managers are semi-technical, and require a commercial bent of mind. They need to be diplomatic and know how to interact with the engineering team," said Mr Gautam Sinha, CEO of TVA Infotech, a Bangalore-based IT recruitment firm.

"In smaller companies, they double as the marketing team, but in larger ones, they can be the face of a product to a client."

Their role is comparatively new to the software industry, whereas in hardware firms there is more talent in marketing products, he added.

"India has astute tech minds but needs to evolve a product management mindset," said Mr Paul Turner, a Senior Director with NetApp.

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