Product Managers That Have Been Laid Off: Here are Some Helpful Resources

We know an internet stranger’s sympathy might not be the most comforting thing, but hopefully, you see that there is a dedicated community with your best interests at heart.

This blog has always been committed to helping product managers and now is no different. So we have compiled some resources that might help you (or distract you) while the economy is in this downturn.

A Product Manager’s Reading List

Here are some great books, blogs, and individual articles that may provide some career value or entertainment. Some of these book links point to Amazon who is offering free audiobook downloads until the pandemic is over.

Business Books

• Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love
• The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses
• How to Win Friends and Influence People

Personal Growth Books

• The Proximity Principle: The Proven Strategy That Will Lead to a Career You Love
• Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones
• The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life

Online Articles

• Why Most Product Managers Suck (and how to be a better one)
• What It Takes to Become a Great Product Manager
• How to Stay Focused When You Get Bored Working Toward Your Goals

Blogs

• Silicon Valley Product Group Blog
• Mind the Product – Content for the world’s largest community of product managers
• ProductCoalition
• And of course, Medium’s product management archive

Join a Product Community

Luckily, there are a lot of welcoming communities for product managers. Whether on Slack or another platform, these associations have events, discussions, and job boards that can provide a sense of community even as you’re quarantined.

Below are a few examples of product communities we think are doing a great job of helping product managers. Most of these communities require an application.

• Colorado Product: Slack Channel, Meetup, and mentorship program
• Product School: Slack Channel, Facebook Group, and LinkedIn Group
• Product Hive: Slack Channel
• Mind the Product: Slack Channel, local Meetups

Build Your Skills & Resume

If you are motivated to actively work on your product management skills, here are some of the best resources, crowdsourced from our team.

The Premium 2020 Project & Quality Management Certification Bundle is a place to gain certifications for your resume. The bundle is currently on sale for $45.99 (as of April 10, 2020).

Work It Daily is an awesome, affordable career coaching site with useful videos for resumes, interviews, and more.

A PMP Certification from Project Management Institute may help you earn more money in your next career. The certification is $555 for non-members, $405 for members.

INDUSTRY Virtual Product Workshops are product management workshops from the comfort of your home. These workshops are not free. They range from $195-525. *Descriptions copied directly from their website.

DEMYSTIFYING THE JOBS-TO-BE-DONE INTERVIEW | APRIL 23rd, $525

If you are relatively new to Jobs-to-be-Done, this three-hour workshop will help you understand how to effectively plan, conduct, and process an interview and let it lead you to find breakthrough innovation within your product or service.

HIGH-IMPACT EXPERIMENTATION | APRIL 30th, $425

Often when we try to increase experimentation in our own companies, it isn’t the magic bullet we expected. In the workshop, you’ll learn how to take your experimentation from good to great.

PRODUCT STRATEGY | MAY 14th, $525

During the five hour workshop, you will build a product strategy for your own product or a company you know and love. We encourage teams to join the workshop to work on their product strategy together but will pair “solos” with others to make the work faster, easier, and more fun.

MANAGING A REMOTE PRODUCT TEAM | MAY 7th, $195

Whether you’re considering the benefits of running a product team remotely or have been recently thrust into it (by choice or necessity) — you likely have a lot of questions. In this three-hour workshop, you will learn techniques you can use to improve your remote product team’s productivity, communication, and overall effectiveness.

HACKING YOUR PRODUCT CAREER | APRIL 28th, $295

In this workshop, Gib describes his hypothesis-driven approach to career advancement. It is designed for product leaders (PM, design, tech, data/consumer science) at all stages.

Don’t Be Too Hard on Yourself

And last, remember that we’re in a pandemic. If you don’t feel like bolstering your resume and reading business books, don’t.

Sometimes it’s best to chill out for a few weeks and embrace the suck. Be unmotivated for a while. Sleep in. Take a long walk.

It will eventually get better, and when it does, there will be new opportunities in product management. Until then, feel free to reach out to our team. We are eager to help anyone that needs it.