Product Management vs. Project Management

Wait a minute. Who said anything about a product? Just
finish the project please.

The above is the all to often sad story of project management. The users are forgotten once the gears are set in motion and the project becomes a self-feeding frenzy with too little user feedback.

So this is where the product manager and product development thinking comes in. To balance the rush to finish on-time and on budget critical junctions are made where rethinking and evaluations can sometimes totally refocus or cancel projects.Thats right. At certain points in the creation of a product gates will actually cancel projects if the results are not meeting the needs (did somebody say Experience, Performance, Basic) of the user.But this spells disaster for the project leader - a canceled project?

Actually there is a way out. By considering the design and front end phases of product development as a project and by considering a prototype as a project. In this way we end the projects at the gates.

And instead of 1 huge failed project we have 3 successful projects and lots of information for the product manager to use for his next product suggestion.

Here is a link to a great posting about this topic.