Steve Johnson shares his unconventional path to product management: programmer → sales engineer → top sales performer → PM by VP referral. He explains product management as systematically creating product success across three interconnected legs: strategy (what to build), development empowerment (how to build), and go-to-market (selling the result). Johnson identifies the core problem: organizations don't allow PMs to do real PM work because they're firefighting for project managers, UX designers, and task allocators. He reframes sales as 'distributors' needing enablement, advocates for sales engineering roles, and traces PM confusion to Agile's unintended consequence of making organizations forget strategic planning.

As heard by us

A clear-eyed look at product management and the confusion that keeps shrinking it into something else.

Steve Johnson treats product management as the work of noticing friction, writing down what the product needs to do, and keeping it properly aligned with sales, marketing, and development.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Want a cleaner definition of product management from someone who has lived it?

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →
Listen to the show on