The following list is a good place to start on a product manager’s responsibilities. Hint: Most of the points are industry agnostic.

1. The product manager defines the game/product vision and strategy
2. Manages the game development lifecycle
3. Conducts market research and competitive analysis
4. Manages the game budget and timeline
5. Monitors in-game metrics and KPIs
6. Collaborates with other teams and functions of the company
7. Communicates with the stakeholders
8. Manages the game soft-launch, launch
9. Manages the update and maintenance of the game
10. Identifies and implements monetization strategies
11. Collects and analyses player feedback and analytics
12. Ensures the game’s quality and success in the marketplace
13. Researches new game ideas
14. Defines the game’s roadmap
15. Creates strong game development teams

The list above can go on and on. Now to prove that, let’s go and apply one of the oldest tricks in the book. Below, I have gathered some requirements from open job postings (at the time of writing), from several different game development companies, for the position of “Product Manager”.

- Collaborate with stakeholders to define the game’s strategy and long-term vision
- Impact the systems during game development to ensure they are optimal for launch
- Create fun and engaging features and other game content
- Test ongoing tasks and ensure that everything is on schedule
- Help to set the strategic direction for the games, develop and execute the product roadmap
- Contribute to the entire game development cycle, from creative concepts to publish
- Brainstorm new ideas together with your team to create the best games
- Ensure the successful delivery of our Publishing roadmap
- Liaise with internal and external stakeholders to help build the backlog of product features
- Manage the development team

An experienced eye can spot that in one company a product manager is more delivery-oriented but more research-oriented in another. So what exactly is going on here?

Several things actually. And from my experience so far, it is common and normal I’d say.

The first is the company size and structure. A small start-up of 2 to 20 employees probably has only one product manager, and that poor guy has other responsibilities as well.

In larger companies probably you will find multiple product managers even on the same product. For example, technical product manager, marketing product manager, etc.

Long story short, everything is fluid (or maybe even… agile?), as it should be nowadays. Long gone (I guess/hope), are the organizations that brought in a new framework or a guru to solve their problems with a new shiny workflow that is simply… not compatible.

Adaptability is key. One of the most important traits for a good product manager in a gaming studio is the ability to think fast and take confident decisions based on multiple factors and experience combined with market knowledge.

Now that topic alone can be discussed to an extent, but I will leave that for another time. If you are interested in that, let me know.

Let’s get a bit more specific on the topic above. A hyper-casual game development studio most likely will search for a product manager that is more inclined to ideate and market research, whereas a casual mobile game development studio would probably be more inclined to search for a product manager with a live-ops or KPI optimization background.

There is only one sure way to know. Ask. Always ask. Ask directly from the first LinkedIn message or the email that a recruiter sends you to see if you are interested in that “amazing opportunity” they have to offer.

If a recruiter cannot effectively answer for the budget range, the game genre, and the platforms of the position the company he/she is recruiting for, then it’s a huge red flag...

Run out of characters I can submit at this point...