Discover how to navigate the dynamic field of product management by obtaining skills in coding, user-driven design, and project management. This professional foundation can lead to a rewarding career as a Product Manager, often referred to as the "CEO of the product".
Key Insights
- Product management involves overseeing a product through its lifecycle, requiring skills in tech, business, and design.
- As a Product Manager, you'll be an advocate for the customer, connecting various development teams to the users of the product.
- Coding, design and project management skills are essential for aspiring Product Managers and can provide a lot of career flexibility.
- Noble Desktop offers comprehensive bootcamps in all three core product management skills, providing an excellent choice for aspiring Product Managers.
- Free online resources, such as video tutorials and articles, can offer foundational knowledge in product management.
- While the path to becoming a Product Manager doesn't require a specific degree, obtaining a mix of coding, user-driven design, and project management skills is vital.
Many professionals are eager to learn product management but hesitate because of the perceived up-front costs. Most of your costs for learning product management will be training costs since you can access most of the required tools and applications with free trials or low monthly subscription costs. However, many free resources are available to help beginners get the hang of this hot career path.
Read on to learn more about the different free resources and tutorials available to help you learn product management.
What is Product Management?
Product management is the process of managing a particular product, including physical products, software programs, and other digital products. A Product Manager oversees a product through the four stages of what product management calls “The Product LifeCycle:” introduction, growth, maturity, and decline. In product management, Product Managers are often referred to as the "CEO of the product."
Product management is at the intersection of tech, business, and design. Successful Product Managers must train in all three core product management skill sets: coding, user-driven design, and project management. Product management connects the different teams who develop a product. For example, a Product Manager might work simultaneously with a development team, a design team, a marketing team, stakeholders, and customers to manage the development and launch of a successful product.
The Product Manager is an advocate for the customer and serves as a liaison between the teams developing a product and the users of the product. User experience is a critical part of product management, so Product Managers are expected to incorporate user-driven design principles and conduct user reviews of their product during the development and after launch.
Read more about what product management is and why you should learn it.
What Can You Do with Product Management?
Product management is a combination of tech, design, and business. You’ll need creativity, technical knowledge, and leadership skills to become a Product Manager. You will need to develop skills in all three to launch a new career in product management. However, the variety of skills creates a lot of flexibility in product management.
Coding skills are essential to an aspiring product manager. You don’t need to be an expert coder, but you will need to understand the process of building a digital product. As you probably already know, coding skills are highly desired by employers. You could even work as a coder while continuing the rest of your product management education.
Design skills are invaluable in many industries: design, digital design, fashion design, publishing, manufacturing, software development, art, marketing, web design, and animation. Product managers must know user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design. Training in these includes learning programs like Adobe XD, Adobe Sketch, and Figma.
Project management skills are required for Product Managers. Developing project management skills is great for the job market: the Project Management Institute (PMI) estimates that more than 22 million new jobs will be created for people with project management skills by 2027. Project management skills are also highly versatile since Project Managers are in demand across industries.
Free Product Management Resources and Tutorials
To learn product management, you’ll need to train in coding, user-driven design, and project management. Combining these skills is the best way to become a Product Manager. There are many free product management resources and tutorials online: these are a great way to get some foundational knowledge in product management before you commit.
YouTube has free product management video tutorials. For example, Noble Desktop is a coding, design, and business school that uploads free video tutorials to its YouTube page. These video lessons are a great way to start getting some experience in coding and design. Their Web Design & Development Playlist includes tutorials on product management skills such as Intro to Front End Development or Intro to React.
Noble Desktop’s Graphic Design Playlist includes videos for Product Managers, including Get Started in Graphic Design for design principles and Intro to UI Design. Aspiring Product Managers can familiarize themselves with industry-standard software applications such as Adobe XD and Figma and learn the different uses for each with Figma vs. Sketch vs. Adobe XD.
There are also other types of free product management resources. For example, free articles can be great career resources to help you start a Product Management Career Without a Degree. Or, free articles can help you develop necessary product management skills, such as What is Figma? or What is Design Thinking?
Learn Product Management with Hands-on Training at Noble Desktop
Since product management is a relatively new career, there is no single path to becoming a Product Manager. To become a Product Manager, you do not typically need a bachelor’s degree. You will need a mix of the three product management core skill sets: coding, user-driven design, and project management. Bootcamps in coding, UX design, and project management are a great way to acquire the knowledge you need to become a Product Manager.
Noble Desktop offers bootcamps in coding, design, and business live online and at its state-of-the-art campus in Midtown Manhattan. Since Noble Desktop offers bootcamps in all three core product management skills, it is an excellent choice for aspiring Product Managers. All of their courses have guaranteed small class sizes. Noble Desktop’s expert instructors teach a “micro-lecture” introducing a topic and then guide students through applying what they learned through hands-on, real-world projects. There is a “free retake” option on their courses, allowing students to retake the course free to refresh their knowledge or continue developing their skills.
Noble Desktop’s Software Engineering Certificate is a great option for aspiring Product Managers who will need to understand how applications are made. This bootcamp immerses students in coding and building applications using HTML, CSS, JavaScript, React, Python, Django, and Node.js. Expert instructors will guide students through hands-on projects to develop skills in coding the front and back ends of websites and applications. Students receive over 500 hours of live, hands-on instruction and twelve 1-on-1 mentoring sessions. Graduates earn a New York State Licensed Certificate in Software Engineering.
Product Managers are required to put users first. Understanding user-driven design is critical for a Product Manager. Noble Desktop offers a UX & UI Design Certificate that provides comprehensive training in user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design. Students in this project-based bootcamp master user-centered design essentials, conduct research and product testing, and digital product design. Students become experienced users of Figma, Sketch, and Adobe XD. Students develop a professional portfolio and receive 1-on-1 job mentoring. Graduates earn a verifiable digital certificate which is shareable on Linkedin.
The successful development and launch of a product is a project. Product Managers are required to have highly-developed project management skills. Noble Desktop’s Project Management Bootcamp provides comprehensive training in project management principles, practices, and methodologies. Topics covered include the “Project LifeCycle,” risk management, resource management, budgeting, and project management terminology. This boot camp includes training in project management methodologies Waterfall, Critical Path, and Agile, including Scrum, Kasan, and Extreme Programming (XP). Graduates earn a Certificate in Project Management which is shareable on Linkedin.
Key Insights
- Free resources are a great way to learn some product management basics.
- Free video tutorials can be a great way to start familiarizing yourself with the core product management skill sets: coding, design, and project management.
- You can receive comprehensive product management training in-person or live online with Noble Desktop.