What Separates Top Product Managers

This McKinsey study addresses a critical gap in product management capabilities across industries, revealing that roughly 75% of companies surveyed aren't effectively implementing product management best practices despite software becoming increasingly central to business success. The research, based on surveys of over 5,000 product managers globally, identified that weak product management functions significantly hamper organizations' ability to capture full value from their software investments.

The study outlines seven key practices of top-performing product managers, with several illustrated through real-world examples. Caviar demonstrated effective hypothesis testing by validating their reorder feature concept through targeted emails before committing development resources, resulting in higher click-through rates and larger orders. Intuit's "follow me home" program, where team members observe customers using products in natural environments, exemplifies the importance of behavioral observation over self-reported feedback. The New York Times showcases holistic impact thinking by embedding journalists in product teams to optimize content formats for multiple stakeholders - readers, reporters, and editors - ultimately strengthening their subscription model.

Key takeaways for product managers include: validate feature hypotheses through low-cost testing before development, observe actual customer behavior rather than relying solely on interviews, understand business models and market dynamics beyond product-market fit, and measure success holistically across all stakeholders in the value chain. These practices help maximize software investment returns and drive sustainable business growth.