What are your responsibilities as a platform product manager versus a feature product manager?

This question is designed to assess your understanding of different roles within product management and to discuss your responsibilities in these roles. The interviewer wants to know how you differentiate between platform product management and feature product management and what responsibilities each role entails. They also want to see how you handle and prioritize different job tasks according to the nature of the product. When answering, try to speak about your experience relevant to each role and provide specific examples where possible.

Key points to mention in your answer could be:

• Understanding of platform product management.
• Understanding of feature product management.
• Real-life application of these responsibilities.

As a platform product manager, my responsibilities are more strategically inclined. I'm focused on the overall direction and operation of a product platform, ensuring its scalability, stability, and functionality. This involves dealing with long-term planning, working with various stakeholders, and making key business decisions about the product's direction and integration.

On the other hand, as a feature product manager, my tasks are more focused on specific product features. I work on the planning, designing, and execution of individual features within the product. Here, it's about creating detailed user stories, working closely with the development team, and paying close attention to user feedback to ensure that features are optimal for the users.

For instance, when I was handling platform product management for our cloud-based product line, I worked closely with various teams and stakeholders to ensure the platform's scalability and seamless integration across multiple geographic locations. When I was handling feature product management, I was more involved in user research and analysis to refine our product offerings.

In the role of a platform product manager, I am responsible for setting the strategic direction of the product platform, ensuring that the platform meets the needs of both our internal teams and our customers. This involves working closely with various teams, such as engineering, sales, and marketing, as well as third-party stakeholders.

On the other hand, as a feature product manager, I focus on the end-to-end journey of a feature, starting from ideation and development, through testing and deployment. I collaborate closely with the engineering team and also spend a lot of time interacting with users to gain first-hand insights into how each feature can serve them better.

For example, during my role as a platform product manager at a previous company, I led the strategic planning for a shift toward a service-based architecture, which greatly increased the efficiency and scalability of our platform. In contrast, as a feature product manager, I concentrated on understanding user needs and translating that into specific features, such as developing a new user interface to make navigation easier.