The path to professionalism

I spend a lot of time talking about how the job of product management and product marketing may be becoming a genuine profession. This sort of change isn't unique—other roles, at other times, have experienced the same process of increased professionalization. Given my interests outside the technology profession, I naturally looked back in military history to find an analogy, and Voila! within a few seconds of pondering, there it was.

In modern history, the big tilt towards military professionalism happened during the upheavals from 1789 to 1815. As with any major historical shift, it would be a mistake to talk as if a single event changed everything, and military professionalism is no exception. Still, it's hard to imagine the process going as fast as it did without the French Revolution and Napoleon.

Roughly, here's the sequence of events:

• Before the French Revolution, officers in the French army came largely from the aristocracy. For them, generalship was an avocation, not a full-time vocation.
• As the radicals gained increasing power during the French Revolution, successive French governments purged the officer corps of aristocrats.
• Meanwhile, other military reforms helped create Napoleon's fearsome Grande Armée. Other changes, such as mass mobilization, made their contributions, too.
• After watching the French rampage throughout Europe (and often being on the receiving end of these rampages), other governments started to emulate the successful French example.

So, by the end of the 19th century, officers became full-time professionals, instead of dilettantes. They received specialized training at military academies, where they studied a college-like curriculum covering the "art of war." Specialized treatises, such as  Clausewitz's On War, formed the core of this curriculum, as did the best practices learned through hard experience in past conflicts.

So, how does this relate to the PM profession?

Skills define the profession
First, it's worth noting how military professionalism got started. One important reason was the growing awareness that technical ability mattered. Napoleon started his career studying artillery, probably the most technically demanding aspect of warfare at the time. At the siege of Toulon, he put these skills to good use, earning him the recognition that made Napoleon...Well, Napoleon.

PMs also have valuable technical skills—but not the type that many have thought were necessary to work in a technology company. Understanding how software and hardware work is, of course, necessary. However, the specialized skills of PM—the kind no one else in the company has, and which the company needs someone to have—have more to do with social science than computer science.

To the surprise and dismay of some PMs with MBAs, a business degree is not the sure-fire way to acquire these skills. The basics you learn in business school, such as the fundamentals of marketing, certainly have relevance. However, if you receive an MBA, you might have no idea how organizations adopt technology, which turns out to be a critical issue in this industry. (After all, car manufacturers don't have to convince their customers to use the cars they buy.)

Events create the need for these skills
The other important part of this analogy is the catalytic event. In the case of military professionalism in the 18th and 19th centuries, that catalyst is easy to identify, the eponymous Napoleonic Wars. Even the most hidebound countries, such as Prussia, reluctantly copied at least some aspects of France's military model.

In the technology industry, the stimulus is harder to identify. On the one hand, there has been a subtle, gradual shift from information technology (IT) to business technology (BT). The burden is increasingly on the vendor to demonstrate the business value of technology, instead of on the customer to figure it out for themselves.

Natually, the next question is, has the recession given technology companies the compelling reason for PM professionalization? It's probably too early to say for sure how much a difference the economic shocks of 2008 and 2009 have made, but certainly, they have played some role.

Technology companies have grown increasingly worried about the amount of waste and inefficiency in their businesses. You hear this concern echoed in the topics currently in vogue, such as the innovation process, portfolio management, and (most obviously) Lean principles.

Which begs the question, who in the company is in the best position to prevent waste and efficiency? Who, for example, is responsible for determining how to connect new ideas to genuine business needs? Certainly the people who write requirements, or craft messaging, are the best suited for this task. And if not them, then who?

There's a lot more to say about this topic, none of which will fit into this already overlong blog post. (For example, what are the essential PM skills?) The basic point, that we can use other instances of professionalization to understand where PM professionalization is going, and why, should be comforting to PMs living in the middle of this change. The path may be circuitous, bumpy, and even lead to the occasional wrong turns, but we know, once it starts, where it ends up.

Comments

[James Parks]

Excellent post. I agree that PdMs have more in common with social science than computer science in that the most consistent skills required of the role is the ability to speak/translate to different audiences, especially with requirements and vision, as well as to lead without authority. I liken PdMs to middleware that connect other skill groups in an organization together. These strike me more as hallmarks of Sociology (admittedly my field of study) and social psychology. Add to this the need for a PdM to be connected and responsible for the bottom line, where cause meets effect, and your argument for the PdM role to undergo professionalization is clear.