🎧 2025 Product Management Job Market Rundown
Stuck in your product management job search?
I gotchu. 🫶
Here's my insider take on the current job market, including 5 ESSENTIAL tips to increase your chances of success. ✨
Plus, I've includes 4 bonus insights about hybrid roles and the evolving Product Management interview process you'll only get here.
Could you use some support on your product job search?
Whether you’re new to Product Management or looking for your next role, the job search can be tough. If know you need guidance, strategy, and end-to-end support, learn more about my SPRINT coaching program that helps Product Managers land their first (or next!) role.
-
Jess Sherlock (00:00)
If it's been a few years since you last searched for a product management role, you might be surprised how much things have changed. there was a point in the last few years where it felt like they were handing out PM jobs like candy on Halloween. And so have things changed? Yes. But are companies still hiring? Also, yes.
you just need to understand what's different so that you can use the right playbook for today's job market.
Jess Sherlock (00:20)
Welcome to another episode of After the Cert, the career podcast for product managers who've collected all the certifications and taken all the courses and still feel stuck in their product career. I'm your host, Jess Sherlock, product management career coach. I know firsthand what it feels like to be overwhelmed, lonely, and stuck in your product career. And I'm on a mission to help you feel confident and empowered to take the lead your product career and achieve your unique career goals.
on me for practical and actionable advice, plus relatable stories from PMs navigating the messy middle of their career.
And remember, if you're feeling stuck with your product management job search, worried about making a great impression during your first 90 days in a new product job, or you want to position yourself for a promotion at work, I'm here to help. You can check out my coaching programs at jesssherlock.com slash apply.
and book time on my calendar so we can chat.
Let's get into it.
Jess Sherlock (01:17)
All right, welcome to the pod. Today we're going to talk about the current state of the product management job market because it is quite possibly the top question that I'm getting from folks recently. And this is questions coming from product managers in my community, but also folks who are interested in my SPRINT program. That's the job search program for PMs looking for their first or next product role and who want personalized support from resume to offer.
So in today's episode, I'm gonna give you a rundown of what I'm seeing in the job market and what that means for you if you're thinking about hunting for your next role or if you're already on the hunt for your next product management role. And if you find this episode helpful and you want a regular update of the job market, let me know. I just might make it a regular thing. So let's get into it.
If it's been a few years since you last searched for a product management role, you might be surprised how much things have changed. I often notice with people that they're surprised by the amount of effort they have to put in. They're noticing a significantly higher amount of competition and all of that is true. mean, there was a point in the last few years where it felt like they were handing out PM jobs like candy on Halloween. And so have things changed? Yes. But are companies still hiring? Also, yes.
you just need to understand what's different so that you can use the right playbook for today's job market.
So based on my firsthand experience helping folks with the job search, but also based on what I'm hearing and seeing in my own personal networks, here's what I think you should know.
Okay, number one, positioning is everything. And I don't necessarily agree with this approach, but there's definitely a trend right now of companies hiring product folks with a certain set of experience, be that in a particular domain, technology, or even something else. And I suspect it's because there's a belief that this will somehow increase the likelihood of a successful hire.
And I think economic uncertainty is also contributing to this desire to reduce risk in hiring or at least any perception of risk. So what does this mean for you? It means the days of someone taking a chance on you or someone seeing an opportunity in you, those days are gone. And just like we don't build a product for anyone and everyone, in this market, the PMs having success finding a new role,
are building a strong personal brand around a particular skill, technology, domain or industry, or a combination of those things and executing on a job search strategy that is in alignment with you don't wanna make recruiters and hiring managers guess about anything. I tell folks all the time, we wanna spoon feed them what you want them to know, okay?
This is a more difficult time also to make a big jump from one industry to another, for example, so you may need to find a bridge opportunity. exact conversation with a current sprint client who wants to get out of media, but happens to be getting the most traction in the interview processes with media companies. But that said, one of the roles they have an opportunity to interview for is at a media company
but it's a growth product manager role. So what's exciting about that is this person can leverage their media background, get into a media company, but in a growth role that could allow them to make a move to a full growth in a different industry in their next job search. So positioning is everything. We wanna make sure that it's very clear.
what your unique superpower is, where your depth of experience is, and we spoon feed that information to our recruiters and hiring managers. So you are the obvious choice.
All right, number two, it's very competitive, plain and simple. There is simply more supply of product talent than roles to fill. Between layoffs, product management courses, teaching new PMs and getting folks into the role, and also just interest in the field, product management is trending. So what does this mean for you?
This means that you absolutely must make yourself the obvious candidate without putting a lot of cognitive load on the recruiters and hiring managers. These folks, believe me when I say, they're spending maybe five, six, seven seconds reviewing your resume. If you're not a fit, they're gonna move on to the next resume. They have options, tons of options. And so this means you need to have a clear and concise resume, you need to be easy to communicate with, and you need to respond quickly.
If you get asked to schedule a screener call, book the earliest day and time you can. Don't delay it so that you can prepare. You wanna be the first to respond, because that just might be the difference between getting the interview or not.
All right, number three, consistency and quality of applications is key in this job market. this is not the job market where casual, infrequent searching is going to lead to a role at least not fast. Some job postings are old, some are already filled and they're waiting for the person's start date to take the roll down or worse, it's fake. And so what does this mean for you?
If you have the benefit of lots of strong referrals, great, use them. But remember, that's what most people are trying to do.
So I strongly recommend that you commit to applying to a high volume of the right jobs for you based on your application strategy. let me be clear, I am absolutely not recommending a spray and pray approach. What I do recommend is tailoring your resume towards your application strategy. And for 80 % plus of the jobs you apply to, you shouldn't need to further edit your resume. And when I say high volume
of applications. I mean something like 30 applications a week, ideally a few each day throughout the week so that you're consistently applying to new jobs when they appear. And so people often ask me, know, Jess, why are we focused on such a high volume? Here's the thing. In this market, even if you see a strong 10 % conversion rate from an application to a screener call,
you'll still need to apply to dozens of jobs before you can start to expect even a single request for an interview.
you really wanna focus on consistency of high quality applications of a tailored resume to the jobs that fit your application strategy. I do not recommend editing your resume for every single job posting for a couple of reasons. Number one, some percentage of those job postings just aren't real or aren't active. And so that's a direct waste of your time.
but it can also lead to burnout in the job search process. And at the end of the day, I just don't believe that switching out a singular keyword for another keyword is gonna make the difference if you have a strong resume to begin with. I often ask people, okay, if we're gonna create another version of your resume, what are we leaving out or what are we adding in? Why not put our strongest foot forward and apply to a high volume of the right jobs?
Okay, number four. In this market, individual contributor product managers are more desirable than product leaders. Here's the latest data I have. Nearly 90 % of open product job listings right now are for individual contributor roles. When I say individual contributor, I'm talking about roles where you're not responsible for managing other people. This could be associate PM, PM, senior PM, and above.
So companies tend to cut middle management roles during bad economic times And you know even during the best of times product leadership roles are simply going to be fewer relative to IC roles So what does this mean for you? This means I would strongly recommend that you position yourself as a doer if you have people leadership experience great. That's a bonus
But don't make that your core competency. It's just not what companies want most right now. What they're really looking for are PMs that are gonna jump into a team, roll up their sleeves on the work, and make an impact fast.
Okay, number five, it's not a great time for entry-level folks. Just 2 % of product management jobs worldwide right now are associate level or entry-level roles. And the roles that do exist are extremely competitive. So what does this mean for you? Either work on your resume and narrative to clearly illustrate your experience so that you can be considered for PM roles.
It may help to work with a coach like me to help you identify those transferable skills and work on your positioning, or consider focusing less on getting into a company with a product title and focus more on getting into a tech company where you can work near product and build your experience. Maybe even get an opportunity to support product work. I call these product adjacent roles. And these might be roles like product analyst, if you have data analyst experience or background.
or maybe a program manager role if you have project management experience. So remember, careers are a long game and this particular job market is one where you may need to trade off this particular season of your career, where you don't end up exactly where you want to end up right now, but maybe it leads you in the right direction. And that's progress.
All right, so to recap the five things that I am seeing in this particular job market, number one, positioning is everything. This is not the time to try to be everything to everyone. This is the time to really pitch and package yourself as a specialist with deep expertise in a certain skill, technology, domain, industry, or some combination of those things.
Number two, it's very competitive. So you need to find ways to stand out, be easy to work with, and be responsive when you do get the opportunity to interview.
Number three, consistency and quality of applications is absolutely key. This is not the market where you can casually job search and hope for the best. This is a job market where you need to be consistently applying, building good, strong momentum and applying to a whole lot of volume of the right jobs.
Number four, individual contributors are seeing more success in the job search than product leaders. So position yourself as a doer to have the best opportunity of being the most attractive to hiring managers.
And number five, if you're an entry level product manager looking for an associate role, consider expanding your search to product adjacent roles where you can leverage your past experience and get into a company where you can take advantage of the long game. Maybe have a season of your career where you work near product so that when the time is right, you can shift into a product management role at that company.
All right, here are a few other quick points to share, things that I've noticed as I've been helping folks with their product management job search. So often people ask me if hybrid and remote roles are going away. And the fact is they're still plentiful. They're about half of the opportunities on the job market right now. some companies are certainly making a splash in the news about forcing their employees to return to office. But many of my recent SPRINT clients have landed hybrid or even fully remote roles.
Interview loops are taking longer. So companies might have done maybe three, four, maybe five rounds of interviews in the past, but now they're often doing more. And I've heard some crazy stories about interview processes taking two or more months, eight or more rounds of interviews. So be ready to be patient.
Next up, assessments are happening more and earlier in the process. So I've been noticing more more companies requiring an assessment in order to even be considered as an applicant. Like literally you apply and then they auto send you an email with an assignment of some kind. I've also heard from folks that had multiple take home assignments, maybe one related to developing a product roadmap for a feature area.
I've also heard of others where there would be a second assignment related to some sort of data analysis, for example. So be prepared for more work and more assessments earlier in the process.
Okay, and last thing, some companies are trying to find ways to automate the interview process and take the human effort out of it or decrease it a bit. I've seen the occasional recorded interview request where instead of meeting with a recruiter at first, you actually respond to a series of questions via like a website or platform that records you as you provide video responses to their interview questions. I've also seen some companies that are trying to use AI tools for live interviews. So like a
AI interviewer, for example. this has been surprising to some folks and obviously can feel a little bit impersonal, a little bit extra stressful. you know, all these technologies are new. So we'll see how much of this sticks around in the long term.
So all that to say, this is not a job market for the faint of heart. And I don't share this information to scare you away from searching for your next role. I just want you to embark on the process with open eyes all too often, I hear from folks who have been using the old job search playbook for six or more months, maybe even a year plus, and they've been getting very little traction. And by the time we chat, they're super frustrated and super burnt out.
So my goal here is to arm you with the best information about what to expect, how to prepare, and what you can do to increase your chances of success. And if you're thinking about kicking off your product management job search and you want some help, consider checking out my SPRINT program so you don't have to go it alone. I often tell people SPRINT is like having a personal trainer for your job search. All you have to do is show up and we'll help you ensure that every minute you spend on the job search is the absolute best use of your time.
This has been super helpful for folks who are trying to balance a job search with a full-time job inside of SPRINT, we actually help you define a strong job search strategy based on your career experience to date and based on the needs of the market. Then we help refine your resume, your LinkedIn, and your narrative to be market ready and as impactful.
and compelling as possible. We do tons of mock interview prep. We help you with your take home assignment. And my favorite, we help you with your offer and negotiation. So if you want to learn more about what it would look like to work with me, you can go to jessherlock.com slash sprint. That's three S's, J-E-S-S-S-H-E-R-L-O-C-K dot com slash sprint. And you can book a call so we can chat.
as always, talk is great, but growth requires action. So I'll ask you, what's one takeaway from today's episode that you want to put into action right away?
Not sure? Here are some ideas. If you're currently job searching and you just haven't been getting traction, consider refining your strategy, your resume, your narrative to reflect a more tailored job search approach. Stop trying to be everything to everyone.
If you've been job searching for an entry level product role with no luck, consider mapping your skills to a product adjacent role where you might have a better chance of landing a role inside a company and using that role as a stepping stone into an eventual product role.
Or if you're thinking it's time to kick off a product management job search and this episode convinced you that you need some help so that you can set yourself up for success, check out my SPRINT program, jesssherlock.com slash SPRINT and book time on my calendar so we can chat.
Thanks again for listening to another episode of AFTER THE CERT If you found this episode helpful, please subscribe to make sure you get notified as soon as new episodes drop. And as always, if you have a product management career question or topic suggestions for a future episode, connect with me on LinkedIn, send me a DM, I'd love to hear from you. And I'll see you next time on AFTER THE CERT.
