Product management is an essential part of every offering of any sort of product or service. With so many new products in the market, the product management industry is growing exponentially. As a result, there’s a growing insurgence of hiring product manager interns across the United States and the rest of the world.
If you surf through job boards and hiring sites, you’ll see product manager internships in almost every city, including San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, and even cities like Bellevue and Grand Rapids. There is an abundance of product manager jobs and internships from large companies, such as Google, Facebook, Dematic, and Fivestars. However, you’ll find lots of opportunities to become a product management intern at smaller companies, as well.
In this article, we’ll dive into what the product manager internship is about, what the typical job description looks like, and what roles and responsibilities befall product manager interns.
Let’s take a look.
What is the Role of a Product Management Intern?
Product manager interns are not new to the product management field. Most of the time, they have experience in product development, product marketing, and project management.
A product expert’s professional development as a product manager depends on this experience. At times, we associate product managers with a product manager internship before assuming the role. Other times, folks from the product team end up with a product manager internship as a means of professional development.
Nowadays, product manager internships have additional requirements, such as experience in:
- Software development
- User research
- Data analysis
- Computer science
- Machine learning
Product manager interns also have to work closely with other departments, program managers, and the management team. Therefore, excellent communication skills are a must.
Product manager internships vary a lot depending on the industry you’re interning in. Some companies consider the internship a formality. Alternatively, some companies treat internships as a way of determining the right product manager for a product.
In any case, interns typically have to do user research and understand user behavior. They analyze the data and identify trends to craft workable strategies. These strategies are recommendations for improvements to the current business and product strategy.
Product manager interns can work both full-time and part-time. They are paired with cross-functional team members who can also provide mentorship. The mentor provides insights into the product requirements, product design, product roadmap, and lifecycle. This way, the intern will have a better idea and understanding of the product.
Lastly, product manager internships can also be department-specific. For example, the intern can be sent to work with engineering teams.
If you’re looking to excel in a product manager position, then check out our product management certification courses.
Roles and Responsibilities of a Product Manager Intern
Every company has its agenda when it comes to internships, and, as a result, each product manager internship can have varying duties.
However, product manager internships are practically what a product manager has to do in their daily duties. Therefore, product manager internships have the same roles and responsibilities as a product manager – without the decision-making powers.
Here are the typical roles and responsibilities of a product manager intern.
1. Develop and Improve Strategies
Product manager interns actively work on product and business strategies. While they don’t have any decision-making power, they can recommend new strategies or improvements to the current ones.
They can also prioritize specific strategies if their research and analysis show promise.
Furthermore, they can recommend and bring up new product initiatives and programs. The intern can either take their recommendations to the product manager or directly to the upper management.
Interns are specially equipped to provide strategy recommendations because a considerable part of their job requires them to listen to customers. They gather feedback, analyze it, and develop strategies for solutions and how the product can be improved. Those recommendations can be used to enhance current product and business strategies, as well.
While this is one of the duties of a product manager, many of them hire product manager interns to do it in a dynamic environment. The idea is to save time while letting the interns learn more about customer research and product strategies.
2. Collaborate with Key Stakeholders
Product manager interns have to actively communicate with everyone who’s associated with the product. That includes product designers, product owners, user researchers, data scientists, product marketers, and engineers.
The interns can collaborate with all parties and develop a communication system for instant information feedback.
The collaboration helps interns recognize and analyze patterns and trends in the market, customer behavior, and how the products are received. It helps them identify new opportunities for improved engagement and growth.
Furthermore, it helps them determine what features customers want to see in the product. Using that information and their collaborative efforts, the interns assist the design and engineering teams in building, testing, and applying new product features.
3. Work on the Product Roadmap and Lifecycle
Every product manager internship starts by providing the intern with a complete understanding of how the product works. Through this process, the intern learns about the product vision, product roadmap, and lifecycle.
Learning all of that helps the interns create and manage a feature backlog. The feature backlog helps keep a record of all the changes being applied to the product. Furthermore, it can work as a blueprint for other products in the product line.
Other than that, product manager interns also help with roadmap planning. While the product roadmap is developed beforehand, it regularly undergoes changes and modifications. Product manager interns can recommend changes and improvements to the product roadmap if they have data to back up their recommendations.
4. Conduct Experiments and Monitor Results
Product manager internships are considered back-end roles. That’s another way of saying that the interns mostly have to observe and recommend, nothing more.
However, product manager interns do have the power to plan and conduct experiments. These experiments need to be approved by the product manager or any other management employee—the approval is necessary if the experiment requires resources.
Product manager interns conduct these experiments and monitor the results to come up with recommendations for improvements.
Their job is to look at the product, product processes, and strategies from a different perspective.
5. Market Research and Analysis
Product manager interns conduct thorough market research to understand customer needs, market trends, and competitive landscape. Analyze data to provide insights that support product decisions and strategy.
They use tools like surveys, interviews, and industry reports to gather information. Moreover, they also summarize the findings in reports or presentations for senior product managers and stakeholders.
6. Documentation and Training Materials
Product manager interns also work to develop and maintain product documentation and training materials to support internal teams and customers.
They create user guides, FAQs, and training manuals and ensure documentation is up-to-date and accessible to all relevant parties.
7. Supporting Product Launches
Product interns also help plan and execute product launches, coordinating with marketing and sales teams to ensure successful market entry.
They work to create launch plans, prepare marketing materials, and assist in organizing launch events or webinars.
8. Customer Feedback and Usability Testing
Last but not least, product manager interns work to collect and analyze customer feedback to understand user experience and identify areas for improvement.
They organize and conduct usability testing sessions, gather feedback through surveys and interviews, and report findings to the product team.
Product Manager Intern Job Description
Many product management professionals find it hard to find product manager jobs. As a result, they opt for a product manager internship to either get more relevant work experience or as a means of getting the job.
Several job postings from equal-opportunity employers across the United States emphasize the rewards of product management internships. For example, many job alerts focus on things like health insurance benefits or new features of a product tool. However, the primary focus should be on what the intern would learn from the internship and which prospects it would open up for them.
Here’s how a typical product manager internship job description is written. Keep in mind that this job description is general and may change depending on the industry, company, or product.
“We’re looking for a Product Manager Intern who can work across multiple product and engineering teams. You will have to work with account management teams to document user responses to a product. Using that data, you’ll develop templates and strategies to increase productivity and improve the products.“
You may have to learn new skills for things such as software development, agile methodologies, and product lifecycle management.
You’ll be working with UX/UI experts, salespeople, marketing teams, and even developers. Furthermore, you will also work to ensure that quality assurance testing is done right.
You must have a Bachelor’s degree and experience in product management. Additional certifications and a product/project portfolio are recommended.”
As a recruiter, it may be wise to include information on your hiring practices. For example, the job description can include your adherence to the National Origin Discrimination law or how there is no discrimination based on sexual orientation, among other things.
Becoming a Product Management Intern
Getting a product manager internship is a great way to open yourself up to the product manager position. Some companies need past product management experience while others are ready to give people with no experience a chance.
In any case, a product manager internship is an excellent way to learn about the roles and responsibilities of a product manager.
As a recruiter, you must tailor the product manager internship job description according to your industry—it will help you hire the right product manager intern for your company.
FAQs
Here are answers to the questions that aspiring product manager interns frequently ask:
What does a product manager intern do?
A product manager intern assists in market research, competitive analysis, and gathering customer feedback. Their role involves learning and contributing to the product development lifecycle under the guidance of experienced product managers.
How to become a product manager without experience?
Start by gaining relevant skills through online courses and certifications. Seek opportunities in related roles such as business analysis, technical marketing, or project management, and build a portfolio of personal projects. Networking and seeking mentorship from experienced product managers will also provide valuable insights into market trends and opportunities. Once you are ready, then you can explore intern jobs in United States.
What does a manager intern do?
A manager intern supports various management functions of cross-functional teams, including project coordination, team communication, and administrative tasks in a fast-paced environment. They assist in planning, executing, and monitoring projects while learning about leadership and organizational dynamics.
What is the product manager intern’s salary?
The salary for a product manager intern in the United States typically averages around $76,200 per year, with a salary range from $56,000 to $100,100 depending on factors such as location, company, and experience level.
If you are new to product management and are looking to break into your first product role, we recommend taking our Product Manager Certification Course, where you will learn the fundamentals of product management, launch your product, and get on the fast track toward landing your first product job.
