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by guelo 3822 days ago
Everyone that walks around with a touch screen computer in their pocket thinks they are a genius of product design. But if you actually want to design products the first step is to become an expert in the code. So stop day dreaming that you're the new Steve Jobs and get coding.
2 comments
kovacs 3822 days ago
Everyone that has a car thinks they're a great race car driver. But if you actually want to be a great race car driver the first step is to become an expert in building the car. So stop day dreaming that you're the new Mario Andretti and grab a wrench.

That sounds as silly to me as your assertion. And yes I can code and have for a very long time.

I'll take the person that can figure out what will resonate with users and doesn't know a line of code over a guy that can code but isn't good with products. The skill sets are orthogonal in many products. Sometimes being able to code may give you important insights that a non-coding product person won't have, but I wouldn't count on it as a sustainable advantage for all but the most complex of products (e.g. enterprise/plumbing software), and even then a great product person will figure out what they need in order to arrive at the salient product decisions.

Sometimes having the ability to code is a hinderance to building a great product.

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guelo 3822 days ago
Yes, everyone, including coders, thinks they are the best product designers. The difference is that top-level coders actually have the influence to implement their ideas, whether they're good or bad. That's how you get your foot in the door. Walking in to a startup wanting to be the one that tells everybody else what ideas they should be implementing is not going to get you far. I'm not saying that product managers are not useful, but good product managers are data driven and their main job is to gather and summarize the available data and enable a conversation within the company about the product direction, not to be the grand visionary that hands down ideas from on top.
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sweezyjeezy 3822 days ago
> if you actually want to design products the first step is to become an expert in the code

I'd say the first step in designing a good product is understanding what the client/customer actually wants. That is where a position like product engineer/product manager are invaluable. It doesn't matter how good you are at coding, if no one wants the thing you're working on.

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