Profession product development manager

Research and development department managers plan, direct and coordinate the research and development activities of a department of an enterprise or organisation or of enterprises that provide related services to other enterprises and organisations.

Personality Type

• Enterprising / Investigative

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Knowledge

• Market research

  The processes, techniques, and purposes comprised in the first step for developing marketing strategies such as the collection of information about customers and the definition of segments and targets.

• Product life-cycle

  The management of the life-cycle of a product from the development stages to the market entry and market removal.

Skills

• Develop new products

  Develop and generate new products and product ideas based on market research on trends and niches.

• Analyse data about clients

  Study data about clients, visitors, customers or guests. Gather, process and analyse data about their characteristics, needs and buying behaviours.

• Manage budgets

  Plan, monitor and report on the budget.

• Calculate production costs

  Calculate the costs for every production stage and department.

• Analyse consumer buying trends

  Analyse buying habits or currently prevalent customer behaviour.

• Design prototypes

  Design prototypes of products or components of products by applying design and engineering principles.

• Perform market research

  Gather, assess and represent data about target market and customers in order to facilitate strategic development and feasibility studies. Identify market trends.

• Plan product management

  Manage the scheduling of procedures which aim to maximise sales objectives, such as forecasting market trends, product placement, and sales planning.

• Follow company standards

  Lead and manage according to the organisation's code of conduct.

• Design customer experiences

  Create customer experiences to maximise client's satisfaction and profitability.

• Combine business technology with user experience

  Analyse and exploit the points where technology, user experience, and business meet in order to create and develop new products.

• Develop product design

  Convert market requirements into product design and development.

• Calculate design costs

  Calculate design costs to make sure the project is financially viable.

• Define technical requirements

  Specify technical properties of goods, materials, methods, processes, services, systems, software and functionalities by identifying and responding to the particular needs that are to be satisfied according to customer requirements.

• Draw conclusions from market research results

  Analyse, draw conclusions and present major observations from the results of market research. Suggest on potential markets, prices, target groups, or investments.

Optional knowledge and skills

Source: Sisyphus ODB