Leveling the Playing Field for Diverse Product Managers
As a founder and executive leader, I spend at least 10% of my time at work thinking about how to empower minorities and underrepresented groups to excel in product management worldwide.
After all, the statistics are quite stark. Some eye-opening facts about product management diversity in the United States:
Only 35% of all PMs are women, which is a 1.4x gap as 51% of the US population is women
Only 12% of all PMs are Latinx, which is a 1.5x gap as 18.7% of the US population is Latinx
Only 4% of all PMs are Black, which is a 3.5x gap as 14.2% of the US population is Black
Only 0.3% of all PMs are Indigenous, which is a 9.6x gap as 2.9% of the US population is Indigenous
And that’s just the United States. We recognize that other geographies face similar challenges in driving an accessible and inclusive ecosystem for product managers.
As an industry, we have a lot of work to do. That’s why our mission at Product Teacher is to make product management easier for everyone, across every axis of identity.
When we say everyone, we mean everyone. In our founding charter, we explicitly state that everyone should have access to the knowledge they need to create, launch, manage, and scale their own software products, regardless of industry, race, gender, nationality, background, education, wealth, or identity.
We’ve made significant strides towards this end goal. Our Diversity in Product interview series has featured product leaders from all walks of life, and we’re humbled to have the opportunity to give queer, non-binary, non-traditional, BIPOC, female, and underrepresented voices a platform to share their perspectives and be heard in the global product management conversation.
But this alone is not enough. That’s why we are actively partnering with 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations to provide product management education at scale.
Breaking down barriers through technology
We’ve been laser-focused on crafting scalable educational resources for product managers, because scalability enables us to increase quality, reduce prices, and accelerate distribution.
As an example, our PM resume course has enabled countless candidates to secure PM interviews with leading tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft.
We designed this course to scale in such a way that lifetime access to the course costs students less than one month’s worth of internet access.
Even so, we recognize that some aspiring product management professionals may not have the ability to pay, no matter how low we push the price point of our resources.
To help break down this barrier, we’re proud to announce that we have partnered with the Blacks In Technology Foundation to provide hundreds of licenses of our PM resume course to Black professionals.
The Blacks In Technology Foundation has carried the torch for over a decade in breaking down barriers for Black professionals. They’ve provided training, education, networking, and mentorship to thousands of members across 61 chapters in 14 countries; membership is free for any individual that identifies as Black.
We’re honored to join other sponsors of the Blacks In Technology Foundation including Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Disney, Bank of America, Breakline, Udemy, Udacity, and Techstars.
This is just the first step out of many. We seek to deepen our partnership with the Blacks In Technology Foundation to provide even more resources over the coming years.
But not only that, our drive to make the world of product management more inclusive requires us to actively seek more avenues for sustained change.
Relentless focus on social good
Positive impact is not something that is one-and-done. It is a long journey that doesn’t stop until we all have attained equitable access to fulfilling and rewarding careers.
We have signed on to the Pledge 1% commitment to formalize our continued investment in the product management ecosystem. We’re joining 15,000+ companies across 120+ countries to make the world a better place. By donating our products and our employee time, we seek to make a significant dent in the problem space of “making product management more inclusive.”
As a founder, I have also personally signed on to the Giving What We Can pledge to ensure that we are backing the organizations that will have the most impact in the world. I’m joining 8,000+ others to donate a portion of my income to high-impact organizations.
Through our charitable work, we have donated not just to the Blacks In Technology Foundation, but also to other worthy causes. Through the DonationMatch platform, we’ve provided thousands of dollars of product management educational resources to dozens of nonprofits across multiple axes, including female empowerment, queer empowerment, and neurodiversity.
Furthermore, our for-profit product offerings have always started from this foundational premise: “how can we get this knowledge in the hands of thousands of people, irrespective of time zone, geography, or background?”
By starting from this premise of scalability, we enable others to secure rewarding and fulfilling careers that uplift their lives, the lives of their loved ones, and the lives of the people they serve through their products.
It’s clear that our scalable approach is driving results. We’re honored to have received multiple awards for our work in product management, including Mogul’s Top 100 Companies with the Best DEIB Initiatives, Scale Higher’s Top Product Coaches, and Amplitude’s Product 50.
We have a long roadmap ahead of us. We’re excited to democratize product management knowledge across a variety of topics, including product vision, product strategy, and product execution. We can’t wait to teach a variety of hard skills and soft skills for product managers of all seniority levels to build the best products possible.
We do all of this work with deep love, because we know that with each for-profit offering we release, we have the opportunity to contribute this resource towards the crucial work that our non-profit partners are doing.
Our continued commitment to positive impact
Moving forward, we will continue to identify places where Product Teacher can make significant changes to the world of product management.
If you are a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization seeking to uplift underrepresented communities, please reach out to us at admin [at] productteacher [dot] com - we’re eager to find ways to help.
If you are an individual looking for free product management resources, visit the Product Teacher website and look for the “Free Resources” tab at the top of the page.
If our mission resonates with you, consider purchasing our courses or our career services; your patronage helps keep us in business so that we can continue to unlock positive impact for years to come.
