Every product goes through a lengthy process and several stages of development before it is fully released on the market.

And even before it is launched, developers have to make valid points on why and how would that product be sold when it is released on the market.

All that combined is a job for the product development manager. To do this kind of job, you need to have knowledge in multiple areas and fields.

Let’s see how does a regular day of a product manager in Yelp look like.

As you can see, you need to be able to combine your technical or engineering skills with business and design, so we could say that it is a rather fun job to do if you have the expertise.

With the rise in the popularity of IT and technology jobs in general, the competition on the market for these jobs is also growing.

In order to get the job of a product manager, you want you have to distinguish yourself from the crowd and the best way to do that is to have a good resume.

Now, writing a good resume can be time-consuming and a bit hard, since it needs to be detailed, but not too long, with the length of between 1 and 2 pages.

However, don’t worry, because we are here to help you with that.

In this guide, we will cover all of the most important parts of a product manager resume, and analyze them separately in order to give you the full knowledge on how the perfect resume should look like.

But, before we begin with the general guide, let’s take a look at two examples of a good product manager resume, just to give you a clearer picture of what details you should focus on.

Without any further due, let’s start with the examples!

Product Development Manager Resume Example

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Digital Product Manager Resume Example

Right

PRESENTING YOUR BASIC INFO IN A PRODUCT MANAGER RESUME THE BEST WAY

Now that we’ve seen some examples of successful product manager resumes, let’s start with our guide about how to write a resume and impress the recruiters.

For product manager jobs, as well as for many other professions, it is crucial to be seen as a professional. No one would like to entrust important tasks to someone who is irresponsible and childish.

A very good way to show professionalism is to introduce yourself properly.

And a good start would be to write some basic information about yourself in your product manager resume since your resume is technically your business card.

Just like when you meet someone in person, you should state your name, profession, share some contact details, such as phone number, email address, and home address.

Apart from that, most people tend to share a photo of themselves.

Some jobs even require you to attach your photo with the application.

Also, since social media has become very popular nowadays, it has become a common thing to include some of your social media profiles in your resume.

However, each of these things should be written in a specific way.

We’ll explain it step by step, so let’s begin.

Using the full name or adding some nicknames as well?

First of all, you should, of course, state your name. It should be written to be visible and noticeable on the paper, to make it easier for recruiters to look it up.

As we had said earlier, it is crucial to make yourself look as professional as possible. Adding any nicknames could be seen as an unprofessional thing to do, so try to avoid adding short names or nicknames.

If the job is somehow related to your nickname, for instance, if you are known gamer or a streamer and if you’re applying to be a game tester, it could be good idea to write down your gaming nickname as well.

However, even in that scenario, it would be seen as a bit unprofessional, so just try to avoid that. The best thing you could do is state your full name, as shown in the example.

Tomas Gaskins
Right
Tommy Gaskins
Wrong

Just like in real life.

When you meet someone for the first time, you rarely introduce yourself by stating your nickname.

Almost everyone would do the right thing, shake their hand and say “Hi, I am Tomas. A pleasure to meet you!”

That is especially the case in the business world, where people also use their last name to introduce themselves. This is also very common method in the academic community.

Writing profession

After you are done writing your name, the next information you should add is your current or past professional title if you have one.

For example, if your last job position was Product Development Manager, you should first write your name and then write ‘Product Development Manager’ underneath it.

If you are, however, a graduate and you still don’t have any experience, what you could do instead is write your highest educational title.

For instance, if you got your Bachelor in Data Science, you could write it down below your name in your resume

That way, recruiters will know whether you have some experience or not, even before they start reading your resume.

Adding a catchy photo on your product manager resume

You’ve probably had several job applications or you’ve heard that someone else had the experience where they were asked to attach a photo of themselves with the job application.

Depending on the job, this might or might not be necessary. For example, no one will ask you to do this when it comes to applying for product manager jobs.

However, it has become a pretty common thing to add personal photos on resumes, so there is really no reason not to do that.

Now you might think ‘Great, I have a bunch of photos on Instagram, let me pick one that looks nice and put it on my resume!’. That would, however, be a great mistake.

Adding random photographs from social media is not going to do any good. Remember, we mentioned that you are trying to look professional.

So, instead of adding random photos, you should take some nice photos of yourself that would make you look as professional as possible.

Let’s see what are the main characteristics of a good photo for your product manager resume:

  • Smile naturally, don’t fore anything
  • Your eyes need to be open, not like you’re staring, but looking naturally
  • Clean and combed hair
  • If you’re a woman, don’t use too much make-up
  • If you’re a man, trim your beard, you’re not applying for a Viking raid after all
  • Your surroundings should be empty and neutral, preferably white wall
  • You should be dressed formally
  • Don’t look sluggish, keep proper posture

Phone number

In a recently conducted research, it has been established that over 5 billion people in the world have a mobile phone, and over 2.5 billion of them have smartphones.

That said, there is really no reason not to include your phone number in your product manager resume. It can be helpful, especially because email messaging can be a bit tricky and buggy from time to time.

Also, some recruiters like to have a personal chat with their applicants, ask them some questions and learn more about them before inviting them to an interview.

So, the more ways to get contacted by recruiters, the better. Some jobs even require you to provide your phone number.

For example, if you want to work in a call center, recruiters like to call you directly and assess your oral interaction with other people, since it would basically be your job if they hired you.

Giving your home address – a good idea or not?

When you write your resume, you can think of it as writing some sort of business letter. And everyone familiar with business practice will know that every business letter contains certain personal information of a sender.

So, adding your address would be considered pretty normal. There is no reason not to do that because it could also benefit you.

Depending on the company, you might get certain benefits according to your location. For instance, if you live a bit further from the office, you might be given paid transportation to your job.

Often, it doesn’t mean taking you directly to your house, but somewhere nearby.

Or, they might just increase your salary so it could cover your transportation costs.

Also, some companies pick the applicants that live closer to the company.

So, even if you are not the most qualified for the job, they might pick you because your transportation expenses would be lower.

Sharing E-Mail Address – Yay or Nay

The most efficient way of communication between employers and employees nowadays is via emails. I

t allows you to quickly transfer files from one computer to another on the same network, which also makes data flow more protected.

Also, you could reach someone from anywhere in the company, without walking to their office or using phone lines to try to get them talking.

Not just that, but emails are also very much used for everything in every-day life. Do you need to contact customer support about the faulty product? You can do that via email.

Do you want to register on multiple websites? You can do that by simply using one email address. So, the question here isn’t whether you should share your email on your resume, but why wouldn’t you do that in the first place?

Most job applications are done through emails nowadays. So, even if you didn’t write your email, recruiters would have it saved if you applied by using email.

However, it is a good thing to type it down, simply because you never know when someone might invite you to an interview.

If you go to some business fairs, you can usually leave your resumes there and the companies’ officials can take a look at everyone’s resumes and find the perfect candidates for their free jobs.

One thing to note, however, is that you shouldn’t share some random email, consisting of your nicknames. Create one email, which you are going to use only for business purposes.

Let’s take a look at the example.

tomasgaskins@gmail.com
Right
tommyg@gmail.com
Wrong

As you can see, the best way is to use your full name or a bit shorter variation of it, in case your full name is very long.

When it comes to choosing the right email provider, you should only use the most known and trusted providers, such as Gmail, Yahoo, and Hotmail.

Social media profiles

There are millions of people using all kinds of social media platforms, from Facebook and Instagram to Twitter and LinkedIn.

Ever since they had become so popular, people have been striving to use them to their full extent. Nowadays, social media platforms are not just used privately, to enhance people’s social lives, but also in business.

You can see almost every major company in the world on social media. They use them as a means to find and bring more customers for themselves, by using new type of marketing, called ‘Social Media Marketing’.

They can easily offer their products over social media platforms and keep closer relations with their customers, by providing them full client support via social media chats, instead of just using website ticket submissions.

For some jobs, extensive knowledge of social media platforms is a must, such as the job of Digital Marketing Manager or Social Media Marketer.

Therefore, people often decide to share their social media profiles on their resume. However, some of them don’t do it properly.

If you want to share your social media profiles, make sure to tweak them a bit, so they look professional since you are trying to be as professional as possible.

This is very important for jobs related to sales, art or even smaller entrepreneurs.

They always want to look good on their social media profiles.

One profile that you should always share with recruiters is your LinkedIn profile.

LinkedIn is mostly used by businessmen and it is very popular because it allows you to connect with other companies and even receive job offers.

Before you share your LinkedIn profile link, however, be sure to edit it a bit, remove those long numbers from the end of the link in order to make it more appealing to the eye.

Just as shown in the example.

linkedin.com/tomas-gaskins
Right
linkedin.com/tomas-gaskins-5x3698412
Wrong

As for your other social media profiles. If you are sharing Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, for instance, make sure to remove some inappropriate photos and posts if you have some.

They would make you look unprofessional.

A SHORT SUMMARY OF YOUR PRODUCT MANAGER RESUME THAT WORKS 100%

Now that you had managed to write your personal information on your product manager’s resume, it is almost the time to write something about your experience.

Before we go into that, however, let’s discuss something else.

As stated above, resumes should be small enough not to bore the reader to death and detailed enough to keep them interested in your personality and potential skills you can bring to their company.

One way to make that possible is to create a short summary of the most important content in your product manager resume.

That means it would be a good idea to write several short sentences about your previous experience and potential accomplishments you achieved in your previous jobs.

A good start would be, to begin with, your professional title and years of experience, which would tell companies’ officials how much experience you could bring with you.

Then, proceed with some of the basic tasks you did on previous jobs and accomplishments, as well as skills used to achieve all those things.

Summary

Product Development Manager with over 6 years of experience. Excellent leadership skills, with product lead for Digital New Card Application in more than 5 countries. Capable of integrating API data into the AMEX app and reducing prospect application time by 50%, which increases submit rates by additional 25%. Excellent communication skills and client relations. Teamwork-based person, looking to apply all these skills to help the company.

Right
Summary

Product Development Manager with over 6 years of experience.

Wrong

Now that we had seen the example, let’s see why it is so important to write such an informative resume summary.

Well, one of the reasons you want to make a good resume is because you want to distinguish yourself from other applicants.

A lot of people tend to just write generic resumes, with copy-pasted text and templates. It just makes recruiters harder to believe that all those people are the same.

Therefore, when they notice someone who is completely different, they usually get interested. This kind of summary allows you to personalize your resume and pique the interest of recruiters.

That could, in return, increase your chances of getting the job of product manager you desire so much. And will most definitely buy you a free interview anyway.

WHAT KIND OF EXPERIENCE IS NEEDED FOR PRODUCT MANAGER JOBS AND HOW TO WRITE IT?

Some kind of previous experience is usually needed for product manager jobs, mostly knowledge about product development and processes that need to be completed in order for the product to reach the final stage.

Then we have some basic experience in negotiating and client relations because you will need to work according to clients’ wishes.

So, all experience is welcomed. But how does that help your resume? How far back should you go on a resume?

Some people say that it is not a good idea to write jobs that you had done 15, 20 years ago.

However, it is not the timeline that is the problem here, but the jobs itself.

Let us explain.

First of all, let’s explain how to even write down your experience on a resume.

To do that, you should first write your most recent jobs. So, you are starting from today and go back to the past.

However, as stated above, it isn’t good to write every job that you’ve ever worked on.

Especially if some of them are not related to your field or the job position you are applying for right now.

So, that said, write mostly those jobs that really matter. Let’s see how that looks in a practical example.

Right
Wrong

As you can see from the example, apart from just stating jobs one after another, it would be a good idea to write something about each job.

For example, include some regular tasks you had done, the skills you had used or even some rewards and achievements you had earned.

That way, you will give a more detail picture of your capabilities to recruiters, which would make it easier for them to decide whether you would be good for the job they’re offering or not.

To find out more about how to crack the job interview for a product manager role, check out this interesting video from UpGrad.

PRODUCT MANAGER RESUME EDUCATION SECTION

When it comes to education required for being a product manager, we could say that it is a job that requires you to be well-educated and also have knowledge of different areas, rather than focusing on just one.

Product managers have to combine their technical knowledge, design and business side of the product, in order to become successful.

As for writing your education in your product manager’s resume, it is completely the same process as writing down your experience.

Start with the highest education you’ve had, going further back to the past. For each college, university or school write something you did or achieved.

For instance, if you had good grades, write your GPA score. Or if you managed to be on the Dean’s list, write that as well.

One thing to note though. If you are very experienced and had to put several jobs in your experience section of the resume, then you could only write the highest education, without adding lower ones.

So, for example, if you earned your MSc in Data Science, you could only write that down, and skip the other education titles and schools.

Right
Wrong

SKILLS TO DOMINATE PRODUCT MANAGER JOBS

Last, but not least, you should describe some of the most important skills in your resume.

A lot of people tend to put a lot of skills on their resumes.

Also, a lot of people tend to lie about some skills they don’t actually have.

It would be best not to lie about your skills because the truth will eventually come out and then your boss won’t be so happy.

So, it is better to tell that you don’t know how to do something than to lie about knowing it, then when you have to do it, you don’t know-how.

That’s why most bigger companies have some sort of skills test, through which all applicants must go. Now let’s see what kind of skills are needed for product manager jobs.

Right
Wrong

As seen above, there aren’t too many skills in this resume. That is because you should only put your key skills, that would be useful for the job you’re applying for.

As shown in the wrong example, painting skills and childcare are basically useless for product manager jobs.

Try to search for the job position you want to apply for and see what skills are required for that job. If you have some of them, make sure to list them as well.

ADDITIONAL TIPS AND TRICKS YOU COULD USE TO NAIL YOUR APPLICATION

So far, we have explained the most important parts of a good product manager resume.

Now, let’s focus on adding some general tips that could help you get the job you want.

  • Selecting font style for your resume. What could make your resume look more professional is making it look pretty. One of the easiest ways to do that is to pick a very nice font style that would fit the job position you are applying for.

Apart from fitting the job position, the font style should also go well in the combination with resume template you made or downloaded from the internet.

Another thing to consider is that you should never use hand-written font styles, since they are much harder to read and could make recruiters’ job more difficult, thus potentially decreasing your chances of getting the job.

  • Good resume size. We often see the question ‘How long should my resume be?’. There are people who have resumes that are more than 4 pages long.

You might think that is amazing, but it is actually a very bad resume size. The perfect size for your resume is from 1 to maximum 2 pages.

Even if you have 40 years of experience, you should be able to fit the most important information on those 2 pages. Because remember, resumes should be short and detailed.

Everything that is more than that would be tiring to read, which completely removes the purpose of a resume.

  • Using sorted lists. One of the best ways to reduce resume size without having to remove a lot of important information is to use sorted lists.

Apart from being practical, it will also allow you to make your product manager resume look prettier and more appealing, while also being easier to read.

So, whenever information can be written by using sorted lists, make sure to use them. For example, when listing skills you have or points about your previous jobs and education.

  • Useful file formats for your product manager resume. Now, this pro tip could save you some time when there is an unexpected job application right in front of you, so make sure to keep this in mind.

Most of us probably write our resumes in Word or similar text-based software, which means that the file we get is of TXT format.

TXT format-based files are easier to edit and that’s why you should always keep a copy of your resume in this file format in case you need to make some changes.

However, since they are easy to edit, that means someone can easily open it and edit certain info. That’s why it is also a good idea to convert your resume to PDF file format before you apply for a job.

PDF is harder to edit and it looks a bit prettier than TXT format. So, because of that, you should keep your resume in PDF for job applications and one copy in TXT for easy editing.

  • Choosing the perfect product manager resume template. There are thousands of online resume templates out there, so you could easily pick one if you don’t have the time to make your own template.

However, if you decide to go with the custom-made templates, make sure to select one that would fit your personality and job position the most.

  • Monitoring your email regularly. The most common way to apply for a job is via email. However, emails can often get a bit buggy, which could hurt your chances of getting the job.

For example, the answer from recruiters could get stored in the ‘Spam’ folder, which is not included in push notification for your mobile phone or PC.

This means you could miss a chance to go to an interview. Recruiters wouldn’t know what happened, they would probably think you just decided to ignore their message.

Therefore, it is a good idea to always check your emails at least once a day, so you don’t miss a chance to get a job you want.

  • Reading your resume again after completion. After you have completed the resume, you should pretend to be a recruiter and read it. That way you will be able to notice some irregularities and possible mistakes, which would allow you to fix them and make your resume look perfect.
  • Political opinions don’t matter. Sharing political opinions and activities you might’ve had on your resume is not a good idea. You never know whether recruiters have the same opinions or whether they would stay objective after they get that information.
  • Fixing grammar errors. One of the most important things to do after you finish writing your resume is checking if you had made some grammar mistakes. Before sending out the resumes with your job application, make sure to fix all grammatically incorrect sentences and words.
  • Constantly updating your product manager resume. Over time, you will probably learn new things, finish some specialization courses and acquire new skills. In order to keep your resume updated, you should regularly add all these things, which would allow you to always be ready to apply for a job.

CONCLUSION

There you go, folks! That was our guide about how to make a perfect product manager resume.

We’ve covered everything you need to know about the topic.

You now know what are the most important parts of every resume, how to write those parts individually and what smaller things to focus on when applying for a product manager job.

What remains now is for you to start making your own resume. If you still feel a bit overwhelmed, however, feel free to use our resume template builder and make your product manager resume in just a couple of minutes.

Product Manager Resume: Sample and Complete Guide

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