Coaching Is Our Job. Do It.
Do It Right
Read on my website / Read time: 6 minutes
When PMs get promoted to a management role — group product manager, Director, etc. — they like to think the job is just about strategy, roadmaps, outcomes, and directing their staff. And it is. Partially...
Here's the thing, though: If you're managing product managers, there's something far more important — and far more neglected.
Coaching.
When you're a manager of people, your ability to coach your people is the difference between a team that ships…
And a force that delivers impact.
And yet, most PM managers absolutely suck at it.
I've lost track of the number of product managers who have booked a call with me and have shared sad stories of poor bosses.
I've lost track of the number of people managers with whom I've spoken who I can tell in two seconds suck as people managers.
In fairness, for the most part, it's not because they don't care. It's because they don't know what coaching really is, or how to do it.
If you're a people manager reading this, you need to fix this. Today. NOW.
And if you're aspiring to be a people manager some day, you need to be prepared. (Else, one day, one of your staff members will be on a call with me where I'll be advising them straight up to get another job.)
Coaching is the most overlooked part of the job
When individual contributors get promoted into people management roles, they quickly focus on the tangible stuff: job assignments, portfolio roadmap, stakeholders, delivery, reporting.
- Coaching feels less urgent than delivery. Product teams run fast. Coaching feels like a "nice-to-have" when execution is on fire. So it gets deprioritized, even though better coaching would actually improve execution.
- It's hard to measure and rarely rewarded. Most orgs don't evaluate or incentivize coaching quality. Success is often measured by hitting dates and KPIs or retaining talent, not by how much a manager is growing their team's capability over time.
- Managers confuse feedback with coaching. Telling someone what they did wrong (or right) is feedback. Helping them reflect, build judgment, and grow over time is coaching. Many managers think they're coaching when they're really just giving directional advice or performance reviews.
- Coaching requires vulnerability and trust. Good coaching means asking questions, listening deeply, and sometimes sitting in silence while someone works through uncertainty. That can feel uncomfortable or inefficient to those who are used to jumping in with answers or solutions.
- Coaching ≠ relying on HR tools. Many managers simply lean on HR-provided tools, like performance review templates, career ladders, 1:1 agendas, feedback frameworks, and believe that using these is the same as coaching. It's not. HR tools can provide scaffolding, but it's not the house. (Frankly, HR sucks at guiding coaching. Also, it's not really HR's true job.)
Why coaching matters more than you think
In my career, I've had the opportunity to lead — and coach — some amazing product managers. Many have gone on to leadership roles themselves:
- Product Lead at Meta
- Senior Product Lead at Amazon
- Director at an insurance-tech company
- Director at a public health-tech company
- Senior Director at a public digital health company
- Head of Product at a commercial real estate analytics company
- Chief Product Officer at an Ed-Tech company
- COO at an international equipment manufacturing company
Every Product Manager we lead is on a learning curve. Our job is to accelerate it.
Coaching is what helps Product Managers:
- Sharpen their thinking
- Improve their judgment
- Build confidence and independence
- Grow into future leaders
Without it, PMs stagnate. Worse, they develop bad habits under pressure. And no amount of "great strategy" can cover for a team that's not growing.
As managers, good coaching scales our impact. It means our PMs can make better decisions without us having to be in every room all the time.
That's how we move from being the bottleneck to being the multiplier.
Why so many VPs, Directors, and Group PMs suck at coaching
Three reasons:
1. They were never coached themselves.
Some of us come up in sink-or-swim environments, which forced us to just figure things out on our own. It's natural to expect our PMs to do the same. But growing up with bad parents doesn't excuse us from being bad parents ourselves.
2. They think coaching = micromanagement.
Many leaders avoid giving input because they're afraid of "stepping on toes." Coaching isn't about taking over. It's about making space for growth.
3. They default to telling instead of asking.
It's faster to just give the answer. But when we do, we rob our PMs of the chance to build their own thinking muscles.
Good coaching takes intention, practice, and time.
Which is exactly why it's so powerful — yet, so rare.
What great coaching actually looks like
Coaching isn't giving advice. It's developing the person in front of you.
Coaching focuses on understanding an individual's goals, and then helping them achieve those goals in a set timeframe through performance and accountability. Coaching involves helping individuals identify and address specific challenges, and ultimately empowering them to find their own solutions. Much of this is done through structured sessions.
- Focus: Coaching is performance-driven, aiming to improve specific skills or behaviors.
- Relationship: Though good coaching is structured in its method, it involves developing a trusting relationship.
- Advice: Good coaching involves facilitating self-discovery, asking questions and guiding individuals towards their own solutions.
- Timeframe: Coaching helps individuals achieve specific outcomes in their performance and behavior over a specific timeframe.
Here's how it can shows up in a product org:
- In a roadmap review: Instead of saying, "We should cut this feature," ask, "What's the user value here? How does this tie to our goals?"
- In a stakeholder conflict: Resist the urge to jump in. Help the PM think through the dynamics, prepare their message, and reflect afterward.
- In a 1:1: Use it to explore challenges, not just report status. Ask questions like, "What's the decision you're struggling with?" or "What trade-offs are you considering?"
- In a post-mortem: Don't just review the launch. Reflect on how the PM led it. What went well in their process? What would they do differently next time?
Coaching is asking and listening. Helping someone think, not just act.
How to start coaching (even if no one taught you)
We don't need a certification to be a great coach. We just need a mindset shift and a few habits:
- Be curious more than corrective. Get out of "solution mode" and into "question mode."
- Use your 1:1s as thinking time. Go beyond updates. Ask: "What's keeping you up at night?", "What are you unsure about?", "What outcome are you trying to drive?"
- Embrace silence. Give them space to think. It might feel uncomfortable, but it works brilliantly.
- Learn a coaching model. There are a number of them out there.
- Model coachability. Let your PMs see you reflect, ask for feedback, and work on your own growth.
- Practice with peers. Build a culture of peer coaching within your team. It helps everyone level up.
And if you really want to grow:
- Get trained.
- Hire a coach for yourself. The best coaches are also being coached.
Big Takeaway: Coaching is the work
If we want to manage teams that deliver massive impact, we need to be a coach.
If we want to grow great PMs, we need to coach them.
If YOU want to grow as a leader, you need to coach great PMs.
That means:
- Making time for reflection, not just execution
- Asking more questions than you answer
- Prioritizing growth over control
We don't need to be perfect. We just need to be intentional.
Because in the end, our greatest impact as a product leader won't come from our roadmap.
It will come from the PMs who thrive because of us.
