THE PATHFINDERS — Meet Femi, Our Product Manager
Introducing ‘Pathfinders’, a blog series where we share inspiring stories from the Tingo Tribe.
For our debut, we sat down with Oluwafemi Ologun, one of our Product Managers. In this article, Femi shares how he made his way to becoming a PM, his typical day to day in Tingo Mobile, his part in the company’s growth and what he loves most about working at Tingo Mobile.
So, Femi to get the ball rolling, would you like to tell our readers how you got here? This simply means how you became a Product Manager.
OK, interesting question. My journey to becoming a product manager is an interesting one. Some five or six years back, I wasn’t very familiar with the job title ‘product manager’ or what it entailed but I’d been working in that capacity for a while. My role at the time involved me bringing several stakeholders together to achieve a common goal. So, looking back now everything, I had done at the time led me to where I am today.
I embarked on this journey without quite defining the path I was on till I came across a JD, (job description) on PM, I picked interest, went further to brush up the skills I had already, took strategic courses, trained further and yeah, that’s how I got here.
Interesting, my story is quite different, but I think that’s what makes career journeys unique.
To the next question, what’s your typical day as a PM in Tingo Mobile?
Tingo Mobile is the home of innovation, and we are constantly seeking for ways to solve different problems and one of the ways we do this is building innovative tech products. This means I have several products I’m managing.
My day to day is primarily ensuring these products meet users’ expectations, are working perfectly and driving business objectives. This means I have to do a lot of research, monitor industry trends, application dashboards and performance and user experience.
I have a number of meetings as well, some days more than two meetings, with stakeholders in the company like IT team and then our partners. Agendas for these meetings can range from planning and ideating about future programmes/events, new app updates, app design, product marketing/growth, fixing bugs, third party integration.
In summary, my day to day here is doing all it takes to ensure my products are successful, that’s my biggest contribution to the business growth.
Quite insightful Femi, with all these you’ll most likely have some tough days. Can you describe a tough work challenge you had to deal with and how you tackled it.
Hmmmm, a tough work challenge… the truth is, being in a fast-paced industry and organization, you’ll experience tough work days more often than not to the point they become the norm. You get used to this and you start to treat your everyday tasks as challenges. I think for me this just drives me to deliver at optimum for everything I do. So, I tackle every task/challenge the same way, be it Nancy asking for GA integration on the app, or Vivien seeking answers for failed transactions, or working with IT/third-party partners to fix an issue, my route to dealing with these will always be, remain calm, understand the problem, find a way, respond, react/fix.
Pretty cool approach if you ask me. Ok, so what do you love most about working at Tingo?
It’s definitely the people. They give you a reason to always want to come to work and I think that when you’re in an environment where you’re not scared of coming to work for the fear of someone ruining your day, you just fall in love with where you work and what you do.
So, yes, it’s the people here, the culture they’ve created around people here has made working in Tingo exciting.
Nice, feels good to be part of this Tribe too. Ok, Last question, what’s your advice for someone who wants to become a product manager?
OK, first thing first, I would say product management is not a course or job description you stumble on. Preparedness is key, especially because you require certain skills and resources to be a successful PM. Fundamental to this role is the ability to multitask while wearing many hats.
You’ll find yourself doing a lot of writing (technical/non-technical), there’ll be tons of meetings with stakeholders, vendors, partners and most often than not you’ll always have to make a pitch.
In summary, brush up your writing, communication, and negotiation skills in addition to project management. Most, importantly, you need the ‘can do’ spirit, without this, it will be a tough journey.