Does Your Team Need a Project Manager, Product Manager, or Product Owner?
Here’s How to Tell

If you’re trying to decide whether your team needs a project manager, product manager, or product owner, it can get confusing fast! While these roles may sound similar, they serve different purposes and focus on distinct parts of your product’s lifecycle. Let’s break it down so you can figure out exactly what your team needs.

What Does a Project Manager Do?

A Project Manager (PM) is all about execution. Their focus is on managing timelines, budgets, and resources to ensure projects are completed on time and within scope. They oversee the logistical side of projects, making sure everything runs smoothly. Need someone to keep the trains running on time and make sure every task is completed by its deadline? That’s where a Project Manager shines.
They’re the orchestrators, ensuring that the project moves forward according to plan, coordinating teams, and resolving any blockers along the way.

You need a Project Manager if:

  • You're focused on delivering a specific project on time and on budget.
  • You have well-defined tasks and a timeline that needs managing.
  • You need someone to coordinate across multiple teams or departments.
  • Your team struggles with meeting deadlines and staying organized.

What Does a Product Manager Do?

A Product Manager is the strategist of the product world. They focus on defining the product’s vision and ensuring that what the team builds aligns with customer needs and business goals. While they may oversee features and functionality, their primary role is to define the product’s direction and prioritize what should be built.
They work closely with stakeholders, conducting user research, analyzing data, and setting the roadmap. Their focus is on building the right product for the right users, ensuring it meets market needs and delivers business value.

You need a Product Manager if:

  • You’re developing or improving a product to meet user needs.
  • You need someone to define the product vision and strategy.
  • You want to align business goals with product development.
  • You need help balancing priorities based on customer value.

What About a Product Owner?

A Product Owner bridges the gap between strategy and execution. While a Product Manager works on the overall vision, a Product Owner focuses on the day-to-day execution of that vision within an agile team. They break down high-level product goals into actionable tasks and manage the product backlog, ensuring the team builds what’s most valuable next.
The Product Owner keeps the development team focused and ensures that priorities are clear and achievable. Think of them as the hands-on person responsible for delivering value to the users through each iteration.

You need a Product Owner if:

  • You already have a Product Manager but need help with translating the vision into daily tasks.
  • Your team works in agile, and you need someone to manage the backlog.
  • You need help coordinating the team's efforts to ensure each sprint delivers the highest value.
  • You want to optimize communication between the development team and other stakeholders.

Can You Have a Product Manager, Product Owner, and Project Manager?

Absolutely, but here’s the kicker: If you already have a Product Manager, you might not need a Project Manager as much as you might need a Product Owner.
In many agile environments, a Product Owner is a more natural fit to work alongside the Product Manager. While the Product Manager defines the what and why of the product, the Product Owner ensures the how gets executed efficiently, working directly with the team to prioritize tasks and manage backlogs.
However, there are certain situations where a Project Manager might still be needed, particularly for large, complex projects that require cross-team coordination, managing budgets, or working within strict deadlines. A Product Owner keeps the development team focused, while the Project Manager ensures that everything from budgeting to timelines stays on track.

You need a Product Manager and Product Owner if:

  • You want the Product Manager to focus on long-term strategy while the Product Owner handles sprint planning and backlog prioritization.
  • You have a complex product that requires ongoing alignment between strategic goals and development efforts.

You need a Project Manager and Product Manager if:

  • The project spans multiple teams and departments, requiring extensive coordination beyond the development team.
  • You need someone to manage budgeting, timelines, and external dependencies.

So, Which One Does Your Team Need?

If you’re focused on building the right product for your users, then a Product Manager is essential. If you’re working in agile and need to translate that product vision into detailed tasks for your development team, a Product Owner will help execute that vision. But if you’re managing large projects, particularly with multiple teams or external stakeholders, a Project Manager will keep everything on track.

And for larger teams, having a Product Manager to guide strategy alongside a Product Owner to handle the daily execution can be incredibly powerful.

In the end, it’s all about balancing strategy and execution. The right mix depends on the complexity of your product, the scale of your team, and the nature of your projects. Just remember: Product Managers focus on building the right thing, Product Owners focus on building it right, and Project Managers ensure it all happens on time.