The MM Network

[Senor_Taylor]

What's the career path for a Product Owner/Manager?

What's the entry level position for that? Or is it kind of a role that comes from different backgrounds? I'm getting really burned out on being in the technical trenches every day staring at code and trying to reproduce bugs. I'm really interested in the functional side of software and I really excel at that part of my job. I come to my PO all of the time with usage data and we have meetings discussing the direction of the product and where it falls short (Not my job). I'm just not as technical as the CS majors I work with and I don't really enjoy spending hours looking at code and data as much as they do. I know my product inside and out and I'm essentially the counter part for our PO and Lead Dev, but at this rate, I foresee me moving up in my role now and taking on more support responsibility. I already feel guilty enough now to take PTO since my product will have no SME in my department while I'm gone. I'm not interested in "support" anymore and the prospect of always being on call, always having to be in the office 9-6 in case someone has a problem, always being on a code red fire drill. My main job is to solve the unsolvable mysteries and it's absolutely defeating to constantly be in fear of getting the next case that will take you 15 hours to debug when you already have other high priority cases that need to be fixed that day.

I understand every job has pressure and deadlines, but I want something more structured and less technical. What are my options? My hope is to stay within the same company so I don't shake up my life too much. We have software/business analyst roles, product design roles, etc. I also fear I stand to take a hit to my salary as I can't imagine a less technical role paying as well for the level of experience I have.