Sep 10, 2024
Lessons Learned On Being a Product Manager + Designer Hybrid
When I started on Athena’s Portfolio Analysis Tool, we had a clear business goal: we wanted to help our partner firms convert unmanaged investors into managed account users. But what we didn’t know—at least not yet—was exactly what features would move the needle.
Here’s how I decided what to build, what to cut, and how I aligned a cross-functional team behind the right decisions—without losing my sanity (mostly).
1. Identifying and Prioritizing the Market Opportunity
Early on, I spent time talking to stakeholders and financial advisors, trying to understand why the problem existed in the first place. A common theme emerged: financial advisors typically only served higher-net-worth investors, leaving a massive, underserved audience—people who had some money but not enough to attract professional guidance.
Looking at competitors, we noticed many portfolio tracking tools existed, but they didn't really answer the questions users actually cared about, like: "Is my portfolio okay?" "Could it be better?" "Should I trust an advisor, or just stick with my DIY approach?"
This was a genuine market gap. Investors were stuck, and our partner firms saw these investors as future managed-account clients—if we could serve them effectively now.
We saw an opening: create something focused, practical, and impactful. To achieve buy-in, I highlighted opportunities in meetings, ensuring that business stakeholders clearly understood how addressing these gaps aligned with Athena’s long-term goals.
2. Narrowing the Scope and Saying No
It’s always tempting to build everything at once. We brainstormed big ideas: AI-driven insights, scenario planning tools, comprehensive onboarding journeys—stuff that sounds amazing until you realize you only have a few months and limited engineering resources.
My job became less about what to build and more about what not to build. Prioritization sessions were tough. People were passionate about their ideas. But to make something impactful quickly, I had to push us to agree on a tightly scoped MVP. We picked three essentials:
Clearly communicate portfolio health (risk, diversification, fees).
Side-by-side visual comparisons showing users the concrete benefits of managed accounts.
An actionable dashboard that 1) didn't overwhelm and 2) provided just enough clarity to motivate users.
Honestly, the hardest part was keeping us focused and avoiding scope creep—something easier said than done. Clearly articulating these trade-offs early was crucial to ensuring our MVP would deliver real user and business impact without feature bloat.
3. Documenting Decisions Clearly
Half my work was making sure everyone had clarity. I documented exactly why we prioritized these three features. I wrote out specific, detailed requirements. It wasn’t glamorous, but clear documentation helped us avoid confusion later when design and engineering needed to execute quickly.
I learned a valuable lesson here: teams can handle constraints and even bad news ("We're not building that right now") if they're confident in the reasoning and aligned on the direction.
Having explicit requirements dramatically streamlined later collaboration between design, engineering, and data science teams.
4. Alignment is an Ongoing Effort—But Worth the Work!
I found that clear docs weren’t enough—I was also spending a lot of time making sure everyone felt heard. I checked in constantly with design, data science, engineering, and business stakeholders. At times, I felt more like a diplomat than a PM. But these conversations reduced friction and ultimately made our teams move faster.
Through regular check-ins, concise documentation, and lightweight validation, I ensured that design, engineering, data science, and stakeholders stayed consistently aligned on priorities and expectations.
I found that clarity was contagious: once teams understood the “why” behind each decision, execution improved dramatically, and cross-team friction decreased.
One engineer said something that stuck: "It's easy to build the wrong thing quickly." He wasn't wrong.
5. Making Hard Calls
Of course, trade-offs happened. Time was tight, resources limited, and we couldn’t build everything at once: so I made tough calls about what features had to wait.
I had to cut things like scenario modeling and advanced AI-driven insights from the MVP. It hurt, especially because these were exciting features everyone loved. But in the end, trimming complexity upfront made it possible to actually deliver something meaningful rather than just promising everything and delivering nothing.
Our narrowed scope made execution feasible, and frankly, was the main reason we successfully launched on time.
6. Outcomes and Reflections
Post-launch numbers:
18% increase in managed account adoption
30% increase in user engagement with portfolio insights
25% improvement in account linking rates
But numbers aside, I think the real win was that we built something clear and useful, which felt even more meaningful considering how uncertain the project felt at the start.
Reflecting honestly, if I could revisit one thing, it’d be introducing lightweight user validation even earlier in the process—small-scale tests that might have smoothed out some early UX friction and helped us avoid reworking visual complexity later on.
