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Examines some of the interpersonal barriers faced by product managers in obtaining interface support. Suggests an influence matrix exists in project management, consisting of four basic types of influence: reward power; punishment power; expert power; and referent power. Looks at each type of influence and analyses the problems encountered in acquiring and using each influence type. Takes a new look at the content of product managers and analyses the nature of their relationships with other executives, and says that apparent lack of influence in these relationships is shown to be over‐exaggerated. Sums up that the study has tried to delineate these interpersonal barriers as well as to indicate how they can be surmounted by product manager in gaining the support of their interfaces.

The purpose of this research is to determine how managers’ decisions to discontinue products may be affected by their cognitive and demographic characteristics. Research in product management and entrepreneurship has primarily focused on the introduction of innovations and the marketing of emerging and existing products in the marketplace. Considerably less research has focused on product elimination and how marketing managers decide to remove poorly performing products from a given product portfolio. Nevertheless, product elimination decisions are critical to maintaining business health and protecting firm profits, and are a commonly encountered decision for entrepreneurs and managers of existing products. This study empirically explores the role of factors that may affect a manager's decisiveness in eliminating poorly performing products from a product portfolio.

Using a simulated business environment, this study empirically explores the role of factors that may affect a manager’s decisiveness in eliminating poorly performing products from a product portfolio. Product portfolio decisions are presented to a sample of emerging managers using a computer simulation, and the impact of manager characteristics, namely, cognitive style, gender, academic profile and entrepreneurial intentions on product elimination decisiveness is examined using regression analysis.

The findings indicate dominant effects for cognitive style and academic profile in driving the decisiveness of product elimination decisions.

The findings highlight the importance of the academic profile and cognitive style of those entrusted with managing product portfolios, especially as is related to product elimination decisions.

The findings imply a need for determining the optimal fit of candidates for product portfolio management roles, based on factors such as cognitive style, academic performance and academic area of specialization.

Given the role of entrepreneurial enterprises in enabling social equity, this research highlights the need for entrepreneurial education focusing not only on product introduction but also product omission.

This research expands prior research findings on innovation, promotion and elimination of products by asking what happens at the end of a product’s life when the prospects for a product are no longer strong. The research shows that some managers are less decisive and therefore may be challenged when handling product portfolios with sub-performing products. The findings indicate cognitive and academic influences on product elimination indecisiveness and open new avenues for further examining similar influences in managerial decision-making. This line of work therefore encourages inquiry into the drivers of the important decision of product elimination.

Examines the types and characteristics of the new forms of the brand management system in marketing organizations as identified in previous research and previous existing research on performance appraisal systems. Draws linkages between the two systems to provide a framework for maximizing individual product manager’s performance, thereby maximizing overall organizational performance. Sets out a number of managerial implications and suggests areas for future research.

Reports an investigation of some of the factors that influence product management decisions in consumer goods companies. Looks at a product manager's role in the whole organization, particularly the decision‐taking and participatory activity as a response to pressures from the working environment, which depends on perceptions of risk and the company's allocation of rewards. Further develops behavioural hypotheses from theoretical and pragmatic areas – testing them among 34 product managers operating within four large fast‐moving consumer goods firms. Concludes that identification of the product manager with his brand is the most crucial factor in favour of the product management system.

The success rate of new products is stubbornly low. This paper aims to explore the differences in how product designers and product managers approach the new product development task by comparing their perspectives on the process.

This study conducted a worldwide survey of professional product designers and managers and compared their perspectives.

Managers struggle to understand the problem to be solved until they see the solution in the form of an outstanding product design. Designers struggle to develop new products until they have a specific and insightful understanding of the problem that needs to be solved.

Designers’ and managers’ ways of thinking are different, and effective collaboration depends on them being cognizant of each other’s ways of thinking; the success of their work is highly interdependent.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first study that simultaneously investigates both product designers and managers to reveal the paradoxical dynamics between their perspectives.

This study examines how technical drivers as well as social drivers influence organic communication and top management involvement (TMI) in new product development (NPD) projects. Technical drivers are of strategic importance and product innovativeness and social drivers are of intrinsic and extrinsic relevance. Organic communication is defined as continuous, bidirectional and informal communication between top management and the NPD teams. Further, arguing that TMI must be studied as a multifaceted construct, it is conceptualized to occur as guidance, active motivation and providing resources and creating a tolerant climate. Subsequently, the effect of TMI and organic communication on NPD performance is investigated.

The data set, collected via surveys from top managers and project managers involved in 86 NPD projects in 85 firms, is analyzed using PLS structural equation modeling.

The authors show that the strategic importance of the project has a positive influence on TMI through active motivation, providing resources and creating a tolerant climate for innovation, but does not have an effect on guidance. Results also show that active motivation and organic communication improve budget and schedule adherence, whereas providing guidance and stimulating a tolerant climate have detrimental effects. In summary, the results show that only active motivation enhances all types of performance while stimulating a tolerant climate appears to have the opposite effect. The results revealed that organic communication between top management and the NPD team has a strong positive effect on all elements of TMI (providing guidance, actively motivating the NPD team, providing resources and creating a tolerant climate). In other words, when top management communicates with the NPD team throughout the project in an informal way and listens to them in addition to engaging in a one-way communication, they are more likely to be seen by the team as being deeply involved in the project.

Executives must walk a managerial tightrope to actively motivate and to assist in providing resources, yet they must not be overbearing with direct guidance and must limit their tolerance for failures.

Involvement of key organizational actors such as top management and the link to project performance has attracted significant attention in research. However, nuanced empirical insights into the dyad of top management and project teams has so far been absent. The study’s findings detail the effect of technical and social drivers of top management involvement in new product development projects. Most notably, (1) the effect of motivation and stimulating a tolerant climate on performance, and (2) the effect of organic communication on top management involvement. Moreover, this study is unique in that it empirically examines TMI from both top management and team perspectives.

In many companies, product managers are under increasing time pressure. They are generalists in a marketing world that is increasingly specialized and complex. There are more tasks to perform, more specialist skills to acquire, more fires to fight, and less time for thinking and strategic planning. If their general management skills are to be used effectively, product managers must be able to focus their time on the tasks that exploit these skills and help their businesses to grow. The product management audit surveys product managers on how they actually spend their time and how they would ideally spend it to really build their businesses. Data from the audit can help to establish time allocation priorities for product managers and uncover potential time allocation problems before they become critical. We will first review the changes in the marketing environment that are putting pressure on the product management system. Second, we will show how any consumer, industrial, or service company can conduct a product management audit to find out how product management personnel are spending their time and why, and how satisfied they are with their jobs, the support provided, and rewards they are receiving. Third, we will illustrate the type of data that the audit can generate and present key findings from responses to audit surveys by over 300 product management personnel from 20 strategic business units in six Fortune 500 consumer goods companies. Finally, we will explain how one multidivision packaged goods company used an audit to identify problems within its product management organization and determine the actions needed to correct them.

One of the most important developments in banking is the increased emphasis on marketing a wide array of financial services. This emphasis has led to the adoption of the product management system in one form or another by many large, full‐service commercial banks. The transition to a product management system has required banks to change how they organize and manage their operations. Examines several of the major challenges and issues faced by product managers in the banking environment, namely, the identification of the product managers’ task responsibilities; the role of organizational support in facilitating product management; the influence of organizational culture; and the impact of power and conflict on product managers and the product management system. Also examines how product managers assess their job performance, work satisfaction, and the performance of the overall product management system in their bank. Develops directions for future research as well as several managerial recommendations to improve product management performance in banking.

To understand the impact of product specificity on organizational practices of retailers at the store level.

An Aokian framework is used that enables one to discriminate between food products according to their informational properties, and to connect these properties with organizational choices of centralization/decentralization.

Emphasizes the existing tension between the dominant “assimilation” organization pattern and the “encapsulation” pattern which fits better in with some specific product departments.

Proposals are confronted with empirical data coming from professional press and experts interviews. Further empirical research is needed to consolidate the findings.

The paper points out the need to differentiate the management of departments according to their product specificity.

The paper stresses the impact of product specificity on department organization. It can be useful for the design of organizational mechanisms: work organization, incentives and career paths.

The primary purpose of this study is to identify how and where product managers in the pharmaceutical industry receive the training required to undertake their job tasks, and whether or not there is a relationship between the tasks they perform and the training they receive.

The methodology for this study was exploratory and descriptive in nature, and utilized a cross‐sectional survey design. Both descriptive and relational statistics are used to analyze the data.

The key findings reveal that product managers receive the majority of their training on the job, with the rest supported by company‐sponsored training and outside seminars. Product managers do not appear to receive company training in proportion to the frequency with which particular tasks are performed.

The limitations to the study are that the findings are limited to one industry and that training needs are self‐reported.

Managers should not assume that on the job training adequately prepares product managers to do their jobs properly, and training should be an essential part of the product manager's experience. The paper identifies specific areas for future training.