Why junior product managers get stuck in the project management trap

Product management has exploded as a career path in recent years, with companies increasingly recognizing the need for strong product leadership. However, many so-called product managers are actually operating as project managers,  focused more on execution and delivery rather than shaping product vision, strategy, and doing real product work.

For junior product managers, getting stuck in such an environment can be a career trap, preventing them from developing the core skills needed to succeed in true product management roles. The thin line between product and project management often causes misconceptions that stall a junior product manager’s growth.

One of the biggest dangers for a junior product manager is not fully understanding the distinction between the two roles. I learned this the hard way early in my career. At my first product manager job, I thought I was crushing it. I was keeping the team on track, delivering features here and there, and managing deadlines like a “timeline ninja.” But it hit me during an interview when I was asked, “Tell me about a time you shaped the product strategy.” I blinked. Strategy? I'd never touched anything remotely strategic. I realized I’d spent months managing tasks, not products. I was only a ClickUp and Jira board professional (which isn’t in itself a bad thing) lacking core product skill – product sense.

Now, this isn't to say project management is a bad career, far from it. But if your goal is to be a true product manager, blurring the lines between these two roles can hold you back. So, let’s break down the key differences and explore why mixing them up can be risky for your career.

The table makes it clear: product managers focus on outcomes, while project managers focus on outputs. Many companies, especially in my region, misinterpret product management, which negatively affects junior product managers. But, this is not to say a product manager should not understand project management concepts but rather the project roles should be toned down if the product manager role is what is required.

How junior product managers get trapped in the wrong environment

For junior product managers, joining a company where product management is done in a project management manner can be a dangerous start to their career. Coupled with my experience and general knowledge, I will share how junior product people can get trapped in this project management and unhealthy scrum environment and what you can do to come out.

1. Working in a company that is in a build trap. This happened to me. We had no roadmap. Only a backlog full of user stories that no one had validated. We built and built. But we didn’t measure impact. There were no clear goals, no user research, no data guiding our decisions. Just endless feature releases. It felt like working on a treadmill; constant motion, but going nowhere.

When a junior begins their career in an environment that is trapped in feature development rather than driving value, the product manager becomes a project manager who is concerned about features only.

2. Working in a company with a weak product culture where it is only the leadership that dictates what gets built. I call this environment the “boss-wants-it driven team.”
3. Working in a company where product managers spend most of their time writing Jira tickets, coordinating deadlines, and managing stakeholder expectations rather than working closely with the development team, receiving and analyzing user feedback, working on product vision, data, and strategy.
4. Working in a company where there is no customer interaction. We once worked on a product where there was no interaction with no one, no market survey, no research whatsoever. This can stall a junior product manager from growth as there is no solid customer relationship experience. When a development team is in a build trap they will most likely not be talking to customers to understand user needs.
5. Working in a company where there is no access to any data whatsoever. Junior product managers should be exposed to data-driven work from the early stage.

This kind of environment creates a fundamental problem: Junior product managers are not developing the skills that will make them great product leaders in the future.

Why this is dangerous for career growth

When a young product manager begins their career in such environment, they suffer from the following;

How to avoid the project management trap as a junior product manager

If you are an early-career product professional, it is essential that you develop proper product role skills.

1. Choose the environment:

Most times, from the job description you will know if a company is doing product management wrongly or not. When looking for a job, don’t just accept any product title. Investigate whether the company has a strong product culture by asking questions. These can be asked during your interview:

• Who decides what gets built? Is it engineering, leadership, or product?
• Do product managers conduct customer interviews and research, or is it all handled by other teams?
• Are product managers responsible for setting strategy, or are they just managing execution?
• How much autonomy do PMs have to say “no” to requests from leadership or stakeholders?
• Is there a product analytics stack in place (e.g., Mixpanel, Amplitude, GA4)? Or are decisions mostly qualitative?
• What is the relationship between product and engineering? Collaborative or delivery-oriented?

2. Do product teardowns, product sense work, competitive analysis reports:

Engaging in product teardowns and product sense work like “How I Would Improve Pinterest as a Product Manager”, for example, can really build up a junior into understanding complex user problems and making faster decisions. You can check TryExponent for more product sense questions. Developing a strong product sense can make a junior product manager become an innovative product manager rather than an execution-machine product manager.

3. Build your own product.

You can build your own product and get to interact with real users. In today’s world where AI is becoming an unfair advantage, with a minimal coding skill, a junior product manager can build a ‘coming soon’ landing page to validate a product idea. If you do not have a coding skill you can work with your developer friends to build an actual product used by real users.

I collaborated with my friends at the Microsoft Imagine Cup, 2025 to build an AI product called Lingroks, which does translations, text-to-speech, text summarization, etc. The experience helped me in things like product ideation, competitive analysis, design process, user persona, AI models, LLM bias, working in a cross-functional team, working with people from different culture and timezone (I had two Indians on my team), creating roadmap, designing pitch deck, building a lean canvas, product launch, etc. It was really a great experience for me. Building and launching a product from scratch taught me many things about product in its entirety. For me, this is the best mode of escaping the trap as you will learn a lot and most likely even fail in the process. Yea, you learn so much from failures.

4. Find a mentor and learn from real product managers

Mentorship is crucial for growth. Find senior product managers who work in strategy-driven roles and learn from their experience. Additionally, read books and take courses that focus on product thinking rather than just agile processes. You can absorb content on YouTube channels like Mind the Product, Product school, Lenny’s Podcast, etc.

The early days of a product manager’s career are pretty much crucial. With the wrong environment and approach, a junior product manager can get stuck for a long period of time without understanding core product roles and functions. Junior product managers should prioritize learning product thinking over writing jira tickets only. While project management skills are valuable, they should not come at the expense of developing core product management capabilities.

If you are already stuck in the trap you can always course-correct. Ask better questions during interviews. Build something small or big on your own with code or no-code tools or with your developer friends if you can’t code. Do teardowns. Talk to customers, or potential users even if no one asks you to. Seek mentors who challenge your thinking and pull you into strategy. Read books. Watch and absorb a lot of product contents.

The real product work is messy, creative, and deeply user-focused. That’s where the magic is, and where you and I can grow into a true product leader. Don’t settle for a role that turns you into a task robot (you can, only if that is what you truly want).

Let us break the trap. Let us build the future.

Read more great career content on Mind the Product

• The product management crossroads: Skills to shape your product journey
• Breaking into product management: A practical guide for aspiring product professionals
• How to break into product management