Product Management Isn’t Dead and It’s Not AI That’s Going To Kill It

But where’s the humanity!? Oh, it’s still there, and it needs to be.

Product management is a deeply human craft. It requires empathy, vision, influence without authority, and nuanced decision-making. These are all things that AI, and specifically LLMs, are terrible at.

I want to get two things out of the way before we continue:

1. I use generative AI on a daily basis and find it an indispensable tool for getting “stuff” done.
2. I realise that it will be very ironic if I’m wrong about all of this stuff and you’re reading this 6 months from now from the comfort of your Matrix-style human mulching cylinder.

Let’s get into it.

There’s been a lot of chatter recently about the rise of generative AI, and the impact it’s going to have on everyone’s jobs:

• We don’t need developers anymore because LLMs can write code for us!
• We don’t need designers anymore because LLMs and diffusion models can make wireframes for us!
• We don’t need product managers anymore because LLMs can write our requirements and even our strategies for us!