My day is filled with meetings (roughly 80 - 90%). I help in coordinating between different teams to meet the business requirements and delivery schedule. As I work in a Consumer Electronics company, there is a hardware and a software component. I work as a software product launch TPM (Technical Program Manager). As you might have guessed it, there would be a hardware product launch TPM too.

A product has many features, and we usually decide on a small number of features (e.g. 10 features) which needs to be built to release the product. For those features, I identify which teams are required, and I coordinate with them. This coordination involves understanding the dependencies which exist and figuring out whether the product can be released on time. For example, the hardware needs to be finalised by the team before the software team starts to work on the product. I reach out to different teams to ensure nothing is blocking them from delivering the feature on time. There would also be weekly updates with executives about our current progress.

Once a product is feature complete (based on the requirement), and it is released to a small number of users. Users provide feedback, and they come up with cases where it doesn't work as expected. I prioritise the issues reported by users and communicate them to the engineering team. I also help to coordinate with the press release team where I write about the features of the product. At times we also educate the customer service team on how a particular product works as they will be the first point of contact with users.

I took Computer Science in my high school and really enjoyed Computer Science, and I felt it was a logical and analytical and I enjoyed mathematics. As I studied in CBSE, there weren't many options, so I ended up choosing a good college where I pursued Chemical Engineering. I did not have much exposure to what people do after graduation, and during that time, IT Consultancy was the most popular choice. On hindsight, I realised the stream (i.e. field of study) is important and I wish I had pursued Electronics and Communication Engineering or Computer Science.

After college, I wanted to stay in the Computer Science field, so I took a job in a consulting company. I learnt coding skills at work. I later knew I wanted to do a masters in business analytics. I focused on a specific field called Data Engineering. After that, I wanted to move to a new field which was TPM, and my background in Data Engineering helps a lot with my current work.

Broadly you would need two different skills (technical and soft skills). You would need a software background (i.e. be in a position to understand the software architecture and design). I need to work 1.5 to 2 times harder than people with Computer Science background as I would need time to research and figure out. In terms of soft skills, I think nobody is your friend or enemy. You need to be in a working relationship with your colleagues. You need to have a fine balance when working with people at all levels. Communication is an essential skill. My writing and speaking differ a lot. In some cases, you have to be concise and precise, and in other cases, you need to explain in detail.