To Be A Product Manager | Week 35

01-29

This journal helps me improve 1% every day…

Welcome to Week 35 of

To Be A Product Manager

Welcome to October! This week is my first working week of the month, because we were having National Holidays for a week, and I went to Japan traveling alone.

The trip is worthwhile and I love Japan, which also gives me enough motivation to move here in the future. In the meantime, I travel by using couchsurfing. It』s similar idea like Airbnb, but you don』t have to pay. Because people on this platform love sharing, traveling and making friends around the world.

Tips: Don』t ever consider this place as free hotels. As a host myself, I can tell who you are within 3 seconds after I open your request.

And because people on this platform are the ones who don』t follow the traditional mindsets and values, I see more possibilities for my life.

Why buying a small apartment and put yourself in debt, when you are able to rent a big house and live a great life for the next couples years?
Why preparing to settle down once you finish college and find a job, your life could be so much more meaningful?
Why not moving to different countries every 2–3 years, challenging yourself to learn new languages and cultures, when you are still young and have the ability to do that?

The last one is also my current life mission, at least for the next 10 years. If I do it right, when I』m about to turn 35, I』m familiar with most popular cultures and languages in this planet, and have a huge relationship network of the globe. And all of this are also the fundamentals for starting your own business.

You cannot be rush, young people need patience the most.

And I think the reasons I love Japan are:

1. Obey

People in Japan follow the rules and order, they are always wait in line, even put their trash bag in the line waiting for trash truck to pick up.

2. Clean

You won』t be able to see any trash bin on the street, it』s same with Korea. People put the trash in their pocket, and wait until you are in a restaurant or at home to throw them out.

So you cannot see any trash on the street.

3. Quietness

The weirdest thing I noticed is even when I was on a commercial or business area, once I made a turn to another road, it could get super quiet. And nobody even talk on bus or subway, they are either reading, or playing games on their cellphone.

So I decide to move to Japan before 2020. It might not be a good choice on technology side, Shenzhen is literally the best place to be in this world. But I can see myself developing games in the next couple years before VR/AR or even AR or blockchain technology get more mature.

You may understand the feeling of living in a world where you are the only one who follow the rules, it』s not a good experience and will waste you plenty of time and energy.

2-year experience in Japan can really help me develop a great and healthy lifestyle, and also enjoy the quietness inside my heart and focus on what I really want to do next.

What I accomplish

demo app updates and planning
website PRD
CMS test and planning

What I』m pondering

Coming to 10th month of being a product manager, I started doing some research for business opportunity and meetings. It』s also a chance for me to learn how to gather all the information online and make them meaningful for the story you are going to tell the potential business partners.

I can also see myself taking more and more responsibilities for every product line, which unleash my mentor and product director to go out and have business meetings.

In the past couple weeks, I also received some job invitations from other company, I appreciate their trust in me but I don』t think it is the time. Now I』m still learning every day and try to build a great product from scratch, so that I will be able to understand the every aspect of this industry, how a startup really works and things I can get rid of when I start mine.

I don』t have much interests in the product we are building as I used to, but I still enjoy the process of making it. Because it』s like my own kid, I have to see it turn 18 before saying goodbye.

My name is Zake Zhang, a VR product manager based in Shenzhen, China. I write weekly product journal and reflection.

Thanks for reading and let』s keep on hacking!

Warm Regards,

Zake

be so good they can』t ignore you.