How I created the product manager role at AQUALEX

The situation

Six product launches in four years. Showrooms that had to be adapted, information sessions for architects, technicians and sales, launch campaigns, pricing. In a fast-growing scale-up this work is done by the people with another job: marketeers, sales directors, R&D engineers. Until it becomes too much.

The products that were ready deserved a more professional and better founded launch. At the same time, the market had to become an input for new innovations.

The role

I worked out the product manager role: what it involves, which responsibilities belong to it and where it touches the rest of the organisation. At the front end, helping decide which products R&D develops and which it does not. At the back end, the market launch, the pricing and training the sales team on new products.

Having both ends in the same role is the core of the design. What the product manager picks up in the market during a launch is what R&D needs to choose the next one.

How the trajectory ran

From 2021 to 2025 I held the CMO role at AQUALEX. Mapping out and filling the product manager role was one part of that.

For filling the role we looked internally. A sales employee with an interest in the role took it on, someone who knew the company, understood the products and could handle the step to a new responsibility. I guided the transition.

The result

The product manager carries the role independently, from product strategy through to launch.