As a PM, who is your most favorite team to work with and why?

I work with designers, marketers, salespeople, data scientists, and engineers on a daily basis. I love working with all cross-functional teams because everybody has such a different and diverse way of thinking that challenges me to think better. But I would have to say engineering is my favorite team to work with for three reasons.

1. We solve problems differently (I come from a non-techncial background). So while we may be oriented towards the same problem, we often have very different solutions in mind. Debating and discussing always yields a more powerful solution than what I would have thought of on my own.

2. We think about how to adopt new technologies. Whether it's a new way to handle data or a new mobile OS update, applying an innovation to our business is exciting and satisfying.

3. We challenge assumptions. In my experience the best engineering teams are the ones that can break down a problem into the smallest principles to truly understand and define requirements. This challenges my way of thinking very well, especially when my personal biases can get in the way of thinking objectively about an assumption.

I assume by team you mean:  Software development, UX/UI, Design, Tech Support, Marketing, etc. ,right?

YES

 

That is such a tough question. I've worked in all of those. And I often see how one team might not understand something  from another team or could benefit from help from another team. So the inter-team is the most interesting to me.

BUT... if I had to pick one I'd pick the UX Design team because it tends to have a huge affect at least in terms of defining the problem and how we might solve it. I've also found UX designers to be very collaborative.

A simple way to answer this behavioral question:

As a PM, I really like to work with Design Team. This is because :-

1. Design team is the 'closest' to the actual users and their primary stake-holder in most of the cases are just actual users. So working with them is the next best thing to working with actual users.
2. They are creative and unconstrained. Unlike PMs and Engineers who are constrained by tech architecture, timelines etc ect, designers can go all out and offer amazing experiences to the user. It's worth working them to develop unconstrained view of things.
3. From learning perspective as well, working with designers help you understand human psychology, do creative thinking, be eccentic about things. All of these things make me learn new things as well as help me grow as a PM.