How I use Notion as a Product Manager
I am a product analyst. If you’re familiar with the job, you’d know as much as it requires brainstorming, it also requires endless documentation. One has to make product requirement documents weekly, take note of minutes of the meeting, look after the tasks and manage teams. Now there are lots of different softwares that people use for each. You can use slack for communication, JIRA for task management, Confluence for documentation but what if there was a way you can collaborate with your team and have ALL of it in just one place.
That is exactly what Notion does. It is a one place stop for teams where your can not only do sprint management but also integrate lots of external software too. It is a place for you to manage all your documentations and have a place where no data can get lost.
Let me share how I use Notion’s features to make my life easier, from capturing ideas and planning roadmaps to collaborating with stakeholders and tracking project progress.
In this dashboard I have everything I need; that includes
- Team dashboard which has an overview of OKRs and Kanban task board
- PRDs where you can also have a repository to story all your previous documents too
- Problems, Ideas and Opportunities dashboard where we brainstorm about roadmaps
- Meetings where we document the MoMs and also create tasks post the meetings
- Team Documentation is usually to store miscellaneous documents or resources that we go back to on frequent basis
- OKRs is the in depth look of the metrics
- Backlogs is for the backlogs tasks
- Experiments is the page where we document the product experiments we are running along with the results for the same.
- Tickets is one of the most important page and the most used page too. Here we have the employee/person vise task view which includes all meeting tasks, sprint tasks and kanban tasks.
I have also integrated my JIRA dashboard here so that every time a new JIRA is created, it will automatically show up in my Notion board too.
- Team Dashboard
Here is the snippet of the kanban board. You can create tasks, assign it to people and have as many properties as you like for effective management - Problems, Ideas and Opportunities
It is a well known concept on product where you brainstorm about your potential problems, ideas and upcoming opportunities to better build your product. Here I document ideas so that when we actually sit for product review, we have points to look after.
3. Meetings
Here we document our MoMs and post meeting notes.
We have team vise MoMs which can also be stored to check history. Then based on the meetings we can also create tasks so that the meeting ends with delegated post actions
4. Sprint Details
Since we have JIRA tasks, meeting tasks, sprint tasks and also kanban tasks; it does become tiresome to keep a track of all. So there is a separate page where you can have accumulated tasks of all the people and keep a track.
Lastly, there is a sprint management for product roadmapping and also sprint task allocation for the same. Product roadmaps are the compass that guides the entire product development journey. Notion’s customizable templates and visual boards empower product managers to create intuitive roadmaps with ease.
Product management is a team sport, requiring seamless collaboration and communication. With the ability to assign tasks, set reminders, and track progress. Notion keeps teams synchronized and accountable. By bridging the gap between product managers, designers, developers, and stakeholders, Notion becomes a catalyst for cross-functional collaboration and alignment.
In the world of product management, mastering information organisation and collaboration is key. By capturing ideas, planning roadmaps, fostering collaboration, and tracking progress, Notion becomes an indispensable tool for product managers seeking to optimise their productivity and drive successful product outcomes. Embrace the power of Notion and unlock a world of possibilities, simplifying the complex and transforming the way you manage products.
