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This question is about principal product manager.
What is the difference between a principal product manager and a senior product manager?
The difference between a principal product manager and a senior product manager comes down to the span of responsibility, depth of experience, and the mix of product planning and product owner responsibilities.
A principal product manager (PPM) is a senior product manager who doesn't have any people-management responsibilities. Instead, they work as the most significant individual contributors to move the needle for the product management team and the company as a whole.
Both senior and principal are primarily individual contributor roles, and each has a unique ratio of the product owner to product planning responsibilities. A senior product manager, for example, has a mix of 60% product owner and 40% product planner responsibilities.
A principal product manager, on the other hand, has a mix of 40% product owner and 60% product planner responsibilities.
It takes around eight years of product management experience to be considered for a senior position. Conversely, it takes ten or more years to be eligible for a principal product manager role. As such, the pay between the two positions is also different, with principal product managers earning $157,183 a year and senior product managers earning $145,208 a year.
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