What's it like to be a PM in VSD
At long last, I am starting to blog. I chose not to be the
one left out J It is nice to be part of the
blogger family in VSD.
I work as a Program Manager (PM) for the Visual Studio for
Devices (VSD) Team in Redmond.
This is the team that Paramesh wrote about in his July 26th blog. Since
he said “More about Program Managers later,” I think this is a good
note for me to start on. Being a PM in this [VSD] team is one of the coolest
things I have done since I graduated with a Ph.D. (yes, graduate school was
cooler, but then how long…). So, why a Ph.D., you ask! That’s also exactly
what Paramesh asked me in my interview. I think I gave him a convincing answer
(which I now don’t remember), and that is why he hired me. Anyway, the
truth is that I am here now – so I better tell you what I am doing. PMs
in our group primarily manage all the cross-group relationships and talking
with customers [developers] in the various forums. This is how we gather what
pains people are experiencing with our product and work on how to address them.
Over the last few weeks, we have been feverishly working on
the next version of Visual Studio. Our team already gave people some of the
Koolaid about this to developers at PDC 2005. Now, we are working with device MVPs,
understanding their views on “what sucks” in VS and why. I am also
having a ball working with our partners in Windows Mobile and in .netCF. This
is the absolutely coolest part of this job – being right in the middle of
this wave where everyone around is talking about devices, and actually playing
a part in making it all happen for them.
Stay tuned, for more from me on the “actual”
insides of what we’ll be doing with VS in the months to come.
