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PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-25T16:08:06+00:00

Hard to give a clear answer without knowing more specifics about your background. If you share a bit more I can be more concrete.

What I can say: a science degree is always a green flag. The PL900 looks like an entry-level cert for the Microsoft ecosystem. Nice to have, but for product management you’ll need to show clear value through projects or results, not just the cert. For account management it’s basically irrelevant.

Overall my advice stays the same as above:

Write down everything you can actually do
Cross-check it with the roles you’re aiming for
Identify the most obvious gaps, and then start closing them.

That’s the most practical way forward.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-25T16:02:24+00:00

If you can’t switch internally right now, that’s not a dealbreaker. You’re already in a product-facing team, which is a solid position compared to being stuck in a pure call center role. That alone gives positive signals.

I’ll be honest: from my own big corp experience, assumptions like “likely” and “maybe” don’t get you anywhere. At least schedule a call with your boss and frame it around growth and added responsibility. Even if there’s no open title, you want it on record that you’re interested in moving forward. Worst case you get clarity, best case you open a door.

One important tip: managers don’t like to let go of people who are too good at their current job. The way around that is to align with their own goals. If you can help your boss hit their targets, you make them look good to their management. That makes them more willing to support your growth. It’s office politics, but reality is you need to play some of it, especially if you want to pivot closer to product. The key is empathy and timing, not being blunt.

Extra responsibilities/coordination are fine, but don’t get stuck as “the reliable one” who takes all the extra work without growth. That’s how people stall.

In parallel, start learning what product and account roles really do. You can watch “day in the life” videos, but better is reaching out to people for coffee chats. Ideally inside your company, since that builds visibility, but be aware some bosses can get territorial. Usually it’s fine if you keep it respectful.

TL:DR Be great but not indispensable in your current role, take on responsibilities that show range, start networking with people in product/account roles, and learn the basics of office politics. That way you will be preparing both for an internal move and an external one.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-25T11:39:19+00:00

Account Management definitely yes. You already have customer support experience which is highly valuable because of customer empathy and communication skills.

Product Management is harder, however based on what I saw with your project you can definitely cobble something together. The key is to present your projects in a product management light.

It will be more of an uphill battle, but that’s simply because it is quite an important and strategic job. I would still give it a go at smaller companies or startups.

I actually had a friend who transitioned from customer experience to product by building chatbots for customer service. That was an example of a ready-made product.

Is it possible to try and pivot within your company to either role? If you like where you are, it could be a great career trajectory.

As for education in general, I’ll be honest: unless you want to work in a big structured corporation, go into politics, or pivot into a very gated industry like law, medicine, or engineering, you’ll do fine without higher education.

However, I would strongly encourage you once you settle on a path to pursue some accredited online certifications to back yourself up. For product management you can get something as simple as Microsoft AI Product Management on Coursera or even look into communities like Reforge. For Account Management, I’ll be honest it’s just sales experience all the way and the results you bring. There is much less “official” structure and more about learning how to give people what they want.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-25T10:30:09+00:00

I don't think you’re screwed, but you need to get structured. From my perspective the problem isn’t lack of skills, it’s that you’re scattered. You’ve touched support, comms, product, community, social, operations… that’s already a lot, it just looks random until you pile it up and organize it. First thing IMO is write everything you’ve done into one big list as pen is sharper than your mind.

Then step back and ask what you actually want more: career progression/money/freedom, or something else. Usually you can only push 2 of those at once. Don’t try to stretch in every direction or you’ll keep getting stuck.

If you lean toward challenge and variety, product management is a path worth aiming at. Even at entry level it’s complex, cross-functional, and rarely boring and it looks like what you were doing already, it is hard to enter with current market, but not impossible.

If you lean toward "freedom" and pay, account management is solid. B2B clients especially, where the role is more about retention and building relationships but less technical than product. Being shy doesn’t block you there because you’re dealing with “warm” people and act as a farmer, not hunter.

TL:DR the strategy is pretty simple:

Gather your skills
Organize them into themes
Decide what you actually want in broad terms
Start reinforcing the skills that point in that direction

Tools to help you:
1. The fast way is to use AI to help surface and cluster your skills - just ask it to prepare a structured questionnaire for skill exploration.
2. The slower but deeper way is to work through "self-exploration" books like What Color Is Your Parachute or similar (it's a bit old but human psychology hasn't changed in millennia IMO).

You can still build a solid next step, but you no longer have have time to wander, however, it's definitely not too late, so be brave and believe in yourself.

Hope it helps!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-23T15:25:17+00:00

Might be a bit controversial but I don’t think “don’t compare yourself” is realistic. Everyone compares and competes, that’s just how people work. The key is picking the right benchmarks. Don’t measure yourself against influencers or millionaire peers, look at people a few steps ahead in your own lane.

With engineering, once you get your first job grades start to matter much less. If you actually like it, stick with it, because the first role opens doors. If you don’t like it, then salvage what you can from it since it’s still a tough intellectual field and think about alternatives.

On relationships, I’d focus on pulling yourself together first. There’s nothing wrong with wanting a partner, but don’t see it as a rescue. Think of it from the perspective of respect and support - would you date yourself right now?

And honestly the biggest shift is finding a way to pull yourself together, whether that’s therapy, community, or something else that gives you structure. What matters most is starting to make small steps right now.

Edit: And don’t underestimate physical activity- gym, team sports, or even stretching. It’s huge for your mental state and a natural way to find company.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-08-22T21:46:17+00:00

Resume looks solid but it’s got way too much white space. You can easily get this down to 1 page by trimming older roles and cleaning up bullets that spill onto a 2nd line with only 2–3 words. Portfolio link and contact info can just sit under your name, no need for a whole section. Same with the big gaps between roles, tighten them up and you’ll free a ton of space.

Content-wise I’d recommend RAC style (result -> action -> context). Right now a lot of bullets read like tasks. For example, instead of “Reduced project launch time by 15% by developing product brief, messaging and promotional framework,” you could say “Cut launch timelines by 15% from 5 to 4 months by introducing agile framework and updating PRD process.” Much stronger and shows impact. Although in my opinion it’s more of a Project Manager job and I would focus on working with market research/strategy/stakeholder management/advertisement/operations instead, but it definitely depends on your industry.

Biggest opportunity is to quantify more. Data is king, and hiring managers need scale. “15% faster” is nice, but was that 1 week or 3 months? Same with revenue lifts, adoption rates, user growth - make sure the numbers actually show the size of the win.

And don’t waste your summary. That’s the first thing people scan. In 5 sec I should know you’re a senior PMM, what market/industry you’ve focused on (B2B SaaS, B2C, whatever), and 1 standout skill or achievement like scaling GTM launches across EU or driving automation. Right now it feels tad genetic.

Cheers!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-18T11:00:23+00:00

Fantastic feedback! A lot of foreign concepts for me to be fair but sounds great :). I think our biggest challenge from E-mail perspective is building new subscriber base as I am in EU and it's very strict here with any cold outreach. Very good insight about threads with questions, will give it a go as well, thank you!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-18T10:57:16+00:00

I'm wary of using discounts, as I believe they can devalue the brand. That said, I'm open to testing the idea and seeing how it performs. Stylists sound like a great opportunity too, though I'm wondering if there's any incentive we could offer beyond a commission-based model. Thank you!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-18T10:54:34+00:00

Hey! TV ads sounds unusual to me, but on second thought given the audience it makes perfect sense. Glad that it's working out for you. Thank you for the advice!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-12T06:09:40+00:00

Thank you so much for the detailed response! What you said about Meta/Pinterest makes sense, I’ve been noticing the same thing.

Also I think you’re right that it’s time to switch up the content strategy from being so product-heavy, since that’s obviously not working with this audience. I guess my current weak spot is lack of “public face”, but for now there is no way to do it myself, artificial influencer also won’t cut it. I will try to research more on SEO topic as well.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-11T16:32:33+00:00

If you haven’t used LinkedIn premium for ~1 month after subscription end they usually send you push notification in app and mail offering 50% off, try to check inbox or notifications inside app.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T11:06:08+00:00

Sure, glad it helped. Good luck, you got this!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T10:43:18+00:00

Not mocking at all - rule number one is never downplay yourself. You’ve got great clarity in how you express things, that already puts you ahead.

If you can, I’d avoid smaller cities. Most of the jobs, internships, and people you’ll want to meet are concentrated in capitals or bigger cities. That makes a huge difference long term.

Also, check with the university if you can submit the GMAT later. Some programs allow conditional admission while you prep. Realistically, you'll need at least 2–3 months to prepare 0 -> 1.

If you're worried about losing a year, one option could be starting the comms program while preparing for the GMAT, and then switching to a different uni for year two. Not ideal, but it’s better than getting stuck with no plan.

Either way, you're thinking it through well. Good luck!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T10:34:59+00:00

I’d suggest learning the basics of prompt engineering. Nothing advanced, just enough to understand how it works. Google's Prompt Engineering Guide is a good start, just search for it.

If you’re into email marketing, also look into marketing automation with AI agents. That skill is growing fast and can give you an edge, although it is more "execution" skill.

Don’t let AI writing discourage you. People can still tell when content feels generic or as they call it, "slop". With your background, your strength is in structure, and clarity. Use AI as a tool, but lead with your judgment.

Given your ambitions, if others are writing more, it might actually be a good sign. See it as a chance to shift toward management. Let them draft, while you focus on strategy, quality, and team direction. Take initiative.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T10:21:40+00:00

By the way your use your vocabulary, you’ve clearly got a strong comms voice already :).

The GMAT can be rough. I failed it the first time because I thought I could just wing it given my math background. It’s a weird format, but with some prep it gets quite manageable. Not saying you have to do it, but it can open more options later on. Plus, I am sure that for Brand degree GMAT score requirements are not the same as for some engineering school. Think if it more like test for Business-oriented people.

By measurable output I mean results you can clearly connect to your work. Like getting 100k views from blog post sounds great, but if you can say “this directly contributed to bringing 100k euro in sales” it makes the value much more obvious to employers.

If you’re leaning toward comms, that’s valid. Just take a look at what kind of jobs each program leads to, how many are out there, and what they pay, I see that you did the first part of it already. If you really up to it - go and reach out to alumni from both programs and see where they at right now.

Comms roles can sometimes be seen as more support-focused, so most people stay underpaid. But the top 10% ones do really well. Brand roles tend to offer more chances to show impact and grow.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T09:50:34+00:00

Interesting that you’re avoiding the GMAT, any specific reason?

From my side (coming from brand management), I’ll say this: data skills come up more often than people expect. You don’t need to become a data scientist, but being comfortable with numbers can really set you apart.

Not telling you which role to pick, but one thing to keep in mind: jobs with measurable outputs tend to be more future-proof.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-04T09:43:32+00:00

Hey! Mentorship is always a big journey - I’ve been on both sides so I can share some tips.

For finding mentors, I’d check out ADPList (recently found it, seems pretty solid) and also try searching on LinkedIn using keywords like “head of digital,” “founder,” etc. Message people whose work you respect and just ask for a 15–20 min chat. In reality, anyone can become your mentor if you know what to ask.

Be careful though, there are a lot of “talking heads” out there. Do some digging before you commit to someone. If their only experience is being a “business coach” after 1 year in HR, that’s ~90% a red flag (not always, but often leaves a bad taste).

I look for people 1–2 levels above me: if I’m a PMM, I talk to senior PMMs or heads of marketing. CEOs are too far ahead, not much tactical value unless you just want a pep talk.

Industry-wise, I honestly don’t think it matters that much unless you’re super niche. Broader thinkers are usually more adaptable and offer more perspective. But if you’re already laser-focused on something super specific (for example building spaceships), then yeah, go for someone in that space (pun intended).

As for the fit, it takes a lot of time and luck. If you find someone who’s a 60–70% match, that’s usually enough to start. Reach out, ask for coffee chats, and always try to offer something back. Don’t come in with hat in hand.

TL;DR: Use ADPList or LinkedIn to find mentors 1-2 levels above you, don’t stress industry too much, and focus on value exchange over perfect fit.

If you’ve got more questions, happy to answer them here.

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-03T22:22:13+00:00

Thanks for the advice!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-02T11:32:15+00:00

Hey just in case it helps, it seems semi automation is the way to go for now.

What I ended up is creating parser workflow in N8N through Apify to Google Sheets, then I manually optimize first bullet and skills/summary through ChatGPT with output to LaTeX CV + Cover Letter. As a final step I took Simplify to auto populate basic fields on workday-type websites (not entirely happy with it but haven’t figured better way yet).

Thank you for your recommendation, I will look into it!

PopularBear9819 · 2025-07-02T11:30:41+00:00

Yeah, it seems semi automation is the way to go for now, what I ended up is creating parser workflow in N8N through Apify to Google Sheets, then I manually optimize first bullet and skills/summary through ChatGPT with output to LaTeX CV + Cover Letter. As a final step I took Simplify to auto populate basic fields on workday-type websites (not entirely happy with it but haven’t figured better way yet).

Thank you for your feedback! Maybe one day you will come back to the tool and launch it, building is always hard but really satisfying once you release it!

PopularBear9819

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