First 90 Days as a Security Product Manager: Setting the Stage for Innovation and Protection

Day 1-30: Understanding the Security Ecosystem and Building Connections

1. Stakeholder Meetings & Relationship Building:
   • Meet key stakeholders across departments—engineering, IT, sales, compliance, and senior leadership—to understand how security fits into the broader organizational strategy.
   • Establish strong relationships with cross-functional teams and position yourself as the go-to person for security-related product development.
2. Understand Customer Needs and Industry Trends:
   • Review existing security products, customer feedback, and market research to understand what’s working and where improvements are needed.
   • Engage directly with customers to identify pain points in their current security posture and how your products can mitigate these vulnerabilities.
   • Stay up-to-date with emerging security threats and regulations like GDPR or HIPAA to ensure your solutions meet the latest standards.
3. Assess Existing Products and the Current Roadmap:
   • Dive into the existing product portfolio, focusing on strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for enhancement.
   • Review the product development lifecycle, paying attention to any gaps in security architecture, application security, or secure SDLC that could hinder innovation.
   • Map out ongoing projects, identifying quick wins or urgent areas for improvement.
4. Compliance and Risk Assessment:
   • Familiarize yourself with security frameworks (NIST, ISO 27001) and regulatory requirements that impact the development of security products.
   • Work closely with legal and compliance teams to ensure that all products align with necessary certifications and standards.

Day 31-60: Shaping Strategy and Prioritizing Security Initiatives

1. Craft the Product Vision & Set Goals:
   • Collaborate with leadership to craft a product vision that reflects both the company’s strategic objectives and the evolving threat landscape.
   • Set concrete, measurable goals for the next 6-12 months, ensuring they address current security gaps and customer needs.
2. Develop the Security Roadmap:
   • With input from R&D and engineering teams, identify the most critical security technologies—whether it’s advanced encryption, zero-trust architecture, or automation for threat detection—and outline a development roadmap.
   • Prioritize initiatives that deliver tangible security improvements, balancing short-term wins with long-term innovations.
3. Create a 90-Day Action Plan:
   • Identify a few high-impact security projects that can be kicked off or optimized within the first 90 days, focusing on quick value delivery.
   • Set clear milestones and ensure that each project adheres to strict security testing protocols.
4. Foster Collaboration Across Teams:
   • Build a cross-functional team, ensuring seamless communication between product, engineering, and IT security teams.
   • Align sales and marketing strategies with product development to ensure the security narrative resonates with customer needs.

Day 61-90: Executing and Driving Early Success

1. Refine Product Requirements and Security Features:
   • Finalize product requirements, emphasizing security-by-design principles and ensuring adherence to all relevant regulatory frameworks.
   • Implement feedback loops with customers and internal teams to continuously refine security features as the product evolves.
2. Vendor and Technology Alignment:
   • Assess key technology vendors or partners to ensure they meet the stringent security needs of your product and support long-term innovation.
   • Establish clear SLAs (Service Level Agreements) and compliance measures with all third-party vendors.
3. Early-Stage Testing and Validation:
   • Oversee the development of Minimum Viable Products (MVPs) or prototypes with rigorous security testing, including penetration testing and vulnerability assessments.
   • Gather early feedback from beta users or trusted customers to ensure the product meets real-world security requirements.
4. Begin Shaping the Go-to-Market Strategy:
   • Collaborate with the marketing and sales teams to build a go-to-market strategy, emphasizing how your product mitigates critical security risks.
   • Ensure that messaging aligns with key security certifications and frameworks, helping to instill trust in prospective customers.

By the end of the first 90 days, your goal is to have a well-defined security product strategy, built momentum across teams, and begun laying the groundwork for product delivery. Success in this period means setting the stage for secure, scalable solutions that adapt to the ever-changing threat landscape.

Marshal is a powerful and exclusive SaaS-enabled marketplace for Security, Resilience & Defence solutions that helps to scale Sales & Marketing, and Operations capability across conflict zones to cyberspace. By providing stakeholders with a cost-effective, single point of reference through which to organise and generate demand for diverse and niche products and services that protect lives, safeguard assets and defend business value, we help drive meaningful business connections, new opportunities and business growth.