It feels like every week there’s a new AI tool that can write user stories, summarize user interviews, or even draft a PRD. This is leading to a quiet but critical question in our field: is AI making core product management skills obsolete?
My take: Absolutely not. It’s making the truly human skills more valuable than ever.
AI is rapidly commoditizing the tactical grunt work. The ‘what’ is becoming easier to generate. But this is forcing a shift in focus to the things AI can’t replicate: deep strategic thinking, setting a compelling vision, and genuine customer empathy. AI can tell you that 80% of users drop off at a certain point, but it can’t feel the user’s frustration or make the nuanced judgment call on whether to fix it, rebuild it, or kill the feature entirely.
We’re moving from “Product Managers” to “Product Leaders.” The value we provide is shifting from being the master of the backlog to being the master of the ‘why.’ It’s about navigating ambiguity and building consensus, not just managing tickets. We need to leverage tools that give us deep qualitative insights, like the user feedback analysis from platforms like https://leera.io, and then apply our uniquely human intuition to that data.
This isn’t a threat; it’s an evolution.
What ‘un-automatable’ PM skills do you believe will be the most critical for success in the next five years?