Jason Knight wrote about a fascinating disconnect between how B2B product leaders rate themselves and how their teams see them. The data from his survey is striking:
Across the board, B2B Product Leaders think they’re doing pretty well in all of these areas, but B2B IC PMs are not convinced. The difference is stark, and they can’t both be right.
The survey measured six core responsibilities—setting strategy, aligning teams, enabling prioritization, fostering ownership, removing blockers, and investing in people. In every category, leaders rated themselves significantly higher than their ICs rated them. Jason offers three possible explanations: leaders are doing poorly and don’t know it, leaders are doing well but not communicating it, or ICs have unreasonable expectations. He concludes:
Product Leaders need to do a much better job of setting expectations within their teams and communicating with them openly and well. IC Product Managers need to do a much better job of understanding the constraints of their business context and, indeed, the business they work for.
I keep coming back to the iceberg effect he mentions—where only some of the work someone does is visible. This cuts both ways. Leaders underestimate how opaque their work is to their teams, and ICs underestimate the constraints leaders are working within. The gap isn’t just about performance; it’s about mutual understanding.