Environmentally Aware Product Management
Since the product manager “owns” the product, especially ensuring that the product meets the expectation of all stakeholders, it is essential that product management leads the way with respect to ensuring that any product being developed is environmentally friendly and is part of a sustainable overall model.
Recent regulatory changes – within the last 5 years – which are designed to force manufacturers to be accountable for implementing basic environmentally responsible behaviors (RoHS, WEEE etc.) are decades overdue. Unfortunately the implementation of some of these directives are “knee jerk” and their actual effectiveness remains to be proven out. Government regulation should only be the last resort – it is up to responsible designers and marketers to think ahead. We need to integrate a set of best-practices for product management which takes into account the real cost of end-of-life of a product and which looks at not only the whole product, but the whole product life cycle.