Attending a conference is one of the best ways to become a more successful and influential product management leader. It can also help bust that midyear burnout slump.
You’ll have to wait until 2023 for some of our favorite product conferences, like Leading the Product, Women in Product, and Gartner Tech Growth & Innovation, but not to worry, some of the year’s best events are still to come. So get ready to talk shop, gain fresh perspectives, get the inside track from the leaders you look up to, and bring a new sense of inspiration and motivation back to your work.
Here are Five of the Best Product Conferences You Can Still Attend in 2022:
1. Industry: The Product Conference
October 18, 2002, Virtual | Global September 19-21 2022 Cleveland, OH
Industry is organized by The Product Collective, an organization that launched its first event in 2015 to bring product managers together and answer the big question no one likes to ask out loud, “am I doing this right?”
Industry has two upcoming events – Industry Virtual and Industry Global. Moreover, the virtual conference is a one-day event that boasts five hours of keynotes, along with interactive Q&As, roundtable discussions, and an exclusive podcast. They expect over 2,000 attendees with whom you’ll be able to connect with via a virtual networking feature. There’s also a virtual expo hall where you can visit booths, ask questions, and see demos. It’s a pretty good deal for $99.
Industry Global promises to be a gathering of the world’s best product managers. In past years, speakers have come from companies like Uber, Square, and Google, while some of this year’s highlighted speakers include David Cancel, CEO of Drift, Michelle Parsons, Chief Product Officer at Hinge, and Tiffany Dockery, Director of Product Management at Etsy.
You also have the option of attending a four-hour workshop with the purchase of a Plus or Superpass ticket. These workshops are interactive deep dives on pressing topics like:
- How to craft a powerful product vision and strategy
- Creating a culture of candid feedback
- How to transition to product leadership
2. SaaStr Annual
September 13-15, 2022 San Francisco Bay area, CA
SaaStr Annual comes from the folks behind the popular SaaStr blog which has been around for a decade. It is billed as the number one cloud gathering for founders, VCs, and executives in the SaaS space, with the goal of scaling your business from $0 to $100 million ARR.
SaaStr offers hundreds of tactical sessions, networking and mentoring meetings, and unique to this event, the opportunity to get matched with and pitch VCs. The conference has numerous product management focused sessions to keep you busy for three days, and you’ll be learning from top CEOs and founders from companies like Mailchimp, Grammerly, Airtable and more. Plus, it’s supposed to be a great time, with parties and happy hours where you can let your hair down after a long day of learning.
3. Chief Product Officer Summit
September 07, 2022 San Francisco, CA
This is the event for product leaders who would benefit from exclusive leadership-focused content and networking. The Chief Product Officer Summit attracts over 1,000 attendees who are mostly director level and above. This event will showcase 150 speakers from today’s most recognizable companies and exciting startups – think Amplitude, Google, Meta, Peek, Twitter, and Uber to name a few.
Whether you’re coming from a startup or enterprise organization, this event provides content designed specifically for product leaders. Sessions are organized around leadership topics like:
- Measuring success
- Mastering product vision and strategy
- Machine learning, AI and other trends
- Hiring and team building best practices
4. ProductCon
September 08, 2022 London | November exact date TBD New York
Organized by Product School, ProductCon is a major product management conference with an online event and in-person events around the world. While the San Francisco and online editions have passed, there’s still the London and New York conferences which promise to be inspirational events where you’ll hear from VPs and CPOs from the industry pioneers like Netflix, Amazon and Shopify.
Scrolling through the agenda on the ProductCon’s website, each topic sounds like a can’t miss session. Here’s a peek at a few topics that feel especially relevant today: Customer Centricity in an Increasingly Remote World, Psychological Safety to Build Great Products, and Product Leadership in an Uncertain Economy.
5. Pulse
August 17-18, San Francisco, CA
Put on by Gainsight, this event once catered solely to customer success professionals but has since expanded to include product management, which we think is a match made in heaven. With one of the Pulse taglines being “Don’t miss the greatest party you’ll ever expense,” it looks like a lively community where you’re sure to have a good time.
According to the website, Pulse is for any Product led growth professionals looking to uplevel their career. There are over a dozen product-specific sessions on topics like:
- The Future of product management
- Crafting game-changing product experiences
- Approaching product with a growth mindset
- Building a data-driven product org for scalable growth
Unlike the other product management events, Pulse allows you to connect with customer success and community management professionals. These product professionals can provide a unique perspective and get you thinking about the customer journey.
Finish 2022 Strong
Maybe it’s time to invest in your career development. Maybe you’re up against a problem you haven’t been able to solve. Or maybe you just need to step away from the day-to-day grind. If this sounds like you, it’s time to unplug, turn on your out-of-office autoresponder, and get to an event. Any of these conferences will help you recharge and get back to work with more energy and ideas you’re excited to try out.
