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Happy New Year — I hope 2026 has started gently for you, and with a bit of space to breathe.

I spent the last couple of weeks in the redwoods with family — swinging through the treetops in the Santa Cruz redwoods, building a snow globe for my son, hiking with our awesome Siberian husky Piper, and taking time in nature to reflect on the year that was.

That pause brought a lot of perspective and gratitude, and also renewed my commitment to keep doing the work I care about most: helping product leaders build confidence, sharpen their skills, and increase their impact.

Through a year of deep work with PMs — across 3 PM Level-Up cohorts, 100+ hours of group and 1:1 coaching sessions, masterclasses & meetups, and countless conversations about growth, leadership, and career decisions — a few clear patterns are standing out as this year begins.

I’m incredibly grateful to my clients and to all of you for being part of this journey.

Here’s what I’m seeing…

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PM Hiring Trends for 2026

Here are some emerging patterns for 2026 for Product Managers & Leaders to watch out for:

1. Generalist PMs are back — especially in AI roles

The most in-demand PMs right now are not narrow specialists.

They’re product leaders who can:

• Show solid product thinking and judgement

• Frame the problem clearly

• Navigate ambiguity

• Translate AI capabilities into real user and business value

In AI-driven teams, problems are rarely clean or well-defined. The PMs who succeed are the ones who can connect dots across product, data, design, engineering, and business — not just own a single slice.

👉 AI PM roles increasingly reward strategic generalists with strong product fundamentals, not just ML expertise.

What this means for you: You need to focus on not just knowing how to build a Gen AI Product - but learning how to articulate YOUR process of building it, from end-to-end! And know that you won’t succeed without solid product thinking skills.

2. PM roles are becoming more senior.

Teams are hiring fewer PMs, but expecting more from each one. The bar is higher: clearer judgment, stronger ownership, better decision-making, and more influence without authority.

What this means for you: Execution alone isn’t enough anymore. PMs are expected to operate with strategic clarity and leadership maturity much earlier in their careers.

3.’On-the-job’ PM skills and ‘interview skills’ overlap even more

I’ve always thought of these skills as intertwined, which is why I designed my PM Level-Up 8-week curriculum to work on both types of skills - together. In real life, the same gaps show up in both places — unclear product or success stories, difficulty explaining your impact, challenges influencing others, or second-guessing decisions.

What’s changing now is the market. Teams are leaner, expectations are higher, and PMs are being evaluated on judgment, clarity, and leadership.

What this means for you: PMs who work on these skills together — thinking clearly about their work, and communicating it well — tend to grow faster, show up with more confidence, and have an easier time navigating both promotions and interviews.

4.GenAI has made prototyping fast and cheap — and that’s a problem

It’s now easy to spin up impressive demos and early prototypes, which has raised executive expectations around speed. But shipping a real AI product still takes time — especially when it comes to validation, reliability, guardrails, and GTM.

I’m also seeing many PMs struggle with how to properly test AI models beyond a demo, especially around edge cases and failure modes.

What this means for you: PMs are increasingly expected to manage exec expectations, slow things down thoughtfully, and bring more rigor to testing.

Who’s hiring (job postings from my network)

New year, new job! 🔥 Yes, PM jobs are out there, and it might not be so hard to get an interview in Jan or Feb 2026. But - candidate supply in the market remains strong with fresh layoffs from several tech companies, and with all the economic uncertainty you still need a LOT of effort, and consistent Product thinking and interview practice for 6-8 weeks to get that offer!

I’ve curated a list of live roles from hiring managers & recruiters in my network.

• Lettuce (startup) – Hiring a Sr. Growth PM in Mountain View, CA → HM Post

• Renew Home – Hiring a Sr PM for Consumer experiences → HM Post

• Amazon – Hiring for Sr PM, FireTV in Seattle, SF & Sunnyvale→ HM Post

• Dropbox – Hiring for Sr Principal PM in both US & Canada → Linkedin Post

• Microsoft – Hiring for Principal PM, Cloud Security & AI → HM Post

• Microsoft – Hiring for Sr Group PM, Copilot Studio team→ HM Post

• Circle (Fintech) – Hiring a Principal PM, CX Platform in Chicago → Job Post

• Uber – Hiring a Group Product Manager for Uber Courier in NYC → HM Post

• Rocket Money (Fintech) – Hiring a Group PM in multiple US cities → HM Post

• Linkedin – Andrew C., Sr Director of PM, working on linkedin recruitment platform is hiring → HM Profile

• Adobe - Hiring a Sr PM for Data Platforms & Apps → HM Post

• Instacart - Hiring a Principal PM for Outbound Enterprise Platform → HM Post

  📍 More roles? Check out trueup.io/jobs.

Ready to take action on your 2026 goals?