One of the biggest issues in working out of India for a US based company is late night and early morning meetings. Really … India is as far as you can travel from the US without traveling back.
So either you are up early or you are working through your evening 8:30PM-11:30PM trying to sort through issues with the US counterparts. These meetings are essential for the project and for your professional growth. As a Product Manager, you should be seen as the face of the product and hence you need be make yourself available for all roadmap review meetings etc with the business unit heads as needed.
In my many years of working with the US company, I’ve been able to manage my work life balance by using the following guiding principles:
- Give up one night a week for meetings instead of short spans of time on every other night
- Consolidate meetings back to back on this night
- Don’t be shy to ask the US team for an evening meeting
- Skew evening meetings based on where most attendees are so that you can maximise attendance
- Say no to any unnecessary or agenda less meetings
Its a well known fact that issue resolution and relationship building is faster over the phone, in person that over email. Changes are high that if you stick to working via email you will not receive information via informal channels in the organisation. These channels are always faster than the formal ones.